Singletrack

TRILLION CYCLES
PRIME
Price:
From:
£1,349.00 (frame only)
Trillion Cycles, trillion.com
Of the three brands on test, Trillion Cycles is by far the
youngest. Having formed this time last year, Trillion only
officially launched to the public in early 2017 at the London
Bike Show – seemingly coming out of nowhere. But as it
turns out, there’s some pretty big investment going on behind
this new name.
Trillion is owned by industrial mega-company the Liberty
House Group, which specialises in producing steel and
aluminium, while also working in metals recycling. Owner
Sanjeev Gupta has made himself known in the UK thanks to
a number of key purchases of declining smelting mills around
the country, with the immediate goal of retaining local jobs
and a long-term goal of repurposing those mills into metal
recycling plants fuelled by renewable energy. In addition
to his ambitious commodities projects and desire to bring
manufacturing back to the UK, Gupta launched the Trillion
brand as an homage to his father – an Indian steel tycoon who
originally founded Victor Bicycles. However, Gupta is keen to
assert that Trillion isn’t a vanity project, but rather a conscious
move to kick-start bicycle mass production in the UK – a
country that was once home to the biggest bike manufacturers
in the world.
That’s some pretty big visionary stuff, and Trillion is still
very much in its infancy right now. To begin with, Trillion is
launching with a small, but focused range of bikes, including
this one called the Prime.
Currently in the prototype phase with the finer details
still being ironed out, the Prime is a UK-made steel hardtail
designed for a 160mm travel fork. It’ll be available both as a
frame only, or as a complete bike with full builds expected to
start at £3k. Custom-build kits are also available, and the final
product is then sold and shipped direct to consumer.
The Bike
The double-diamond Prime frame is made up of a collection
of large diameter steel tubes from Reynolds and Columbus,
with a 44mm headtube up front and a sharply sloping top
tube that takes a pleasingly straight line down the seatstays to
the rear dropouts.
There are some nice details on the Prime frame, including
a proper metal headtube badge, and a subtle British flag
graphic on the seat tube that indicates the frame’s origins.
All cables run externally under the downtube, captured by
tidy bolt-on clamps. The dropper post cable is the only one
that runs internally, and it’s only for a small length inside
the seat tube. Other nods towards practicality include the
73mm threaded bottom bracket and the addition of ISCG 05
chainguide tabs for those who want to make use of them.
Rear dropouts are 148mm wide, and they use a sliding
design with integrated tensioners. This allows you to tune
chainstay length between 430mm–450mm, and also offers
an easy conversion to singlespeed. However, according to
Trillion, it also means the Prime can accommodate either
27.5in or 29in wheels, with max tyre clearance rated at 2.6in
for both wheel diameters. To match the frame and its wheel
size compatibility, Trillion has fitted a RockShox Yari 29er
fork with 160mm of travel.
With Trillion listing the Prime as “Designed for 29er,
compatible with 27.5”, the frame geometry has been set
around running 29in wheels. That’s resulted in a 65° head
angle, a 74° seat angle, and a 44mm bottom bracket drop.
There will be three sizes available in the Prime, with Trillion
claiming that’ll suit riders from as short as 5ft 6in up to 6ft
3in. However, the company has also hinted that custom frame
geometry may be an option in the future.
Our test bike came set up with Mavic XA Elite 27.5in
wheels and 2.4in wide tyres, and quite a high-end build kit
that would set you back £4,599 for the whole bike. Decked
out with Hope brakes and headset along with a SRAM X01
Eagle 1x12 drivetrain, the complete Prime weighs in at an
impressive 12.13kg.
Being a prototype frame, the Prime we’ve been testing is
somewhat rough around the edges. The paint is patchy, and
the welds aren’t exactly what you’d call exquisite. The seat
tube is slightly oversized, resulting in the seatpost twisting
even with the seat clamp tightened up to spec. The dropouts
also require heavy spreading to fit and remove the rear wheel
from the frame. Apparently this issue was caused by heat
deformation on early prototypes from welding without the
correct jig on hand. The splayed dropouts have also robbed
available chainstay clearance with the drive-side crank arm,
resulting in an annoying knock on every revolution.
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