Soma Wolverine Review

Despite only becoming available in late-2014, many riders are digging what the Wolverine is laying down, to the point where Soma is struggling to keep up with demand.

“The original inspiration for the Wolverine was “monster cross”, but it is seriously so much more. Its geometry is stable enough for off road touring, but sporty enough for all-around adventure.” – Soma Fabrications

Whoa-whoa-whoa! Hold up a minute. Monster Cross? Is that a type of bike? Or is it some kind of riding genre? Or are we talking about transgender ghouls here?

What exactly is “Monster Cross”?

Up until very recently, that was a question I really wasn’t particularly interested in answering. Just as Specialized’s Mike Sinyard wasn’t interested in 29ers when they first became popular, I can’t say I’ve been totally convinced by this “Monster Cross” movement of recent years. That was until the Soma Wolverine turned up for testing.

The original Monster Cross concept stems from cyclocross bikes. In Australia, cyclocross has gradually been gathering momentum as more riders look to take their drop bars onto the dirt. Races are popping up all over the country and we even have a National Series for those who take their ‘crossin’ seriously. More cyclocross bikes are becoming available in shops, and they’re proving to be popular with riders looking for a versatile bike for a bit of commuting, winter training, and cyclocross racing. That said, most cyclocross bikes are still just road racing bikes with knobbly 32mm wide tyres.

A Monster Cross essentially takes a cyclocross bike and pumps it full of steroids to create a brawnier, meaner, and more capable rig for tackling the dirt. More tyre clearance allows for fatter rubber to be fitted, and slacker angles help to aid stability when riding the bike down proper off-road trails. In essence, a Monster Cross is the dirty love-child behind a traditional cyclocross bike and a 29er hardtail.

As you can imagine, there aren’t heaps of these Monster Cross bikes out there. They’re a bit of an oddball bike that doesn’t fit into any pre-existing niche. Kind of like a hipster.

The Monster Cross bikes that do exist are usually made by some bespoke frame builder who welds up frames using PBR beer cans and lugs that are made from his glorious beard. Thusly, they’re incredibly cool, but they’re also incredibly expensive.

The Wolverine on the other hand is a far more accessible machine for those wanting all the versatility that a Monster Crosser offers. It comes in for less than a grand for the frame and fork, and it offers up a host of features that allow you to build it for all sorts of different riding applications.

As hip as the Wolverine no doubt is, the question still remaining on my lips after pulling it out of the box went something like this: Is this a Jack Of All Trades? Or a Master Of None?

Slender Steel

Like most of Soma’s frames, the Wolverine is made from Tange Prestige steel tubing. The front triangle is heat-treated CrMo, while the rear uses butted tubes to keep weight down and to assist with dissipating vibration.

The Wolverine has a distinctly classic look about it, and it sits very unassumingly next to modern carbon and alloy bikes. The lugged flat-crown fork adds to the old-school appeal, and is made from Tange Infinity CrMo tubing with a heavily raked design. The fork attaches to the 1 1/8” headtube with a normal external headset, while a 68mm English threaded bottom bracket makes for a welcome change from the current crop of creaky press-fit designs.

Using CrMo steel tubing means the Wolverine is a little porky at 2.17kg for the frame, but it does add a measure of assurance in the durability stakes. For those who long for epic backcountry adventures off the beaten track, steel is also more manageable if it breaks and requires re-welding. Plus I think it looks sweet.

Versatility & Adaptability

Simple steel construction aside, the Wolverine has a lot going for it in the feature department. Easily the coolest trick up the Wolverine’s sleeve is the split Tange/IRD dropout design. This allows the use of a belt drive, which requires an opening in the rear triangle in order to fit the one-piece belt. The split on the driveside dropout is very subtle, and it’s reinforced with 4x enormous steel bolts that also secure the modular dropouts.

Our test bike came fitted with Paragon Machine Works 135mm singlespeed dropouts, which are CNC machined in the US. Because they’re removable, you can swap in a derailleur hanger if you want to run gears. PMW also make dropouts to suit Rohloff internal hubs and even 142x12mm thru-axle hubs too.

The sliding horizontal dropouts allow you to tension the belt/chain for easy singlespeed setup, though the rear disc calliper mounts to the same plate, meaning you won’t have to adjust the brake every time you tension the chain.

Other frame features include full-length cable routing for the brakes, bosses to mount two bottle cages, as well as all the necessary mounts to fit pannier racks to both the fork and the frame. There are also eyelets for mudguards too.

On that note, Soma claim that you can fit up to a 45c tyre with mudguards on the Wolverine. They’re a bit vague about what the max tyre width is, but that’s likely because of the variation between a tyres actual width and what the manufacturer claims. Without mudguards, I measured about 58mm of lateral clearance between the upper legs on the fork crown, meaning that most 29×2.1” tyres will fit.

