Trek recently released the details of the new Fuel EX 27.5+, the latest iteration of a bike that's been a mainstay in the company's lineup for the last 16 years. The big news is that this version is equipped with 27.5+ wheels, with all three models rolling on 27.5 x 2.8" Bontrager Chupacabra tires. The wheel dimension change is also accompanied by a 10-millimeter increase in rear travel and several geometry tweaks, alterations that serve to push the bike further away from its cross-country roots and deeper into territory that's populated by ultra-capable trail bikes.
Trek Fuel EX 27.5+ Details• Travel: 130mm rear, 140mm front
• Frame material: carbon or aluminum
• 27.5 x 2.8" tires
• 67.2° or 66.6° head angle
• 432mm chainstays
• 12 x 148mm rear spacing
• Price: $2399 - $5299 USD
• Availability: Fuel EX 8 and EX 9.8: now, Fuel EX 5: June.
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Trek Bikes /
@trek The Fuel EX 27.5+ comes with big 27.5" tires on 40mm rims, but it's also possible to run 29” wheels on the new ride with only a slight increase in bottom bracket height. The bike comes set in the 'high' geometry position, but a flip of the Mino Link on the seatstay allows that to be reduced to 66.6°, allowing riders to choose the handling characteristics they prefer. According to Trek, they see the 27.5+ Fuel as a supplement to their renowned Fuel EX 29; it's a sibling rather than a replacement in the line.
Frame DetailsThe Fuel EX is bristling with all of the latest standards – there's Boost spacing front and rear, and the 130mm of rear travel is delivered via a metric sized shock (210 x 52.5mm) from either Fox or RockShox depending on the model. Visually, the frame itself looks similar to previous models, that is until you reach the head tube junction area. There's now a slight hump to the top tube, and the down tube has been straightened out in a move that's said to bring the bike's stiffness to the same level as the Slash, Trek's all-mountain / enduro race bike.
Straightening the Fuel's down tube tube did bring a set of hurdles for Trek's designers to overcome, namely the fact that the fork would contact the frame if was turned too sharply. To solve this issue they came up with the 'Knock Block', which uses a keyed headset cover and a replaceable stop chip in the top tube that prevents the handlebar from turning too far. If you harbored dreams of throwing barspins on your plus-bike, the Fuel EX won't be the one for you. There's also additional protection on the outside of the down tube, just in case for some reason the Knock Block ceases blocking.
GeometryWith a 140mm fork up front, the new Fuel EX's head angle now sits at 66.6° in the low geometry position. Compare that to the prior version's 68.8° head angle and it's clear that this is intended to be an entirely different machine than its predecessor . The reach has been lengthened slightly, up to 458mm on a size large, and the chainstay length now sits at either 432 or 433mm. The rear end is designed to fit a 27.5 x 2.8” tire, a width that Trek settled on after experimenting with numerous rim and tire width combinations.
As far as sizing goes, the two aluminum models of the Fuel EX are available in six sizes, from 15.5” to 23”, and the carbon version is available in five sizes, from 15.5” to 21.5”.
| It's still not entirely clear what the future holds for 27.5+ bikes, but the fact that Trek would add a plus-sized option of one of their most popular models shows they feel there's a definite demand out there. The wider tires do make a lot of sense for this style of bike, the type of rig that's made for doing a little bit of everything, as long as fun is the overarching goal. That being said, it's going to be interesting to see what else Trek has in store this season.- Mike Kazimer |
As for Plus tyres, they are super awesome. 275+ makes sense because you can toss in regular 29" wheels with 29,4" tyres if you are going to race or just ride something different.
I mean, I love low BBs, but 329mm bottom bracket height ... seriously? Ouch. Not sure if 170mm cranks are short enough for this one.
In just a few years, they will advertise higher BBs as a new feature, helping us ride rocky trails without pedal strikes.
Why not? I don't think that the average trail rider get's the urge to do spontaneous bar spins mid ride.
Bianchi did a much better solution for that matter, they made a bumper under the downtube so that forks crown smashes into it. Well it looks weird but solves the issue in the easiest of ways.
Also, it's pretty dumb to use acronyms for every little part of the bike to make it sound more special than it really is, but since the industry can't help themselves, I think that Knock Block is an acceptable compromise. It could've been worse.
