Review: 2014 Kona Sutra

Again the usual applies with my product reviews. I am not being paid by Kona to write this. I am not a professional reviewer. I am writing my own opinions, the good and the bad, about products that I purchase with my own money. It is worth noting at this point that I have taken a job at a local bike shop which sells Konas. It is also worth noting that I have been a Kona fan for a very long time. The goal here is not to write a piece of "fanfic" designed the sell Konas. Feel free to take it that way if you must, but if you are familiar with my reviews, you know that I mention what I do not like about something even if the something is a thing that I like.

The purpose for me buying a Kona Sutra, a touring bike, was two fold. Firstly, my wife and I are interested in doing some bicycle camping. She already owns an Optima Orca recumbent touring bicycle, and she loves to camp. I love to ride bikes. She does not mind cycling, and I will admit, under duress, that I don't mind camping as long as I get my not ugly sleep. So it only makes sense to put the two things together. Enter the Sutra. Also, we are moving house in about a month, and my ride to the bike shop will increase from five km each way to about 27 km each way. Therefore, a better long distance commuter bike is needed. As a nice bonus, I will be able to ride instead of drive to my other job with ease where we are moving to. Again, enter the Sutra.

With all that in mind, let's explore the bike.

Here is what Kona says about the bicycle on their webpage:

"Our classic touring bike receives a facelift for 2014. We’ve taken our massively successful Rove frame and blended it with the styling and class of our Sutra from years past. The bike features solid front and rear Blackburn racks, as well as bar end shifters for simplicity. The oversized 44mm headtube gives a more precise ride while the steel tubing keeps things plush and smooth. Our new drop bar, the Wet Bar, features flared drops and a short reach to keep things comfortable during long descents." Source URL

Looking around the shop, I can definitely say that yes, this is a Rove in touring dress. Basically, if you were to take the current Rove, strip it of all of its parts, and take last year's Sutra, and strip it of all of its parts and then install all of those parts onto the Rove frame, you would have the 2014 Sutra.

This is not a bad thing.

My "road" bicycles for the last decade or so have been Kona cyclocross bikes, and I like the way that they feel on pavement and gravel/sand. The current Sutra has a very planted feel that I have come to associate with Kona cyclocross bicycles. But there are some significant differences in the feel of the machines.

The cyclocross bikes, while they share a geometry similar to the Sutra, are definitely racier. My Jake the Snake is a much faster bike with a more aggressive layout. The Sutra feels very sedate. A tall stack of spacers lift the stem and help keep the riding position relaxed. The Sutra's handling could best be described as lazy in comparison to the Jake the Snake. This is a very good thing for touring where the goal is to ride all day in comfort with a loaded bicycle as opposed to riding for several hours quickly, in a more aggressive stance. Also, darty handling is not a good thing when there is a heavy load on the bicycle.

The Sutra is made of steel. It has been a very long time since I have owned a steel bicycle and after riding the Sutra, I am reminded why steel is a good material for bicycle building. The ride is very supple but the bike does not flex in a noticeable way. Steel advocates will tell you that steel is the only material to make a bicycle out of. Clearly, this is a load of what cows leave behind, but steel is very good when used for certain applications. For a ride it all day bicycle, one intended to be loaded down, steel works very well indeed. The frame is comfortable.

Protecting the steel from corrosion is a matte finish which is semi transparent and tinted a sort of sand brown colour. It is possible to see through it and see different colours on the steel itself. As well, where the welds and brazing was done, the colour of the brazing material shows through. This is an aesthetic affection which fairly screams "look at me, I am steel!", but it is one which I like. It does nothing to help with the bicycle's performance, but does look nice. Not everyone will agree with that, but I like it. Time will tell if the finish is durable or not. It looks nice though.

