Is there a retro full sus bike which can still cut it?

[66 triumph daytona]

'97 was definitely the year when full sus. grew up. I bought a Marin Rift Zone.They were available from the back end of '96 so could fit into this category.
My '96 Proflex Attack LE is more of a soft tail but is OK for XC riding. The Rift Zone only had 3" of travel up front and really needed more. I fitted a Bomber with around 5" of travel but that was a bit too much. Never satisfied!
It's the length of the top tube/short stem thing that makes modern bikes so much better. You don't feel like you're going to go OTB like we did in the good old days.
My Whyte JW4 and PRST4 are unique. Short in the top tube but the non bobbing suspension is what suspension should be. I'm doing the Mary Towneley loop in April. It's 47 miles and 6,500 feet of climbing so my weapon of choice will be the JW4. It's light and should be ideal for this sort of ride.

Totally agree.I got a 97 Kona King Kikapu with Z1s and in one fell swoop it consigned all the previous bonkers designs to the bin.It could do things that the previous ones simply couldnt.Its not a patch on my Anthem of course but for the time it was a game changer.

 

[TOMAS]

Re: Re:

I quite enjoy my Giant MCM D990 from '97 - NOTHING on modern bikes and I mean NOTHING, but for its time it does ride really nice

Do you have a build thread for your D990?
I have one I'm soon to build up

No I don't i'm afraid, I bought it mostly as standard, well except the h.set, fork, wheels, stem, bars and seatpost & seat! It was effectively 'saved from death' - was somehow running a 1" steerer Zoom fork in a 1.1/8 headset with bare metal on metal, a sky high stem and bars too - the guy said he'd built it that way for the sale but thank the lord it hadn't had a proper ride like that! I stripped and rebuilt it from scratch, so if you've any questions feel free to PM me but all fairly simple

 

[al-onestare]

'97 was definitely the year when full sus. grew up. I bought a Marin Rift Zone.They were available from the back end of '96 so could fit into this category.
My '96 Proflex Attack LE is more of a soft tail but is OK for XC riding. The Rift Zone only had 3" of travel up front and really needed more. I fitted a Bomber with around 5" of travel but that was a bit too much. Never satisfied!
It's the length of the top tube/short stem thing that makes modern bikes so much better. You don't feel like you're going to go OTB like we did in the good old days.
My Whyte JW4 and PRST4 are unique. Short in the top tube but the non bobbing suspension is what suspension should be. I'm doing the Mary Towneley loop in April. It's 47 miles and 6,500 feet of climbing so my weapon of choice will be the JW4. It's light and should be ideal for this sort of ride.

Totally agree.I got a 97 Kona King Kikapu with Z1s and in one fell swoop it consigned all the previous bonkers designs to the bin.It could do things that the previous ones simply couldnt.Its not a patch on my Anthem of course but for the time it was a game changer.

But even then in 97 the URT design wasn't the right option. It lasted one more year into 98 before 4-bar took over fully. It's quite something to look at that line up in the catalogue and see two completely different set ups: one that lasted for a decade, one for 24 months.

 

[brocklanders023]

Re:

That misses the point of URT though. It was meant to be rear suss for people that didn’t want rear suss, the gentle link for people used to rigid or ht that were not convinced by full suss. To that end it worked and did it’s job. It was never meant to be anything other than a short term fix.

 

[al-onestare]

Re: Re:

That misses the point of URT though. It was meant to be rear suss for people that didn’t want rear suss, the gentle link for people used to rigid or ht that were not convinced by full suss. To that end it worked and did it’s job. It was never meant to be anything other than a short term fix.

I get your point. For me we'll agree to disagree as it's not how a lot of the press wrote about it back then.

 

[bolly]

Re:

Does an orange 224 class as a retro bike these days?

 

[madjh]

I have own a full suspension arround 1998-99 a Element Team Only and was amazing, the rear works really well and can compare with the new models, but it has a problem with the geometry and I have to sold. Now I own a 2006 Element 70 with 2018-19 componentes, it has a fox CTD instead the RP3. Rp3 works quite fine and the CTD is similar. But the bicycle is pure joy, Amazing. It is perfect for narrow and twisty paths and it is better than any other modern bicycle I have tested, 27.5 or 29 because they are not as fast in reactions, and have a long handlebar and that combined with close trees are not a goood combination and new bikes feels a bit big in this enviroment.

Now the Element 70 will be next to his brother, a Yeti SB5T. It is in process but with this two bicycles (and 3 other more hard tails) I have forget the idea of building a STS or a Marin Nail Trail FRS or any retro dual suspension bicycle. I like the idea but it is far away from the Element even the first one.

In this photo the Element TO was 9,8 kg.