Revel is officially putting their 32er mountain bike up for sale. The Revel El Jefe Grande is a titanium hardtail mountain bike designed around 32-inch wheels, and was first teased as a prototype at Sea Otter just six months ago. The Colorado-based brand notes, however, that “the finished production bike is a different animal.” Here’s what we now know about the El Jefe Grande, and what’s changed.
The geometry has been refined
“A lot of 32″ bikes have pretty strange geometry,” Revel Founder and CEO Adam Miller says in a press release announcing the El Jefe Grande. “To me, most of them feel awkward like they’ve just been stretched out to fit the wheels. Figuring out how to get the handling right with these big wheels took a lot of trial and error.”
I tested a prototype version of the El Jefe Grande back in April and as a tall rider (I’m 6’3″), the geometry fit me well. Only the steering felt a little awkward at slow speeds. However, the real challenge is making the geometry work for not just large frame sizes, but small ones too.
On that front, Revel has designed size-small El Jefe Grande frames to run 32/29″ mixed wheels. Interestingly, the reported head tube angle, 67.5°, is the same for all frame sizes, from small to extra large. One challenge with the bigger front wheel is toe overlap, especially on smaller frames with shorter reaches. Some builders are compensating with a slacker head tube angle on smaller frame sizes. Revel, it appears, is not taking this route.
Looking back through my photos of the Revel 32er from Sea Otter, it appears the prototype had a slightly slacker head tube angle than 67.5°. Designed around a 100mm suspension travel fork, the El Jefe Grande is clearly an XC machine — not a hardcore hardtail by any means — so the relatively steep head tube angle makes sense. Just as long as toe overlap isn’t a problem.
Revel says the effective seat tube angle ranges between 75.8° and 76.4°, which is fairly steep for a hardtail. The actual seat tube angle is more than 3° slacker because of a kink in the seat tube to accommodate the large rear wheel while providing as much dropper post insertion as possible.
Reaches for the Revel El Jefe Grande range from 440mm to 510mm. Stack heights are 660mm for sizes medium and larger; the size small only has a slightly lower stack height — 657mm — since it still has a 32″ tire up front. Chainstay lengths range from 430mm (29er rear wheel) to 457mm.
The titanium frame has strategically placed mounts and keeps its sliding dropouts
The Revel El Jefe Grande boasts five sets of bottle/tool mounts on the frame. The prototype bike I tested back in April had just three, including one set on the seat tube. Those are gone, presumably to maximize dropper post insertion, but the good news is there are even more mounts to choose from on the finished bike.
The frame’s internal cable routing has been improved. The prototype bike fed cables directly into the top and down tubes, which was likely a quick-and-dirty solution. There’s a reason cables aren’t routed this way—for starters, it looks super awkward—so it’s good to see the final design takes a more traditional route.
Sliding dropouts allow buyers to set up the frame as singlespeed or with a traditional geared drivetrain. These are the same dropouts found on the 29er Revel El Jefe that was released in 2020. The El Jefe Grande fits 32″ tires up to 2.4″ wide.
A size large frame is said to weigh 4.76lb. The Revel El Jefe Grande is being sold as a frame only for $3,499, and buyers will need to source their own 32er fork, wheels, and tires, in addition to other parts.
For more info and to order, visit the Revel website.
Keep up with the latest mountain bike news by adding Singletracks as a preferred source on Google.
0 Comments