The frame is festooned with nice touches. Braze on mounts for three waterbottles are included. This is a good feature for a touring bike - two are for water, and the third for a sig bottle filled with fuel for a camp stove. If you use a small camping wood stove and have no need of stove fuel, a tool kit put into a waterbottle would fit quite nicely into the lower bottle cage. Cables are routed on the down tube through brazed on cable guides. The rear brake cable is fully encased in a housing, while the shifter cables are less fully covered - barrel adjusters for the shifters are on the cable guides near the head tube. Rack and fender mounts are part of the frame. Kona made a mistake here in my opinion. The fenders and rack share a mount. I prefer them not to. Fenders and racks are easier to set up and adjust when they have their own dedicated eyelets to bolt to. That said, what is there works, but I wish that Kona had tweaked the Rove frame a little more to add the extra mounting points. Also missing are brazeons for extra spokes (like those found on the Surly Long Haul Trucker). How much this matters is a personal thing since it is possible to affix extra spokes to other spots on the bike. The head tube on this bike is oversized but not tapered. This makes it nice and stiff, and allows for an internal headset. It looks a little odd mind you, but it works. The brakes are disks and the mounts, on both the forks and the rear triangle, were perfectly aligned and did not need to be refaced or shimmed in any way. Nice touch.

The stock components are very good. Here is the list from the Kona website:

Frame Material	Kona Cromoly
Sizes	47, 49, 53, 56, 59, 61cm (mine is the 56cm one)
Rear Shock	n/a
Fork	Kona Project Two Touring
Crankarms	Shimano Deore
Chainrings	26/36/48t
B/B	Shimano BB51
Pedals	n/a (I put some Shimano SPD pedals on mine)
Chain	KMC HG53
Freewheel	Shimano Deore 11-32t 9 spd
Chainguide	n/a
F/D	Shimano Deore
R/D	Shimano LX Treking (Shimano SLX in Canada)
Shifters	Shimano BarCon
Brake Calipers	Hayes CX Expert (mechanical not hydraulic)
Front Brake Rotor	Hayes L Series 160mm
Rear Brake Rotor	Hayes L Series 160mm
Brake Levers	Tektro RL340
Headset	TH 848
Handlebar	Kona Deluxe Road Bar (actually the Kona Wet Bar - a flared thing which is quite nice)
Stem	Kona XC/Road
Seatpost	Kona Double Clamp w/Offset
Seat Clamp	Kona Clamp (wish it was a bolt and not a quick release)
Grips	Kona Cork Tape
Saddle	WTB Rocket V Comp
Front Hub	Shimano Deore (comes with an allen key clamp)
Rear Hub	Shimano Deore (comes with a traditional quick release)
Spokes	Sandvik Stainless 14g
Rims	Freedom Ryder 21
Front Tire	Continental Contact 700x32C
Rear Tire	Continental Contact 700x32C
Paint Color	Matt Raw Steel w/Sand Tint
Extras	Pannier Racks, Fenders (The racks are Blackburn units and the fenders are full coverage units with mudflaps)

Source

Bolded print is added by me.

The bike is well kitted out with good solid reliable gear. That said, I made some changes right off the hop.

The first thing to go was the saddle. Stock is the Kona branded WTB Rocket V Comp saddle which is found on other Kona bikes. It is a very comfortable saddle which I have used before. However, it is not something that I feel like sitting on all day. So, out came my Brooks B17 Narrow saddle. I have the chocolate brown one and it looks absolutely gorgeous when mated to the colour of the Sutra. I find double clamp seatposts to be a bit of a pain to set up as small adjustments made mid ride are kind of annoying to do compared with a single bolt seatpost. That said, once it is dialed in, there is no problem. A future change will see Brooks leather bar tape replace the stock Kona tape the bike comes with. Of course, the Brooks tape will match the saddle. Previously, I have had leather wrapped bars and really like how well they wear and how nice they look.

Seeing as how the racks are Blackburn, I grabbed some Blackburn waterbottle cages and an old Blackburn pump I had and put them on. The tail light I installed is a Blackburn Mars 3.0 unit which comes with a mount designed specifically for a Blackburn rack. One might think this was a plan on their part to sell lights. Well, it worked. This light has five rear facing LEDs and two side facing ones and is pretty bright. It will go nicely with my Fly6 camera/light combination when it shows up in the mail sometime in June.

I have replaced the quick release skewers with ones which use allen keys. In fact, the ones I am using are pinned and need a special allen key to open. While this won't stop a determined thief, it will slow one down or prompt them to move on. I wish that Kona had used a more traditional seat post clamp as my pinned seat clamp bolt will not fit with the QR clamp that comes with the bike. It will need to be swapped out in order to fix this problem.

