Junker bars and Klunkpacker forks – things are going backwards!! or…. what if St. Thomas had lived?

April 2019.

Two things to talk about in this little ditty. First off, the steel Speedball now has a new fork option and a cheaper pricepoint. The Klunkpacker fork is a really delicious bi-plane affair, hand brazed by my friends in Taiwan. Its an alternative to the truss fork and in truth, I think it suits the Speedball perfectly. Its impossible to do the right thing sometimes, but a lot of people are put off the truss by the complexity of the headset arrangement and the harsh ride, so to please those folks (and myself) I’ve made these available. The ride is a lot more compliant and we also have triple cage mounts on the legs for bikepacking or water/wine carrying duties. I’m wholeheartedly in love with these forks, they do great things to the bike on a lot of levels.

Next up is the new Stooge Junker bar. This is my take on the classic Klunker handlebar, which in reality is almost impossible to buy off the shelf, and the few options that are sporadically available don’t really cut it. Its going to be available in two rises – 70 and 85mm – and will certainly be a premier finishing touch for the MK4 framesets. The idea is that taller riders will use the 85, and those below 5’10 will use the 70, but we’ll see how that pans out.

Junker bars should be with us early summer, but if you’re quick I have a couple of 70s available in the shop right now. I’ve been running a set of 85s on the Speedball and although I may be biased, they really are the perfect handlebar for this bike. The sweep and width is spot on, they’ve turned a big chunky bike into something that feels like it’ll outrun a boulder on a very steep slope and do a snazzy skid at the bottom before jumping over a car, one handed, with a beer.