Parlee today announces the arrival of the latest frame to its range, the sub-800g Z5.

It makes much use of Parlee’s advances in carbon moulding technology since the Z4 brought ownership to new levels of affordability. It’s Parlee’s lightest frame to date, comes equipped with a BB30 bottom bracket and borrows the twin stays from the range topping Z1.

The geometry is similar to that on the Z4 but will come in five sizes and two head tube heights for each size. The shorter headtube option is the same height as the current Z4 and the taller option adds a further 25mm.

Parlee says: “After the success of our Z4 we realized we could create a lighter weight stock frame while maintaining the same performance.”

The Z5 then features a new carbon fibre lay-up and redundant material has been eliminated saveing 25g, and the move to twin-stay seat stays with a co-moulded carbon brake bridge removes the need for a seat lug. New one-piece carbon dropouts saving 20g over the two-part forged aluminium dropouts on the Z4, the bottom bracket is a threadless BB30 design saving another 30g and a carbon seatclamp saves 7g. A new fork has a tapered steerer tube from 1.125″ to 1.25 which improves strength while still reducing weight by 30g. The total weight savings from all these small changes is in the area of 160g compared to the Z4.

UK Parlee importers Bespoke Cycling, who also offer the excellent Retul bike fitting service, say this new frame will be a bike fitters dream.

“Now bikes with higher head tubes are not new (all the big players have “sportive” models) but these are normally cheaper/less racey models,” says Bespoke’s Barry Scott. “With the Z5 there will be no such requirement for performance compromises.

“For a number of reasons (long legs/short torso, flexibility issues, previous injuries) I often do fits on people whom (for instance) would like the top tube length of the Large frame but the headtube of the XL. Unfortunately this brings certain compromises; if you get the Large you will need alot of spacers, whereas if you get the XL chances are the TT is too long and we will need to reduce stem length.

“With the Z5 we can spec the Large with the higher HT size and you have the best of both worlds: limited spacers improve front end stiffness and improve aesthetics, whilst the longer stem improves handling.”

The Z5 will come as a frame, fork, headset and front mech clamp and will cost £2750.

More at www.bespokecycling.com and www.parleecycles.com.