An oversized bar bell and a Garmin GPS mount complete the initial modifications. At some point I want to source a nice sprung brass gong for the bike. They look cool, and are really loud and are my personal choice for waking up iPod zombies.

That about covers it for how it is kitted out, so how does it ride?

Due to it being a bit of a heavy pig, it takes a bit to get going. However, once it is rolling, it moves along quite nicely.

The riding position is very upright. This is due to a combination of frame geometry, a huge stack of spacers under the stem, and an absolutely marvellous handlebar. The bar is very flat across the top, has a shallow drop, and is flared outwards. This makes it very comfortable to use. It reminds me a lot of the Salsa woodchipper handlebar that comes on my friend's old Surly Crosscheck. Those seeking a relaxed fit and ride should be happy about this. If you are seeking a more traditional bar, you may wish to swap this one out. The relative upright riding position mates well with the Brooks saddle I added. The bike is very comfortable to perch upon and ride, even in "street" clothing.

The riding position encourages me to take my time and focus more on what is going on around me. I find on a bike with a more aggressive stance, I tend to push a lot harder than I do when riding this one. While I do focus on my surroundings when pushing hard, a lot of my thought processes go into various mental exercises designed to help me increase my speed or maintain a steady high output. This bike encourages me to amble. Not a bad trait in a touring bike where speed is not of the essence but enjoying the more sedate pace of a wander, vs a race (real or imagined), is the goal. Interestingly, a quick glance at my gps unit indicates that while me speed is lower than it would be on my cyclocross bike, it is not as low as the relaxed feeling the bicycle imbues would suggest.

The geometry and widely spaced gearing make for a different approach to tackling hills. Often, when on a race based bicycle, I spin up the hills at a high cadence out of the saddle. It is a quick and energy intensive way to climb, but one I really enjoy. With the Sutra, I find I drop a few gears as I ride up hills and stay seated. It is a more "dum de dum" approach to climbing vs a "grrrr hill be eaten" approach, if you take my meaning.

Bumps are nicely sorted out by the smooth rolling quick and nimble Continental touring tires. Lately, I have become a big fan of German tire manufacturers. Both Schwalbe and Continental make superior bicycle tires and I have yet to go wrong with any tire I have had over the years from either brand. In my opinion, Kona made a good choice by sourcing these tires for this bike. The steel frame also aids in bump suppression.

The stock drive train is simple and competent. Bar end shifters are a great idea for a touring bicycle. The front derailleur is shifted by friction. This makes it endlessly featherable and there is zero drive train noise coming from the front of the bike. Shimano, be a dear and give us a brifter for front derailleurs which gives this level of flexibility. I miss it and love this hearkening back to the "old days". The rear shifter is indexed, works perfectly, and can be made into a friction shifter should the need arise (like a bent derailleur out in the middle of nowhere on a tour).

There is a learning curve with these shifters if all you have used is brifter style indexed road levers. I grew up using down tube friction shifters from Campagnolo, so it only took me about 30 seconds to get the front derailleur dialed in. What took a bit was reaching to the end of the bar for the shifter. It does not feel natural after using brifters for the last decade or so. Adapt or change them out I suppose. Some people will really dislike the bar end shifters. I have read in other reviews of this bicycle and similar bicycles some complaints about them. However, I would suggest considering the following: brifters can break if the bike falls over, especially if the bike is loaded down and heavy, and cost a lot to repair or replace; and including bar end shifters instead of brifters helps keep the cost of the bicycle.

The brakes work well. I like using disk brakes and have no issues with mechanical ones. The brakes on my truck like commuter bike are cheap Avid BB5 brakes which work very well despite all of the abuse I heap upon them. This bike has Hayes CX Expert brakes which seem to be doing fine so far. While mechanical disk brakes are not as nice to use as hydraulic ones, they do work better than rim brakes, particularly when it is wet outside. They are also easier to maintain in the field. Remember, it is important to run new disk brakes in properly or they will not work well. About ten stops from near 30kmph at the threshold of skidding will seat them. Do the fronts and rears separately. After doing this, you should feel a marked improvement in the brakes ability to haul the bicycle down from speed. During the initial break in period, the brakes kept performing better and better.

