Archibald Cycles: Leading Canada’s gearbox revolution

Sometimes, if you want something done right, you just have to do it yourself. That’s exactly what Alex Troughton is doing with Archibald Cycles. And it’s working.

The Vancouver-based brand just released its third model, or configuration, the AC1 Trail. Following a full Dh and an enduro build, “trail” is very much relative to the rest of Archibald’s line. But it’s also the first AC1 configuration designed with more consideration for pedalling included in the boutique gearbox bike’s descending experience.

“We’re taking the core bike we have and then basically elevating certain aspects. In this case, we’re just making it going further into pedalability, further into playfulness,” Troughton says over the phone, explaining what makes the AC1 Trail different. He continues, “And not worrying about the descending as much, because it’s already got that.”

While I caught up Troughton, one of Archibald’s new, very old CNC machines worked away in the background, busily building parts for the new bikes. While it worked, we talked about the simple joy of making things yourself, why he’s driven by the gearbox design and how Archibald’s grown from a garage operation to a growing brand with all its own tooling and a worldwide customer base.

A bike that started with a problem

Archibald may be opening up to more pedal-friendly, or pedal-tolerant riding, but its roots are very much in gravity riding. The AC1’s distinctive design started with a simple problem, though.

“I was never really happy with the bikes I was riding,” Troughton says of what sparked the Archibald journey. “I’m 6″4, so finding a bike that fit me in 2016 was pretty challenging. I never really had a bike that fit me properly. And the bikes I had, some would be nice in certain ways and others in other ways, but never a whole package.”

Troughton was working at Blackspire at the time which, he says, meant making things yourself in Canada always seemed like a realistic option. Even in an era when bicycle production was primarily an overseas venture. When he returned to school, designing his own bike was a natural extension of work he did with Blackspire and the AC1 became his Capstone project for his engineering program.

“That was two to three years of design work figuring out what the bike would be to try and hit every everything I wanted out of it. And really…