The history of this little bike is somewhat chequered, it was sent to us by Bill from Downhill Direct while he was still the Da Bomb dealer in Australia. Da Bomb is now being imported by Steve Cramer Products, so if this review convinces you to go buy a CR8 you should give them a call (or talk to Bill about some crazy closeout deals).
Having said that, lets review this puppy;
On Test: Da Bomb CR8 BMX, 13.5"
RRP (frame only): Now $299 !! (was $599)
Distributor: Steve Cramer Products
Phone: (03) 9587 1466
Fax: (03) 9587 2018
Email: craig@stevecramerproducts.com.au
First of all, I suggest you haul yourselves over to the Da Bomb website and check it out, it is in Engrish and it is hilarious. It also contains surprisingly little detail about the actual geometry of the CR8 BMX frame, so if you want to know any of that sort of stuff, you're going to have to go over to Downhill Direct and check out their geometry chart.
The CR8 came to me early one summer morning when I was just preparing to head out on a cross-country ride. "Sick!" I thought, "Gotta take the new bike out!" as I took the bike into the living room and hurriedly assembled it. What emerged from the box was an assortment of just about every product Da Bomb make, built up onto the 13.5" CR8 BMX frame with Manitou Black forks, FSA tubular cromo BMX cranks and Alex MX22 rims on Shimano hubs. YDopen hydraulic discs (think Armour, Dice, Dia Tech) handled stopping duties front and rear but other than that every component on the bike was Da Bomb brand. Check da spec's yo!
The Frame
Built from 4130 Cromo the CR8 BMX is a tough, street and trails oriented frame designed to take a serious beating. It has a BMX bottom bracket shell, horizontal dropouts with adjustable disc mounts and derailleur mount and the option to run v-brakes for either 24 or 26 inch wheels. These features mean you could build a CR8 BMX up in any number of ways, as anything from a full-sized 9 speed, 26" wheeled 4X and dirt jumping machine to a tiny dual 24" setup that would be perfect for smaller riders and particularly those making the cross-over from 20" to mountain bikes.
Critical dimensions on a street and trails hardtail in my opinion are the top tube and chainstay lengths. On first impressions the 21" top-tube on the CR8 BMX felt waaaaay too short for my liking, easily shorter than my DMR Trailstar's 22.5" and as the test progressed, getting over this discomfort proved to be the biggest obstacle to getting to like the CR8.
Another disconcerting feature was the chainstay length, as our test bike came set-up as a singlespeed the shortest we could successfully get the chainstay length to while maintaining reasonable chain tension was a tiny bit over 16.5". Despite awesome brakes and a snappy 71 degree head angle almost every farkin tester who jumped on the CR8 said they didn't like the feel of it and immediately handed it back to me.
Despite my misgivings about the bike I took note of it's obvious intent as a street and dirt jumping bike and dutifully packed it into the farkin.net van and took it to the skate park and dirt jumps every time I went. I gradually became accustomed to the bike's quirky geometry and after three months of testing I could confidently ride it anywhere I could ride my DMR.
I actually believe the CR8 was a better 'pure' skate-park bike than my DMR, with it's single speed divetrain and short wheelbase it could be flicked around in bowls and on ramps, ridden fakie confidently and stopped on a dime for lip-tricks. If I could afford to have a bike that I only ever rode at skateparks it would definitely be single speed, the CR8 taught me to enjoy the simplicity of not having to worry about smashing derailleurs or having the chain skip when you're trying to ride fakie.
The CR8 BMX came with an adjustable rear disc brake mount to allow for proper brake setup when moving the rear wheel in the dropouts. Great idea, poor execution. Despite my best efforts to get the mount to stay put, every ride at the skatepark would leave me cursing and abusing the mental aptitude of whoever designed the system.
Even with Loctite, high-tensile bolts and a whole shit-ton of good, old fashioned over-tightening the bolts that connected the disc mount to the frame consistently worked themselves loose, making braking unpredictable and causing a god-awful shuddering and squealing to emanate from the rear end.
The Bits
The vast majority of the parts that came on the CR8 were supplied by Da Bomb, from seat post to stem to skewers to seat. I can honestly say that of all the Da Bomb products on the bike only a few gave me worries.
Chief among these worry-givers were the obscenely bad Da Bomb shin burger pedals. Products this bad should not be brought to market ever and if you buy these pedals you deserve every bit of damage they do to your shins. In perfectly dry conditions the pedals were moderately grippy and though the waffle-design didn't offer any real bite into my Orchid Teem shoes, the compound of the shoes made up for it and kept my feet in place.
As soon as these pedals encountered even the slightest bit of moisture on either shoe or pedal they became lethal, gripless hunks of meat tenderiser spinning dangerously on cranks as they gave up any semblance of grip they had. These pedals would be appropriate for the rider who never encounters any sort of moisture at all in any form, for everyone else, they're shite and should be avoided.
The Da Bomb Tribal bars never really agreed with me, they just didn't have enough sweep for my liking and I ended up with sore wrists as a result. Bars are a personal decision, you may love Tribal bars, I did not.
The oversized Da Bomb quick release skewers that came specced also looked the goods but failed to deliver. They feature a massive, hand friendly lever that would suggest the ability to really crank down the tension when securing a wheel. "Great idea!" Was my first thought when I saw them, "Surely I can use these massive quick release skewers to get the rear wheel to stay put in the horizontal dropouts."
Wrong. 2 minutes later I was holding a broken quick release, as although the massive lever did indeed allow me to generate a huge amount of clamping force, the threaded knob on the other side of the skewer was not equipped to deal with so-much tension and promptly tore itself to pieces. Note, if you buy Da Bomb quick release skewers, they are purely for looking cool, not for clamping your hubs in super-tight.
On the good side, the Da Bomb Dax stem was a pretty pimp piece of equipment, nicely machined, beefy and with a cool paint job, I could definitely see myself owning one of them. The Da Bomb micro-adjust seat post was another good find, I set it up once at the start of the test and never worried about it again, could be the go if you're looking for a micro-adjust seat post on a budget.
The Ride
No matter how much you trick a bike up you can never make a frame with bad geometry feel right and in my opinion that's what is fundamentally wrong with the CR8. Even though I did adjust to the feel of the bike over time, I was never comfortable on it and probably never would be. Lately I've been spoiled by fantastic bikes like the Cove Foreplay MX, with 16" chainstays and super-roomy top-tubes and I confess, I've got a taste for it. The CR8 just doesn't feel right to me compared to other bikes I've ridden
The short front end made x-ups and barspins impossible as foot / wheel overlap was huge and I would constantly buzz my foot on the front tire when riding fakie. The short wheel-base and steep head angle of the CR8 made it excel in tight, technical skatepark situations. Once I got used to the longish chainstays the consistent power of the YDopen brakes allowed me to tail tap and abubaca the bike confidently, though at the same time I was reviewing other bikes and riding them far more confidently.
One thing I can say that was truly unique about the CR8 BMX was its grindability, it's the only bike I've tested in my farkin.net career that has come set up single-speed and with a proper BMX bashplate. Crank-feebling ledges at the skatepark was almost second-nature on the CR8, just bunnyhop on and sliiiide down...good for earning just a tiny bit of cred from the no-helmet, no-stickers, no-brakes crew on 20" wheels who can do things 10,000 times cooler than you ever will (and are usually 16 years old to boot).
What can I say? Overall, the CR8 BMX wasn't for me and even if I could afford to have a dedicated skatepark bike, it wouldn't be the CR8. It still may be the right frame for you though, get your local dealer to get one in before you buy one, I have a feeling that this bike is one that you'll either love, or hate.
Overall
5/10
