Bassi Hog's Back Frameset
Steel all-road world touring frame, a modern Montreal design
The Hog's Back is the flagship Bassi model. It's a do-it-all loaded-down world tourer, yet unloaded it'll rip as quick as you want around gravelly mountain roads and even a bit off-road. Build it with your parts bin or get the fancy boutique stuff, it's happy either way.
Colours are not necessarily representative when viewed on a screen. Please be prepared to accept slight differences in hue from the colours you see here.
Bassi frames ship for flat rates in Canada, the US, and Europe. Please contact us for a quote in other regions.
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The Hog's Back is our true all-road loaded touring frame, and we do mean all the roads. This bike has ridden all over, from Montréal's streets to Vermont's highways to Peru's dirt roads, as loaded-down with baggage as you please.
For the curious, if you want to bring your Hog's Back to visit its namesake mountain, it lives in Gaspésie National Park. You can hike up it, but you'd best ask the park rangers before you ride up it, too.
Available here fully-built. If you'd like just the frame, we'll be glad to install any headset, bottom bracket and sundry parts you'll need. Parts installation is always included free with our frame prep service, or for a minor fee otherwise.
If you have a build in mind different from ours, start a conversation, we'll be glad to help. We're pretty good at custom bikes.
On the third run of frames, we added ED coating to protect the inside of the frame from rust.
Chainline 45.5mm (older mountain bike normal).
Tire clearances stated include fender clearance.
A note on frame prep:
Although Bassi frames, as well as many others, go through many quality control steps and come almost immaculate from the factory, some imperfections may still arise. Usually, paint is the culprit by being applied slightly unevenly or being oversprayed and covering some threads. The result, in the case of a headset or a bottom bracket, is uneven surfaces or imperfect planes which can cause binding and/or premature wear of the bearings. Bottom bracket and headset bearings work at their very best when they're perfectly in line and parallel to each other! In the case of overspray on the threads, it can make fender or rack installations more of a headache than they need to be. With the help of C&L's very fancy facing, chasing, reaming and tapping tools, installing parts on your new fully prep'd frame will be a breeze!
With a Frame Prep Labour on a new or newly painted frame, we will:
- Face the head tube and bottom bracket shell
- Ream the head tube when necessary
- Chase bottom bracket shell threads when necessary (almost never)
- Tap threaded braze-on eyelets
- Face flat mount brake caliper contact points
When you add a Frame Prep Labour to a Bassi frame purchase, it includes the labour to install a bottom bracket and a headset if we have them in stock!
Details and Measurements
Frame & Fork
Frame
4130 CrMo steel tubing with gauges, butts and profiles adapted to frame sizes
Geometry optimized for balanced front-rear load, or front-biased load.
Ideally used with swept-back "alt-bars" rather than road drops. If using drops, you'll need a short stem and/or a frame one size smaller, this bike has a long front to it.
27.2mm seatpost, cast seat collar
EC34 headset (1-1/8" standard)
Disc brake ISO mounts, 160mm rotor recommended
Downtube mounts for shift levers or housing stops
135mm rear spacing, quick-release vertical dropout
BSC threaded bottom bracket (1.37" x 24TPI), 68mm shell width
Higher BB than many touring bikes, so you don't do what Julian always does and break teeth off your chainrings hitting rocks.
Kickstand plate (please don't overload the kickstand, touring bikes should be handled delicately when loaded and the kickstand cannot bear as much weight as the hub axles. Kickstands should be adjusted so that when extended, both wheels still contact the ground. We will not warranty frames with damage due to incautious kickstand use.)
Pretty darned rugged weight limits, as far as luggage on a properly installed rack goes. We tested with 26kg of weights in panniers, up and down steep hills, and handling didn't change much, so you're probably good. But be reasonable.
So many eyelets, I haven't even counted them. Put racks, cages, fenders, whatever you want on this bike. Keep putting 'em on. No, more than that.
Eyelets for a Bassi Strap, too. It's for helping you handle the bike when you've taken the luggage off. Don't try hauling it onto that train with the bike's weight and the luggage's weight all on the strap, please. You'll hurt the bike, the strap, and probably yourself.
Metal headbadge. It doesn't change anything but boy is it pretty and really classes up the place.
We weighed a 51cm frame with its fork steerer uncut, with no parts on, at 3.8kg. We don't really worry about frame weights, but some people like to know that kind of thing, so a year into this frame's existence we finally put one on the scale. Turns out it weighs pretty much what you'd expect for a touring frame. A Montréal frame is about 600g lighter FYI, which is the same as a mostly-full water bottle.
Fork
28.6mm theadless steerer
100mm hub spacing
ISO brake mount (Post Mount with adapter)
Triple mounts on fork legs for Everything Cage-type micro racks
Hidden dynamo front light routing
Biplane crown with very large tire capacity
Threaded plate under the crown for fender mounting
Mini-rack eyelets fit Soma Champs-Élysées wide version, and others
Top of blade eyelets fit certain rear racks for front mounting
Dropout eyelets for racks and fenders
Boy, what a fork huh? It's also available separately.
Includes
Bottom bracket cable guide
Seatpost clamp bolt (M6 plus 10mm nut)
Housing clips
Bolts already installed in most eyelets
Geometry













| Size | A | B1 | G1 | G | C | D | E | Stack | Reach | W | H | I | WideTire | NarrowTire | PBH |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| S | 470 | 530 | 70.5 | 73 | 440 | 40 | 130 | 519 | 371 | 1032 | 50 | 395 | 26x2.2 | 650Bx47 | 760 |
| M | 510 | 560 | 71 | 73 | 440 | 40 | 170 | 559 | 389 | 1059 | 50 | 395 | 26x2.2 | 650Bx47 | 800 |
| L | 540 | 590 | 72 | 73 | 440 | 60 | 150 | 583 | 412 | 1070 | 50 | 415 | 27.5x2.2 | 700Cx42 | 830 |
| XL | 580 | 630 | 72 | 73 | 440 | 60 | 190 | 621 | 440 | 1111 | 50 | 415 | 27.5x2.2 | 700Cx42 | 870 |