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Written by Tyler Benedict
13Comments
The new Pilot Scram Pinion is the world’s first gravel bike with Pinion’s electronic Smart.Shift gear box. And it’s paired with Gates’ CDX Belt Drive and titanium frame for ultra-low maintenance all around.
Pinion’s Smart.Shift debuted in 2022 for e-bikes, pulling power from their battery. Then in 2023, they launched this standalone unit with it’s own battery and Priority Cycles launched the first mountain bike with it that summer. This is the first drop bar bike to use it.
The system combines Pinion’s internally geared gearbox at the cranks with electronic shifting, overcoming the original’s drawback of requiring two cables running from the shifter, replacing them with a single wire.
It’s housed in a custom titanium shell, beautifully integrated into this frame’s design.
For drop bar bikes, it’s paired with TRP HyWire shifters and brakeset, which is a gamechanger for ergonomics compared to the mechanical twist shifter. Both brake hoses and the shift wires run internally through the frame, with a small charging port on the downtube.
Pilot is using the Pinion C-line model with 12-speeds and rapid 0.2-second shifts. It can shift under load or at a standstill. You can even program a “starting gear” that it’ll automatically return to when you come to a stop, making take-off easier and at just the right cadence.
The bike uses sliding dropouts to tension the belt drive, with a bolt-together frame brake on the driveside seatstay.
The completely sealed gearbox and maintenance-free belt drive makes it a perfect adventure bike, and it has triple bottle bosses on the seat tube and both sides of the downtube, giving you plenty of storage options…
…plus rack and fender mounts on the rear. Swap out the fork for something with Anything Cage mounts (or add Old Man Mountain’s new Axle Pack kit) and you’re ready for bikepacking.
It’ll be available as a frameset (€4,200) and complete bike (from €8,250) with the following spec:
- Wheelset: OHR G2 / G45
- Handlebar: Ritchey Venturemax
- Seatpost: Ritchey 2-Bolt
- Frame finish: Brushed Frame with Sandblasted Logos / custom logos
- Fork: Pilot Carbon Gravel
- Brakes and shifters: TRP HyWire
- Tires: Vredestein Aventura / Grezzo 38 / 44mm
- Wheels: OHR Cycling G2
Tyler Benedict
11,267 articles
Tyler Benedict is the Founder of Bikerumor.com, where he’s been writing about the latest bikes, components, and cycling technology for almost two decades. Prior to that, Tyler launched and built multiple sports nutrition brands and consumer goods companies, mostly as an excuse to travel and ride in new places.
Based in North Carolina, Tyler also loves the Vanlife & family adventure travel and is always on the lookout for the next shiny new part and off-grid adventure.
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Oliver
7 months ago
Disappointingly Pinion have no plans to accommodate any of the following: power meter that isn’t pedal based; gearing that isn’t adventure / touring; oval chainrings. I’d assumed all would be on the cards given this development … but they said no plans for any of them.
Matthias
7 months ago
Reply to Oliver
Of all these things, the power meter is the only one that might make a tiny bit of sense if you explained what your problem with pedal based meter is. If you don’t like the gearing, change a sprocket, so that’s a non-issue, and if you think just a few seconds of how an oval chainring would even work with a Pinion it should become clear that it doesn’t.
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Oliver
7 months ago
Reply to Matthias
lol. “if you think just a few seconds” – oval chainrings for belt drives work in exactly the same way as they do for chain driven. there’s no difference. you can get them made up yourself, but it would be useful to have them made available by Gates or Pinion. PM pedals are less durable, often increase stack, cost the earth and unless axle based drastically reduce shoe clarance at pedal axle.
Reply
7 months ago
Reply to Oliver
Oval rings have to be timed with your leg-stroke to have any (if there is any…) effect. In a Pinion gearbox there’s a whole set of gears (aka ratios) between the cranks (input, aka your legs…) and the belt pulley/chain ring (output). So yeah, technically an oval chainring or belt pulley can be made, but it makes no sense at all.
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mud
7 months ago
Reply to Oliver
That’s nuts. An integral power meter in a Pinion? Oval rings with a Gates drive?
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SteveT
7 months ago
Reply to Oliver
Yes, because non professional racers actually need power meters or the slew of other devices the gullible have been convinced they need to ride a bike recreationally. LOL
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Ben
5 months ago
Reply to SteveT
Yep, thought exactly the same. They’ll always be someone who wants something extra. In what world would a Power meter be useful for a bike with a pinion gearbox? Heh, why not add a Bluetooth speaker in there as well and a coffee grinder. Something seriously wrong with people nowadays.
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mud
7 months ago
Looks like the frame would take 45mm tires max, kind of a miss for Pilot. Don’t know what kind of “chainline” such a set up would be but if it works for the Priority 600 they could easily have designed the frame to take a bigger tire, which would appeal to those who are ready to jump on this. Plus an adventure fork.
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SteveT
7 months ago
Reply to mud
The vast majority of gravel rides and riders never need anything over a 45. If you are actually riding stuff regularly that requires a tire over a 45 you might as well be on an XC MTB at that point if you are honest about it. 🙂
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mud
7 months ago
Reply to SteveT
There are a lot of drop bar riders who need fat rubber to tackle things like the TD, Atlas Mtn Race, Silk Road etc. In fact that niche segment is growing quickly. For these people, the Tour Divide is the keystone they look to, and you need 2.1 width tire at minimum. With all the mud they have been getting lately, IGH and Pinions are growing in popularity.
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Ben
7 months ago
Reply to SteveT
“Need”? That’s probably accurate.
But who around here only considers what they ‘need’ related to bikes versus what they ‘want’?
And also, 700x50s as well as 27.5×2.1s are totally rad on a gravel rig.
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Naka
7 months ago
Reply to SteveT
It’s actually great to ride gravel or race ultra-distance on fatter tires on a gravel bike geometry. I never go skinnier than 700x50c or 27.5×2.1 and it’s a great compromise between speed and comfort.
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