Full Suspension Mountain Bike Bikepacking

After demoing several different full suspension 27 5 bikes trying to find the perfect bikepacking trail machine the pivot mach 429 trail got the nod for gin s long term review.

Full suspension mountain bike bikepacking.

Scott spark 950 13 9kg and us 2899 the scott spark 950 has everything you want out of a full suspension trail bike. Full suspension mountain bikes were originally rejected by bikepacking purists primarily because of the difficulty of mounting bags on a bike with a back end that moves relative to the frame. This is especially well suited for an overnight trip. A slack head tube angle a long top tube a short stem wide handlebars a dropper seatpost and clearance for 2 6 tyres.

I once gravitated toward hardtails and shorter travel full suspension bikes for bikepacking fixated on the fact that these are lighter and more efficient over smooth surfaces. Riders who only had full suspension bikes wanted to go bikepacking too though and they quickly found ways to deal with that problem. Full suspension frame bag pack list bikepacking it often surprises me to see just how much can fit into a full suspension frame pack. Plus our take on what s required for a full suspension bike to make a great bikepacking rig.

Here s my typical snug fitting bikepacking packlist. This bedrock frame bag made of x pac and dyneema was custom made for a large salsa pony rustler. Being able to run. But really there s no one bike right for bikepacking.

But after spending a week riding 14 000 foot peaks in colorado a few weeks touring from bike park to bike park in the australian alps and a month bikepacking. Bikepackers use everything from touring bikes to full suspension rigs on their explorations. A full suspension is the right choice for technical bikepacking trips lots of technical trails and rocky roads will be much more comfortable on a full suspension. It s perfectly doable to bikepack on a full suspension mountain bike.

There are a couple of caveats to this however. It s better to have a full susser with a bit of space in the front triangle and ideally a bottle mount the ibis ripley has two pairs of bottle mounts.