Author Archives: Justin Fox

Just a before and after of a stock 2026 Specialized Chisel FS 29er in size small vs. my bike with 27.5″ wheels front and back, 140mm fork and angleset.

OEM headset was 88g + 5g of spacers (this headset has a higher stack so I no longer need to run spacers).

I used a piece of string tied to the seatpost to eye and mark where centre was to align the cups.

Rode Loftus with Eugene yesterday. Was good to get Eugene’s opinion on the build as he’s ridden my other bikes and always found 29ers to feel too big.

He loved the Chisel. In his words it was crazy light, wants to get airborne off everything. Super efficient. Climbed like a goat.

I think we both agree that 27.5″ feels more like a spiritual successor to 26″, and a lot more like 26″ than 29″

All that said I came home to a package from Great Britain. A Works Components Angled Headset which slackens (or steepens!) the head tube angle by 1°.

I thought about not installing it as I’m happy with how the bike rides as is, but it’s here now, and hey I’m all for experimentation so I got it on.

The Chisel now has a 65° HTA (67° stock with 29er wheelset), 75.7° STA (+0.2°), -1.5mm reach, +10.9mm wheelbase and -1.8mm BB Height.

I doubt I’ll feel a radical difference, and if there is a difference I’m sure I’ll adapt to it pretty quickly.

The only changes I made were a long 80mm stem.

Was a bit muddy out there.

Fit wise it felt AOK! Suspension wise the bike was a lot more squishy than my Chisel. Bit bobby up tech stuff too. Surprisingly I got no PR’s at all.

I rode the Epic yesterday, today I took my Chisel out for a back to back comparo.

Lots of PR’s!

Put 40mm risers bars on and yup. It’s pretty much a trail bike now, albeit a really light and poppy one! Comparing Strava data to yesterday’s ride on the same loop with Gina’s 29er Epic EVO I was more than 2km/hr average faster on the Chisel with the smaller 27.5″ wheels. What’s interesting is that I got 4 PR’s (got none yesterday on the Epic), of note a PR on the 3 minute Kirrawee Burning Legs Climb.

I think the data (I have a lot of it now) is confirming that I just don’t make enough power to make the most out of bigger 29″ wheels and I especially struggle to crank the bigger wheels (and weight as my Starling Murmur is almost 5kg heavier than my Chisel and the Epic is 2kg heavier) up tech features vs. shifting my body weight to more easily shove the Chisel up the technical stuff with the smaller wheels.

I hate the matchy matchy grips to pedals that most people do to their bikes, but the orange fork on this pink bike is doing my head in so I’m trying everything (in this case some matchy grips and heavy alloy bars). Functionally the bike is awesome, but visually I think it looks like balls. Keen to try some higher riser bars though, could be even more fun!

All this rain has got me going bat shit crazy, but the sun was up so I just had to ride. I went out to Loftus to see how the Chisel would go on Holy Trail. Sadly the trail was pretty damn wet, rocks and roots were slippery AF on these XC tyres and one part of it was 1ft deep. Confidence to do some of the more rocky techy stuff kinda went out the window, but happy to have cleared at least some of the janky features on this trail.

By the end of the ride I was just so happy with the bike.

My cousin Adam was with me, he just bought a second hand Polygon Siskiu T8 so it was awesome to swap bikes throughout the day. He commented that my Chisel felt like riding a road bike haha, and yeah for sure his Polygon felt much more planted and confidence inspiring, mainly because of the higher and wider bars + slacker front end, but the Chisel feels so much lighter, it climbs SO good and accelerates so much faster. Over the janky tech stuff I can actually control, lift and push the bike around so much more, something that I don’t even bother to do on my Amflow e-MTB or Starling Murmur (which is more a case of just commit and plough over shit).

I did get hung up on a rooty section where the front wheel got caught up and shot the rear wheel up in the air. Wouldn’t have happened on a 29er or mullet setup, but that was just one bit of the trail so I think I’ll stick with the smaller wheels front and back.

It’s a confused build for sure. If I put the fat plus sized tyres back on it would have been way better on Holy Trail, but I didn’t build the bike for trails like this! That said, it’s a capable bike and clearing some of the more janky features on it felt so much more rewarding than clearing them on the Amflow.

I think overall the bike has well and truly done what I hoped it would do; and that’s to forever replace a hardtail.