Most expensive DH bike?

So I have a buddy over, and we are debating what the most expensive DH mountain bike would would be. What do you guys think? I know that you can easily break 6G's, but I'm sure that there are some out there that are above 10. Anybody have photos or links to further the discussion?

Thanks,
Gray

 

saw a $6k Trek at Pasadena Cyclery today.

 

Doesn't scott have an $11,000 XC bike? No one's stopping you from riding one downhill. :bang:

 

I've heard of the 20 grand ferrari bike and a 15 grand bridgestone track bike you can build at the bike biz website. Did you try building one at wrenchscience.com?

 

*Saying everything is custom built and paid for in retail- some contenders would be:

Honda RN01
Nicolai TST

 

I'm gonna go with a custom geometry nicolai ION G-boxx.

even accounting for the VAT, that's a $5900 frame, before getting the rear shock, custom geometry, and any other custom tricks you'd put on it, and shipping from germany. it does include a rear hub, cranks, and shifting though I suppose.

throw a manitou dorado on it, formula ONE brakes, all manner of light, expensive weight weenie parts, and you're looking at a 10k bike easy.

doing the same thing with a standard ION would probably be just as expensive though

edit: forgot the gratuitous picture

 

Probably was the Honda RN01 but I think they stopped the program last year.

 

I just built a $23,239.15 road bike on wrench science.

 

Nearly 6k for a frame in THAT color? :?:

 

Perhaps a better title for this thread would be "Most over-priced DH bike?".

Seems to me that generally speaking, after around $6K you reach the point of diminishing returns.

 

It's red, just the picture isn't that good.


They'll sell them to you in about any color you want though.

 

If they have 6k for a frame, then I would have thought they could have afforded a decent camera:lol:
But just imagine if your colour choice got f 'ed up and it did arrive in that shade of sicky-pink.

 

WTF is with the rake and chopped wood in the background. :-k

 

The bottom bracket is tricked out eh?

 

if you read into it, you can get a fully custom, 9lb DH frame from them if you so desire. it's pretty cool, albeit expensive. hell, they even list bottle cage bosses on their list of custom options for the ION :bang:

as for colors, that red matches the red on the boxxers. the image is just a bit desaturated. they can do pretty much everything, including, but not limited to, several shades of camoflouge :lol:






your guess is as good as mine on the rake and the wood pile. they ARE german...

 

i remember reading that an estimate cost for the honda rn 01 was around 70k!!

 

I was going to say the same thing. These things were like $60k or something I think. Mainly due to the "gearbox" that they had on them. The last year that Team G raced was in 2007 though...

 

I am sure with some time and a ridiculous build list you could push a bike build outside of 10G's you would just have to be very particular about everything and get only the best down to tubes, grips, custom machined parts, etc.

 

Agree...

These were never available retail nor will they ever be. They literally crushed these bikes out of existence with the close of the Honda racing program. These were the closest thing in DH to a Formula 1 bike--they were made specifically for World Cup domination. I think they had a figure of $75K associated with them. I could be wrong. I bet 2WheelLee would know.

 

Nah, they're still around. Minaar has one in his shop in South Africa as a display piece. Honda has at least a couple left, they were lent to some Trek guys for testing/ R&D at Whizzler a couple weeks ago.