Cotic launch new Escapade road frame + video

Sheffield based Cotic have a very loyal following in the mountainbike world for their steel framed off-road bikes and owner Cy Turner has recently co-founded Bicycle Manufacturing Limited to produce bicycle frames and parts right here in the UK. Whilst on the tarmac side of things they also have a lot of love for their versatile and commuter friendly Roadrat and not-just-for racing >X< cyclo-cross bike.

Cotic have just issued this video, which they filmed to try and get across what the Escapade means to them, which is a "going to work bike, your going to the shops bike, your getting away from it all bike," a bike that does everything really.

The new Escapade is the progression from those last two Cotic bikes, it’s a road bike in the broadest sense of the word with drop bars, disc brakes, massive tyre clearance and few limitations.

The frame is made from custom butted Cotic Fe cromoly steel with an Ovalform top tube and the 35mm down tube carried over from the >X< to keep the frame solid when loaded up or grunting a singlespeed gear.

On that frame there’s a mount for just about everything; racks, mudguards, twin bottle mounts and the discs, so it can take you to work, to the shops, on holiday, up onto the hills, on adventures, or just off to that quiet place.

The resourceful Dogsbody2 dropouts come from the Roadrat with a solid non-replaceable rear-mech hanger and a chainstay placed disc mount. The design means you can run the bike with gears, as a single-speed, with a hub gear or even fixed, whatever takes your fancy.

There’s huge tyre clearance in the Escapade frame for whatever 700c wheels you might want to put in there, or even 29” MTB ones. The frame will take up to a 46C cyclo-cross tyre or a 1.8” MTB tyre, so go small and fast for road or big and floaty for green lanes, mucking about off-road or even a go at that on-trend gravel racing. The Escapade has the exciting map investigating potential to cover a wide range of ground, as the name advocates. Likewise the 68mm threaded BB shell is as accommodating with clearance for pretty much any chainset you’d like to slip in there; road standard or compact, double, triple or single ring all are good on the Escapade. Only super narrow track setups won't fit.

Committing to the ongoing movement towards disc braked drop-bar frames isn’t the only news from Cotic on the Escapade, the bolt-thru fork is a Big Thing. Cotic have experimented in the past with dealing with the extra issues a disc brake adds to a road fork by mounting the disc tab on the front of the right-hand fork leg to counteract a conventionally placed disc brake’s desire to rotate a wheel out of the fork.

The Escapade comes with the new Cotic RB3 9mm bolt-thru fork. Thru axled forks are creeping from the mountainbike world into the cyclo-cross vocabulary with Giant and Focus amongst others featuring bikes with them on and the likes of Whisky making a carbon thru axle ‘cross fork. The RB3 fork has cromoly tapered legs, disc only fixings and a captive 9mm axle for the ultimate secure front wheel. Cotic say closed fork ends make the most of the thru axle ‘cross fork, where it makes a lot of sense on road bikes, particularly because of the strong constant braking from very high speeds that give very high ejection loads onto the fork end.

The closed ends also mean the disc mount is back in the traditional position which people prefer the look of, because looks are important, let’s not pretend otherwise. It will also lead to less “Your fork is on backwards” comments. You can still use the fork with a regular quick-release hub, simply remove the skewer and spring the forks apart to get the hub in, then re-install the skewer. It’s not quick but it is nearly as stiff and just as secure as a thru axle setup.

Frames come in small, medium and large which relate to 48cm, 51cm and 54cm seat-tubes and 54cm, 56cm and 58cm top-tubes. The seat angle is 73° and head angle is 72° across all sizes, with what Cotic call a confident geometry and handling with semi-compact frame layout. It's a much more road orientated frame than the Cotic >X<, which was pretty short and slack and quite heavily biased to being stable off road. A slightly steeper head angle, although not race bike sharp, should still make things responsive enough with the 45mm offset fork.

The Escapade comes in the Gloss Black Grape colour you see here and the Matte Duckegg hue of the current Roadrat.

Framesets are available to order now, at just £249 for the frame only, or £329 for the frame and RB3 9mm bolt thru fork, chainstay protector. Bikes and rolling chassis will follow in a couple of weeks once Cotic have the bolt thru wheelsets built to match, coming in at £175.

More at www.cotic.co.uk