Dangerholm’s Solace Wasteland

Sweden, 2025. Gustav Gullholm, also known as Dangerholm, is renowned for his groundbreaking and innovative bike builds that challenge the limits of what’s possible. This time, he has ventured into uncharted territory within the SCOTT portfolio, creating a bike tailored to the rugged demands of the Wasteland from the Mad Max universe. Using the Solace Gravel eRIDE as the foundation, he unveils a custom-built masterpiece packed with unique features to make it truly apocalypse-ready.

(Words by Dangerholm)
Concept Idea
There is something special about certain movie universes. How concept, lore and world building can be so compelling that you feel like you’re drawn into it. But a big factor can also be if it just looks good, because after all it is visual art.

One such example is the Mad Max movie franchise, and especially the two latest additions shot in recent years. Incredible creations in all shapes and forms, but with a strong theme of rust, shiny metal and pointy dangerous things. Despite having an air about them of how they’ve been built in scrap yards, they are some of the coolest and most badass looking cars and motorcycles ever created.

Modern e-bikes like the SCOTT Solace Gravel eRIDE are absolutely fantastic riding bikes, with looks so sleek most people don’t even notice there’s a battery. But if we’re being completely honest they are rarely mentioned if we’d ask about the coolest and most badass bikes. 

But what if we take a Solace Gravel eRIDE and make it look like something straight out of these action movies?

The Build
The SCOTT Solace Gravel eRIDE is a bit of a wolf in sheep clothing if you ask me. Yes, it is an E-Bike and it is comfortable but this is a bike that’s way faster than what you’d expect after a first glance. And tons of fun too. This is mainly because of two factors. The little wonder that is the TQ HPR50 drive system and that it in reality is a quite close sibling to its race focused SCOTT Addict Gravel RC bike when it comes to geometry and ride experience. It’s just that here you have the option to get an extra boost.

The extra ”Klunker” style tube in the front triangle, serves no purpose other than to add to the appearance of the bike. This was cut up and re-shaped to fit as good as possible inside the Solace front triangle. While I’m no stranger to modifications I’m no carbon work expert, so I left it to my local carbon repair man to bond it in place.

To go with the rusty metal theme, I made a new drive unit guard plate out of metal, along with seat stay skid plates held in place using the fender attachment points.

The Fork
The most visually striking part about the bike is definitely the very unique looking fork. While the standard SCOTT carbon fork is perfectly fine, this area of the bike held an opportunity to go ”full Mad Max” with steel and give the bike a much more menacing appearance.

The result was a fork and handlebar combination like nothing else out there, full of amazing little details. The aero shaped tubing of the fork crown matches the headset cover, which locks the fork in place, with Damascus steel styling. Coins act as fork tube and handlebar ends, and the brake mount placement with its special cable routing is a little work of art.

Color & Design
Carbon fiber makes for lightweight and great riding bicycles, but needless to say it’s not present on any of the scrapyard style Mad Max vehicles. Here raw metal, matte black, rust and worn fabrics reign supreme. The easy way out would’ve of course been to simply paint the frame matte black. But in the world of specialty paints you can find many interesting things.

The paint used on this bike truly does rust. It contains a type of iron powder, so after application you roughly sand the paint and spray it with an activator that speeds up the rusting process.
So now any time the bike is washed or sits in the rain, it’ll rust all over again taking on new tones and textures. But of course, in our desert universe it’ll see a lot more dust than rain.

The Brakes
Why the custom fabricated disc guard on the fork and its bolt-on counterpart on the frame? Well, pushing the spirit of allowing myself to get a bit carried away and going with my wildest ideas, clearly the bike needed saw disc style brake discs.The brake discs are actually fully rideable, even though they are clearly not performance items like their other offerings.
For the brakes I went with a mechanical option, as this would go much better visually with the rest of the bike and would allow me to use metal cable housing instead of plastic brake hoses.

The Drivetrain
TQ’s HPR50 system is the heart of it all, providing 50Nm of torque paired to a 360Wh battery hidden inside the down tube. The crank arms come from Rotor, paired with cage-style pedals, and the chainring is a custom size version of Garbaruk’s TQ compatible model.

The cassette and super strong chain comes from the e-bike approved SRAM X0 Eagle Transmission product line. The matching X0 Eagle Transmission rear derailleur has been paired to SRAM Wireless Blips, working as tiny shifter buttons hidden in the grips.

Accessories
The Syncros seat post has been modified with mounts for a King Cage Oliver Flask Cage, made specifically to fit a Stanley flask.

On the down tube you’ll find a King Cage Manything Cage, which normally is used as a luggage rack but here holds a retro Elite bottle instead using leather straps.

The old and worn Brooks leather saddle is the only item on the bike, aside from the steel fork and handlebar, with true patina. It was my commuter saddle for many years, including surviving a crash or two.

While not perhaps fully as cool looking or imposing as some muscle car, motorcycle or monster truck out of the movies I’d say that it sure hit the mark. It looks like no other bike really, and encourages you to imagine it in a different world. 
 
But the best part is that it actually is so much fun to ride. Not only is it still a great bike thanks to the SCOTT Solace Gravel eRIDE frame being the base, there’s just something about looking down at that fork, handlebar and rusty top tube while you’re riding.

In the end, the only downside with this bike is that it’s very difficult to find a matching riding attire. As I’ve been forced to realize, post-apocalyptic riding kits have not yet come in style.