The rear is a little more complicated though, as while the seatstays have got similar clearance, the chainstays are a little tighter at around 55mm. Of course the effective tyre clearance will depend on how far back you run the rear wheel with the sliding dropouts. I’d speculate that if Soma had gone with a 73mm wide bottom bracket shell, they would have likely been able to squeeze in a little more flexibility for chunkier tyres regardless of the rear wheel position.

For the initial part of the test period I ran meaty-looking Panaracer Fire XC Pro 700x45c tyres, which provided oodles of mud clearance. More recently, I’ve been running Maxxis Beaver 29×2.0” wide tyres for a little more cushion, though there’s still plenty of room. The Beavers are renowned for being a little narrow for their claimed size, but it’s clear that the Wolverine will take standard XC tyres such as the WTB Nanoraptor and the Bontrager XR1.

While most riders will spec out their Wolverines with drop bars, Soma have designed the frame so that you can run it with flat, riser or moustache bars (if you’re into that sort of thing). You can run conventional gears with trigger shifters or road STI shifters. If you’ve got drop bars with single speed brake levers (as I have setup on our test bike), you can still get gears onto the Wolverine by mounting friction shifters to the bosses on the downtube.

With all of these options on offer, it’s easy to see just how versatile the Wolverine platform is. Looking for a bike for loaded off-road touring? After a rigid singlespeed to test your skills and fitness on the trails? Chasing a bombproof commuter bike for daily urban warfare? Short of fitting a suspension fork, the Wolverine will change its outfit for whatever riding you’re into.

Geometry & Fit

I will admit that choosing the right frame size on the Wolverine was a little tricky at first. At 175cm tall, I typically fit most brands ‘Medium’ sized mountain bikes. With the Wolverine, there are 6 different frame sizes available from 50cm to 60cm. Each frame grows by 10mm in its top tube length as you go up a size, meaning that your preferred cockpit setup might swing you to one frame size over another.

In my case, I was straddling between a 52cm and a 54cm frame size. On Soma’s advice, I ended up going with the larger 54cm size in order to gain some additional flexibility to run a flat bar in the future. The idea of being able to run a shorter stem and having a slightly longer (and therefore more stable) wheelbase was also appealing for dirt work.

Key numbers on the Wolverine include a 71.5-degree head angle and a 73.5-degree seat tube angle. These are a fraction steeper than a 29er hardtail mountain bike, but remember that the Wolverine has a rigid fork and therefore no suspension to sag into. Hardtails end up being steeper with the rider on the bike because the fork sags 20mm into its travel.

The bottom bracket sits a whopping 7cm lower than the axle line, which helps to create a low centre of gravity and to keep the bike stable at speed. It does mean that on rocky trails I did tend to clip my pedals every now and then, but it was about on par with what I’d expect from most modern mountain bikes. Again there is no suspension sag, so that 7cm figure is a little different to a hardtail.

The Build Kit on the Wolverine

Our test bike was kindly built up by the crew at Commuter Cycles in Melbourne. Not only are Commuter Cycles longtime proponents of Soma Fabrications product, they’re also well versed with setting up bikes for cyclocross, dirt touring and commuting duties.

Looking to take advantage of the Wolverine’s split dropout design, we fitted a Gates Carbon Belt Drive complete with a 46/24t singlespeed ratio. This gives the bike a super clean look that fits well with the classic lines of the steel tubing.

Washing off speed was taken care of by a pair of TRP Hy/Rd hydraulic disc brakes, which Commuter Cycles setup with compression-less Yokozuna brake cables and the TRP RRL levers.

I’ve been testing both the belt drive setup and the TRP brakes alongside the Wolverine, so make sure you keep an eye out for those upcoming reviews on AMBmag.com.au.

For rolling stock, I had a schmick set of wheels assembled in-house by Commuter Cycles wheel building wizard, Scott Symes. The build revolves around the super smooth Japanese-made Suzue hubs, which were laced sensibly with DT Swiss Competition spokes and brass nipples to the box-section Soma Weyland rims. The wheels aren’t particularly light, but the rims are wide and capable of some serious punishment.

The rest of the Wolverine’s outfit largely comes from the Soma Fabrications stable, which includes their twin-bolt alloy seatpost, sealed bearing headset and Tange square-taper bottom bracket. Up front, I specced out the 54cm frame size with an 80mm Shotwell stem and the excellent 46cm wide Highway 1 handlebars.

Other spec highlights included the fluted IRD crank arms and the supple Fizik microfiber bar tape. And it’s all finished off with a beautiful Salsa Liplock seat collar, and the very neat Problem Solvers blanks for the downtube shifter bosses.

