Two years ago I rode the Salsa Bucksaw full suspension (FS) fat bike, and at the time I said it was the best bike, fat or not, that I had ridden all year. Since that time there have been plenty of FS plus bikes hitting the market, but only one or two new FS fat bikes (the Turner King Khan came and went, while Trek only announced their FS Farley fat bike a few months ago). So imagine my surprise (and quite frankly, stoke) to find three full suspension fat bikes on display at Interbike this year.
Full Suspension Fat Bikes
Recon is a South Korean company that seems to sell a lot of ebikes, but at Interbike I noticed a lone “classic” mountain bike on display, the X6-III. According to the placard, the Recon X6-III weighs 17kg (37.5lbs) and retails for $3,700 USD. This particular build sports an inverted DNM fork and a DNM coil shock, which seems like overkill to me. However, the Recon website notes the rider weight limit for this bike is a generous 125kg (275lbs), so maybe the coil shock isn’t such a bad idea after all. Front suspension is pegged at 100mm, with no mention of actual travel in the rear (my guess is it’s also about 100mm).
In addition to the X6-III, Recon appears to offer other versions of their FS fat bike, including one in titanium. Several of the builds shown online appear to cost half as much as the X6-III “Hyper” bike shown at Interbike.
The IMUST Malamute is another FS fat bike from Asia, with this particular bike coming from mainland China. The Malamute is offered in a full carbon frame, and you can actually buy one of these online for $3,799 USD. Even though the Malamute is priced similarly to the Recon X6-III, buyers appear to get much more bang for their buck with a carbon frame, RockShox suspension, and even carbon rims. Claimed weight is about 15.6kg (34.4lbs) without pedals.
I wrote about the Lamere Dopamine last week, so here’s the abbreviated version. Lamere says this is the world’s lightest FS fat bike, and it’s designed to work with a number of different wheel diameters and widths. The bike is carbon fiber and claims a whopping 130mm of rear travel. Pricing starts at $5,900 USD for a complete bike.
Click over to page 2 to read about even more fatties!
