The Monkey Lab: Rohloff-Equipped, Belt Driven Co-Motion Americano Touring Bike

We built this steel touring bike for a customer in Henderson, NV to replace the Surly Cross Check that he had been riding. He came to us two and a half years ago to build a rear wheel with a Rohloff SPEEDHUB 500/14 to replace the derailleur system on his Cross Check, and a couple months later, we built him a matching front wheel with a Phil Wood Touring hub. Having been happy with the performance of the Rohloff drivetrain, he decided to upgrade to a dedicated Rohloff frame and swap out his chain for a belt while he was at it. The Americano model from Co-Motion offered all the options that he wanted.

Co-Motion is one of the few US bike companies that offers dedicated Rohloff-specific frame models. They build bikes out of steel and aluminum in their facility in Eugene, Oregon. They are well known for their tandems and touring bikes, though they also offer road, cyclocross, and commuting frames. Their catalog includes a wide variety of models with stock geometry, with custom geometry available for a moderate up-charge. A few years ago, they decided to design a Rohloff OEM dropout and offer stock Rohloff-specific frames to accommodate a growing number of custom Rohloff frame orders. Since many of these customers also wanted to use the Gates Carbon Drive belt drive system, they incorporated a split point into the dropout so a belt could be inserted in the frame.

Co-Motion currently offers 3 Rohloff-specific touring frame models: the 26"-wheeled Pangea, the 29"-wheeled (wide 700c) Divide, and the 700c-wheeled Americano. All of these frames are built from chromoly steel and use oversized tandem chain stays for stiffness and durability. They are all capable of handling the rigors of expedition level touring with geometry that is designed around using drop handlebars and having a comfortable, upright seating position. The frames are normally spec'd with disc brake mounts only, but for this build, we requested both disc and cantilever brake options, so the customer could continue to use his rim-brake-specific wheels but have the option to change down the road. This frame also has a head tube extension to get the handlebars higher without using a large stack of headset spacers. Extensions are available as a minor customization up-charge with 10, 20, 30, or 40mm of additional height.

For the wheels, the Rohloff and Phil Wood hubs are laced into Velocity Dyad rims using Sapim Race double butted spokes. This is a common build for touring bikes, where strength and durability is extremely important. These wheels came back in for the new bike build in nearly perfect condition after having covered various tours over the past two years.

Build details