The Wild Wolverine

Over the past 6 months, I’ve taken the Wolverine across all sorts of terrain in all kinds of different conditions. I’ve used it for day-in-day-out commuting, dirt road riding, XC racing, and general trail riding. That said, I’ve still barely touched the sides of what the Wolverine is capable of.

After spending much of the summer racing aboard a full suspension 29er, the first few trail rides with the Wolverine took quite the readjustment. You can’t bomb it around like a regular mountain bike because without suspension, you’ll pay the price for poor line choices on rocky trails. It’s the kind of bike that encourages you to stay loose and relaxed, as that’s the real key to getting the bike up and over the rough stuff.

Given my mountain biking background, I wanted to see how hard I could push the Wolverine. I raced several dirt crits aboard the Pumpkin Orange steed, which warranted some pretty strange looks on the start line. My first lap at race pace was quite the baptism of fire, with me rolling through transition looking like I’d been inside a washing machine. Once I started to pick the right race lines though, I loosened up and began to ride smoother.

The rigid setup means the handling is very direct, with the short(ish) back end on the Wolverine helping to deliver pinpoint steering accuracy when exiting tricky corners. On tight switchbacks where some mountain bikes can feel a little vague, the Wolverine feels nimble and lively. It’s refreshing in a very honest kind of way.

The wide bars and short stem help in this regard, and I felt plenty stable with the 46cm width. Typically I found that riding on top of the brake hoods to be the best position for tackling technical singletrack, with the drops being reserved for sprinting on the flats. I still think a riser bar will be the way to go if you’re more intent on singletrack than single bike lanes, but I was surprised at how comfortable I felt with the drop bars. The multiple hand positions certainly help on the longer rides too.

There’s a nice bit of swing from the back end of the bike, which you’ll feel when loading up into banked corners. It never presents itself as an issue, just more of a charming quirk thanks to the steel frame.

One flex issue that did present as more of an issue was the shuddering from the front fork under hard braking. It was only apparent when really grabbing a fistful of front brake, but the skinny fork legs flexing back and fourth wasn’t confidence inspiring.

However, this isn’t necessarily a downside, but more of a trade-off. Soma Fabrications do offer burlier straight-blade forks for their 29er hardtails, which are designed for faster and harder trail riding. The beefier forks tend to transmit a lot more feedback through to the handlebars though, and so the decision was made at Soma’s end to spec the Wolverine with the swept fork to help provide additional compliance to the front end. The design certainly works, and combined with the slender back end, the Wolverine offers an incredibly comfortable ride both on and off the road.

Following the Wolverine’s dirt-crit flirt, I decided to spend some more saddle time exploring backcountry fire roads and double track in the local forests surrounding my hometown. On these slightly smoother surfaces, the Wolverine really comes into its own. It oozes comfort and stability, and it has no problems getting into a groove for all-day exploring.

This kind of dirt-oriented adventure riding is where the Wolverine’s geometry really shines. With decent tyres and a comfortable cockpit setup, the Wolverine possesses a unique desire to maintain momentum on the kind of terrain that makes skinnier-tyre bikes feel uncomfortable, and fatter-tyre mountain bikes feel sluggish.

I feel that the next build kit will involve fitting on some gears and a pannier rack in search of overnight camping adventures. And the best aspect about using the Wolverine for that kind of expedition is that when you arrive at your basecamp, you can remove the camping gear and explore the local singletrack too.

The Skinny

For me, riding the Wolverine has opened up a whole new riding experience. It’s an absolute hoot to ride off road because it really tests the limits of your fitness and skill. I have a number of local trails that can occasionally become a bit boring if I’ve over-ridden them. Not so on the Wolverine though, where all that old singletrack becomes new and exciting again.

While it may be no frills compared to complex carbon full suspension bikes, the refreshing simplicity of the Wolverine is one of its greatest attributes. And it has to be said that for less than a grand, the Wolverine is superb value. It’s built from great quality steel tubing that is designed to last a lifetime, and it has all the necessary features that most riders are looking for these days. Once you factor in its versatility, the value is even more impressive.

As a “Monster Cross” bike, the Wolverine definitely ticks a lot of boxes. It can handle loaded dirt touring, it’s functional enough for commuting, and it’s also a helluva lot of fun on the singletrack. Of course it is no expert at any of those riding genres, but the fact that it can do them all well is why I think Soma have built an absolute winner with the Wolverine.

Hits

• Supremely versatile
• Smooth-riding steel frame and fork
• Good tyre clearance
• Trick dropouts

Misses

• Portly frame
• Fork flex

Brand: Soma

Model: Wolverine

RRP: $900 (frame & fork)

Website: www.scvimports.com.au