BikeRadar Builds | Matthew’s Genesis Croix de Fer 853

This week’s BikeRadar Build is my Genesis Croix de Fer 853 with GRX – Shimano’s dedicated gravel and adventure groupset.

The Croix de Fer is a bit of an institution, an unapologetically weighty steel tourer that was a gravel bike before gravel became the achingly trendy riding niche it is today.

Genesis offers the CdF (as it’s widely known) in various grades of steel, and there’s a titanium option too.

The Reynolds 853 variant is the poshest of the ferrous options, and it’s sold as a frameset only, complete with an all-steel fork.

I was looking to build a bike based on a mid-range Shimano GRX gravel groupset and the CdF ticked the boxes because it takes the latest flat-mount brakes and has 12mm thru-axles front and rear, so I knew there wouldn’t be any compatibility issues.

At the same time, it’s a very straightforward frame with fully external cable routing and a proper threaded bottom bracket.

The bike is meant for 700c wheels but, as we’ll get to, 650bs will fit, sort of. I’m keen to use this bike as a do-everything machine for on-road cruising, gravel and perhaps winter riding with full mudguards too.

Croix de Fer 853: heavy metal

There is no such thing as a weight weenie Croix de Fer. My medium frame (385mm reach, 593mm stack) weighs 2.4kg, but perhaps more startling is the 1.3kg of fork (uncut) that accompanies it.

That’s more than a decent aluminium road frame in its own right, and a good kilo over a high-end carbon road fork.

I say this not as a criticism of the bike, but to put things in context.

The idea with this build was to assemble the combination of Shimano GRX components that I think will be most popular among those building their own bikes, i.e. the cheapest 11-speed mechanical setup.

GRX doesn’t offer components at every level in the groupset hierarchy, so that means Ultegra-level RX810 front and rear derailleurs, 105 level RX600 shifters and RX400 Tiagra-level brakes.

I wanted a wide range of gears without huge jumps, so I opted for a 2× setup with Shimano’s RX600 46/30t crank.

Combined with an 11-34t cassette, this gives a seriously low bottom end (even with chunky tyres) without sacrificing too much at the top for my purposes.

I’ll be writing a separate review of the groupset, but building the Croix de Fer was a good refresher because Shimano’s groupsets have evolved considerably since I was last regularly building bikes up from a pile of boxes.

The correct cable routing for the front derailleur isn’t particularly intuitive, for instance, so I found Shimano’s extensive tech docs invaluable.

Another small detail that caught me out was the flat-mount rear caliper mounting bolts. As these thread directly into the caliper body when you're using a 140mm rear rotor, with a retaining pin for added security, the bolts need to be exactly the right length, and of course I had the wrong ones on hand.

A shout out goes to Mike at Madison for quickly sending me a box containing pretty much every bolt size, ensuring I ended up with the right ones.

Leftovers. Delicious, expensive leftovers

The rest of the build is mostly stuff I had lying around. The seatpost and saddle are from my now sadly departed Trek Emonda ALR while the bars and stem are random leftovers I had kicking around my garage.

Most delightful of all is the pink Chris King headset, which I’ve been hoarding for years.

The Croix de Fer has a now-rare old-school 1 1/8in straight steerer, so I finally had an opportunity to use this gorgeous headset, a much more exciting object than the no-name item that comes with the frameset (although I’m sure that would have been absolutely fine).

Oh and the nice people at Temple Cycles sent me some rather elegant stainless steel bottle cages, while the bar tape is cushy Fizik stuff.

(Side note: either I’ve lost my touch or it’s near-enough impossible to wrap Shimano hydraulic levers with no gaps without using the cheater strips. I am filled with shame.)

Then there are the wheels, which might seem a little out of keeping with the rest of the build because they’re the fearsomely expensive Mavic Allroad SL+.

These are 650b and have hookless carbon rims that measure a very respectable 26mm internally.

I should note that the Croix de Fer is not actually designed for 650b wheels and its official maximum tyre size is a 700c × 38mm.

With 650b × 47mm WTB Byway tyres there’s lots of clearance everywhere except the chainstays, where the rear tyre’s moulding whiskers are skimming the frame.

Is this a good idea? Probably not. However, I’ve already decided that these tyres are simply too fat for the riding I’m doing anyway.

They have a pleasing balloon-like quality to them, but at low pressures they feel a little too draggy on tarmac for my liking, so I’m going to try something skinnier and likely experiment with 700c wheels too.

I need to do something to the tyres in any case because I somehow failed to align the front’s logo with the valve stem, a grave offence in some quarters.

I mentioned weight earlier, and it goes without saying that this isn’t a light bike. However, thanks to some very expensive bits and bobs, the total figure is 10.8kg without pedals, which really isn’t too shabby for a bike like this.

Genesis does offer a carbon fork for the Croix de Fer which might be a worthwhile upgrade down the line, but there’s something quite appealing about an all-metal machine.

The bouncy elephant in the room

I have a confession: I haven’t ridden the Croix de Fer a great deal yet and it’s not because of the coronavirus lockdown, it’s the fault of my long-termer, the stunningly good Specialized Roubaix Expert.

The problem is that the carbon über-machine is a little bit too good at everything and despite being a road bike, it’s pretty good at faking it as a gravel machine, at least in the dry, so I keep riding it instead of any of my other bikes.

I will be giving the sturdy Croix de Fer the chance to prove itself properly though, and I look forward to putting even more stupidly expensive and inappropriate componentry on it.

What would you like to know about this machine?