The rotors on the bicycle are 160mm ones. The larger 160mm rotors (vs 140mm ones used on some other Kona bicycles) will give more stopping power when the bicycle is loaded for touring. While heavier than cantilever brakes, the more precise and powerful stopping power they offer is worth the minor weight penalty, especially when roads are wet. As an added bonus, if the brakes are dragged a bit on a steep descent when the bike is loaded, heat build up will not cause a tube to potentially fail.

Some pictures and a few things worthy of note follow.

Detail of the front brake rotor, calliper, and rack mount. With a little bending, the included fenders fit fine. One of my gripes about the frame is clearly shown here - the rack and fenders share a mount. I would prefer them not to. Looking at how crowded things are here, it is easy to see why Kona chose to use an allen key bolt for a quick release instead of a typical qr skewer. Look carefully at the one I changed the bike over to - this one is pinned making a conventional allen key useless for wheel removal. One of the things I like about the brakes is how solid the callipers are compared to others I have used.

Detail of the rear brake and rack mount. Again with the shared mounts. Kudos though to Kona for putting the calliper on the inside of the rear triangle vs the outside. This increases the options for racks and reduces cost for fenders. Look through to the seat stay in the background. Kona included a pin for hanging the chain on when the rear wheel is removed - a nice touch which will help keep the drivetrain clean should the need arise to perform maintenance road side.

Being a steel bicycle, the bottom bracket is not massive and oversized. The encased cable is for the rear brake, while the other two are for the derailleurs. I added some spacers on the underside water bottle bolts so a bottle cage installed there in the future will clear the cables. They are on the bicycle now so I don't lose them :)  The dirt splash gives a good idea how much the fenders cover. Your feet might get a little damp, but not too likely. Top of the line SKS fenders with mudflaps will drop significantly lower and help prevent dirt from hitting you or the drive train.

Of note here is the space around the fender mount. There is a lot of clearance for the 700x32c tires, and a gap still remains between the fender and the underside of the fork. Much larger tires will fit should the need arise with fenders, and even larger without. The headset is internal. Note the brass from the brazeons showing through the tinted finish which is, I think, a lovely lovely colour. I put some tire patches between the cable housing and the head tube to prevent wear to the frame's finish.

Shimano SLX derailleur. The cassette has a wide range of gears which should make climbing steep hills under load fairly easy. There is a fairly long 10% grade on my new commuter route I will be travelling with the bicycle loaded down once we move in May which I will report back on after I ride it a bit.

This year's Shimano Deore crank is a pretty thing. Very beefy and strong.

Shimano Deore hubs - 36 hole - are at the core of the heavily built wheels. My friend at work is a terrific wheel builder and he tensioned it up for me nicely. I suggest having new wheels be looked at before the bicycle is ridden by someone who knows what they are doing to ensure they are true and tensioned correctly.

The rear. Nice and compact. The rack has multiple mounting points for various things. I am not 100% sure what the slotted mount is sticking out the back of the rack, but I think it is for running a strap through to further secure panniers or perhaps something stacked on top of the rack and panniers.

Nice and simple. This is the rear shifter. It can be switched from indexed to friction shift by twisting the switch on the inside of the shifter.

How the cockpit is laid out at this time. GPS on the stem, and bell on the bar. Future updates will include hardware to mount a handlebar bag and a light (removable). Note the huge stack of spacers underneath the stem. My Jake the Snake stem pretty much sits on the top of the headset.

The brake levers. These Tektro levers are quite comfortable actually. I was pleased to see that they bulked them up a bit compared to the way that they used to be. It is possible to see the flare of the handlebar I was talking about above in this picture. I would like you to use your imagination and pretend that the tape is a rich chocolate brown leather. That is what will be swapped in sometime this summer.

This is how I prefer to carry my pump. At some point, I would like to replace this one with a slick brass plated one and redo the bottle cages in a brass colour. It would look great on the bike with it the colour it is.

The Blackburn Mars 3.0 tail light. It is a seriously bright unit which fits perfectly on the rack.

My Chocolate Brown Brooks B17 Narrow saddle. I love this one on this bicycle. It is a perfect match.

That is it for now.

I have been riding long enough to be certain that my initial impressions about the way the bicycle handles will remain consistent as I use the bicycle more. Should this not be true, I will do an update post and tack it to the bottom of the review.

Cheers and good riding!