Jeff designed his iconic Truss forks to make the best use of the traits of titanium (the original material in which he made them) in order to deliver the maximum stiffness and strength with the least weight, all while maining a forgiving ride. They deliver an impressive ride quality that manages to balance precise tracking—even under hard braking—with just a bit of vibration damping in the rough stuff, so they are hard to beat on those terms. He found though, that there were times when a traditional unicrown-style fork was perfectly adequate, and therefore a good option for riders who didn’t need the extra stiffness of the braced truss design. The Unicrown design allows for more bosses to mount traditional low-rider racks, bottle cages, and fenders, making it a great option for riders who want to load their bikes up with cages and racks. For this reason, as well as simply to expand the range of useful options, in 2009 Jeff set about making the best unicrown fork he could. Then, in 2010, the Jones Unicrown fork was introduced for the Jones 29 frames, with a one-piece, machined steerer tube and custom CNC’d dropouts. That fork allowed riders to build bikes like the Jones City and Touring Bike featured in this blog post. Now 8 years later, Jeff has brought the Jones Unicrown fork to the Jones Plus LWB and Jones Plus SWB, which opens a new range of Jones city, touring, and bikepacking build possibilities!
Using the same geometry of as Truss forks (with 76mm of offset for the Jones Plus LWB, and 55mm of offset for the Jones Plus SWB/Jones 29), the new Jones Plus LWB and Jones Plus SWB Unicrown forks maintain the great handling for which these geometries have become known, but lose a bit of precision and instead substitute an extra smooth ride and enough bosses to attach just about everything you might want to carry on your fork. The Jones Plus LWB and Jones Plus SWB Unicrown forks use heat treated, custom butted chromoly tubing, with custom CNC’d dropouts and one piece, internally butted and externally machined steerer tube to make the best unicrown fork possible.
This is the first time that the Jones Unicrown fork is available in the Jones Plus LWB fork geometry, and its introduction brings a new level of versatility and smoothness to that already extremely smooth and versatile frame! This is because where the Jones Truss fork puts a premium on fore-aft stiffness for precise handling, the Jones Unicrown fork is built to allow ease of mounting gear and fenders. The tradeoff with this is that the fork has much more flex under hard braking than the Truss (a trait it has in common with other non-truss forks). A side benefit of this however, is that the Unicrown fork—especially when combined with the Jones Plus LWB’s very slack headtube angle— has a nice springy ride that really soaks up bumps, so it’s a great option if maximum comfort is the goal. Combined with a Jones Plus LWB frame, the Unicrown fork for the Jones Plus LWB makes for a truly exceptional touring, city, or bikepacking bike.
All Jones framesets were originally designed for use with Truss forks, which add 40mm of stack above the top of the headset, so when installing the Unicrown fork, make sure to install a 40mm spacer in addition to whatever amount of spacers you normally use if you want to get the same stem height. Also remember that the Jones Unicrown fork uses a standard press-on crown race, so if you have a headset for a truss fork, you will need to either replace it or get a press-on crown race (if available for your headset).
The new Jones Plus SWB Unicrown fork will work with older Jones 29 frames since the length and offset is the same, but you will need a new front hub, because the dropout spacing on all of the Jones Plus Unicrown forks is 150x15mm thru-axle (the same as all the current Jones Plus LWB and Jones Plus SWB Truss forks). This allows original Jones 29 riders to get an expanded range of rack and bottle cage options along with access to the latest 150 x 15mm front hubs!
Along with the the two different fork geometries to match the Jones Plus LWB or the Jones Plus SWB frame geometries, the new Jones Plus Unicrown forks get a few more carefully-placed bosses to allow you to mount a wide variety of cages and/or racks! All of the Jones Plus Unicrown forks have three bosses down the outside of each leg, which allow you to mount a triple-boss cage. The lowest of those three bosses has a twin on the inside of the leg, allowing you to mount a Tubus Duo low-rider front rack. In this configuration, there is still room to mount a standard water bottle cage above the lowrider for extra water capacity, further expanding the versatility of the fork. Down at the dropout, there is a boss in front of the dropout as well as one behind to facilitate fender and low rider mounting, in addition to baskets and other front racks. Finally, the steerer tube is drilled at the crown for mounting fenders, racks, baskets, or lights among other things.
Check out the photos that follow for some of the various combinations of racks and cages that can be used:
Please note that there will be limited quantity to start: the first Unicrown forks will only be available as part of a Jones Complete Jones bike, then as part of frameset, then finally on their own once we have more inventory. If you would like to be notified when Framesets with the Unicrown fork or the Unicrown forks become available please choose the product you’re looking for from our Framesets or Forks pages and and enter your email for notifications!
If you are interest in a Complete Jones bike with the Unicrown fork please email or call.
