Vielo is a relatively new brand, founded in 2017 and producing the V+1, an ‘all-road’ bike designed for British roads and British riding conditions by a father and son with over 35 years of experience in the cycling industry. Now they introduce the V+1 Rival, a cheaper option to the 5K option, we take a first look here before handing it over for review on road.cc.
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Of the first V+1 Force, Mat over at road.cc says “the V+1, a road plus/gravel/adventure carbon bike is a triumph of design. It offers a highly impressive ride: smooth and composed, fast and fun, and bristles with smart details that make it as practical as it is intoxicating. At £5,499 it’s not cheap, but if you’ve got deep pockets and want a versatile and highly capable bike for taming rough roads and going wild in the back of beyond, you’re in for a real treat.”
The new V+1 Rival bike keeps the same frame as the original (and still available) V+1 Force, the bikes have identical geometry and sizing with just a change of carbon layup and different spec for the new bike. Due to this, rather than the 5K price tag, the new bike comes in at £3,499.
The new Vielo V+1 Rival uses the same frame mould as the original, with a slightly more economic layup. The frame weight changes in light of the different carbon layup and is 1,110gm compared 880gm. We weighed the complete bike as 8.87g without mudguards and 9.41kg with the SKS custom 3 point mudguards, designed to work specifically with this frame.
The frame itself its lovely to look at, the fork is slender and lacks bulk, whilst the down tube is wider nearest to the (press fit) bottom bracket for more stiffness in that area. The seat clamp is hidden away in the seat tube and there’s internal routing for a dropper post too.
Attention to detail is high, protecting the expensive carbon fibre are small metal plates on the chainstay, both behind the crankset and also near the disc brake, the latter to prevent accidentally dinging the brake rotor into the frame when installing the wheel.
The Vielo V+1 is designed for a 1x drivetrain only, it’s be better suited for muddy conditions this way whilst allowing the designers to optimise stiffness without having to accommodate a front mech into the design. All cables are internally routed, disappearing symmetrically into the frame near the headtube.
Lastly, the rear seat stays are flattened and slightly bowed for increased rear end comfort and grip, Vielo call it ‘passive rear suspension’.
Geometry wise a medium provides the following figures with 700x38c tyres; a 71-degree head angle, 1,026.9mm wheelbase, 48mm fork offset, 52.5mm bottom bracket drop, 150mm head tube and 380mm reach and 554.2mm stack.
To meet the new price tag the new V+1 is specced with SRAM Rival gear, a 1×11 drivetrain with a 42t chainring and a 10-42t cassette. The normal spec for this bike is DT Swiss C1800 wheels rather than the C1600’s you see here.
The new bikes keep the same Vielo 3D forged alloy stem, Vielo carbon bars, and Vielo Carbon seat post and the more expensive bike. The customer can choose either 700c or 650 wheel tyre combo, plus crank length, stem length, chainring size and bar width when ordering and all customers get the routing already installed for a dropper post should they want one.
A word on those mudguards, they are custom designed for the Vielo V+1 with SKS. They are wide enough to accommodate tyres 700c x 40 and 650b x 47 plus satin black rods so the mudguards can hardly be seen. The 3 rod fixing at the back means they don’t need a support across the rear of the stays. Vielo says they also wanted the mudguards to finish ‘ground parallel’ on front and back. If you want a longer extension to the front mudguard, we can offer the SKS 15cm ‘Spoiler’ to help keep spray away from the feet of the rider.
In their words, “the V-Plus 1 is a new breed of road plus performance bikes for the road cyclist who is fed up with being shaken to pieces on the poorly maintained British roads and who also wants to combine a bit of fun riding on gravel or loose forest roads”. They’ve also just told us that the bike are available now buy now on their website, follow this link to order a bike and get it sent to your local dealer.
Keep a check on road.cc for a review soon.
- V+1 Force – £5,499
- V+1 Rival – £3,499
- Force Frameset – £2,999
- Rival Frameset – £2,399
- SKS Mudguards – £55
Find out more here – www.vielo.cc