There is no reason for the downtube to be straight with modern hydroforming apart from appearance.
Look at the number of modern bikes with bended DT, I think weight/rigidity is really a minor issue.
I wonder if there is another reason for a straight DT, like if I look to the overall frame design, with low standover and BB, I guess a straight DT was the only solution to accomodate a water bottle.
That, plus overall look of the frame, which are real marketing arguments for a generalist brand like Trek.
Don't forget that this bike major concurrent is the spesh stumpy 27.5+.
Curvy stuff is more durable, thanks to FLEX n direction of forces and is laterally stiffer than straight stuff. And it is the lateral stiffness you are after in most cases as it is the quality affecting steering.
So Trek goes back in time. Congrats.
There's not really any good structural reason why a straight tube would be stiffer. In fact, for the type of loading a bicycle sees, a curved carbon tube would be better.
A straight down tube does make the head tube junction a heck of a lot cheaper to manufacture however.
Trek spend millions on R&D. They know what they're doing. You think they'd compromise the ride of the bike by introducing the knock block. No - that is the solution for re-introducing the straight down tube, not the other way round.
Anyway regardless I can't believe they're producing new frames without some integrated storage like Specialized. I hear many manufacturers are looking at something similar.
Again, there is no structural principle behind their claims of increased stiffness due to tube shape. Given the same cross section, each tube's area moment of inertia is the same, hence their resistance to bending is the same.
What straight tubes do allow is a more simple mold, and a simplified head tube joint. That cuts way, way down on costs, especially on a big production run.
I remember my 2003 spesh epic had one.
Ever bought c'dale f series before, with straight pyramidal tube shapping, so the epic looks a bit like a bio designed car in comparison.
Cannondale frames were beautiful.
I still own a 2009 f4 I bought just because it was the last batch of frames welded in US.
@mtmtber182 - it has little if anything to do with structure, I don't think it compromises anything, it was you who brought up details. I just commented on that. But I'd say this is a new selling point rather than a rational design decision from a structural perspective. It's just another bullet point on the list of features. Hopefully more companies will stock their bikes with such headsets after a big company like Trek pa es way for the trend.
Now... Trek makes some very nice bikes, Trek Factory store is probably the coolest shop in my Town, with probably best suspension service in Sweden. But their combo of marketing pitch and product management is just bollocks. The only way Trek can sell this wicked idea to me is to make a vid with Emily Batty explaining it all to me. If I was to buy a super light XC fork I'd buy Fox over Sid, because of her. I'm a creep.
What is fascinating for me is that usually one post of an engineer from the company shuts stuff down, smelly speculation bubble bursts and there's nothing else left but fresh air and a few butt hurt trolls. But something stops them reps coming in here. Not every company has Jason-at-Specialized
Reps tend to ask interesting questions and a lot of those nice and outstanding gentlemen from forums don't have answer to those. So they shut the fu*k up. And I don't blame the reps for staying away. It's a waste of perfectly good time. Would you come here if you were, oh I don't know, Wacek-at-Trek?
Pinkbikers who loose time on reading and writing posts so deep are a minority and probably not the core target of generalist brands like trek or spesh or c'dale.
So why loose time with that ? The bike will sell anyway because it looks good, got a ton of state of the art engineero-marketing acronymes giving it a high-tech aura, got a solid brand name and a good selling network.
So why bother with pinkbike trolls?
They created their own standard and there'll only be one place to acquire replacement parts from. Then there is the whole knock/cock block thing. They had to realize it, bet they even thought it was funny, when most people will wonder how they could have been so juvenile minded to have not thought clearer. When you go to buy parts I'm sure there won't be any blocking as you get bent over ....
That downtube isn't straight, it is curved near the bb. It is fairly straight though. I can't tell anything about ride quality, strength and/or stiffness just from looking at pictures. I lack the internet x-ray to check wall thickness and fibre orientations to be able to tell anything about that, let alone have a look at the calculations. I can compare some geometry numbers to what I'm riding myself and imagine what it'd be like, but that goes only so far for minor differences. If it is massively off, I wouldn't be able to tell. Moreover companies rarely mention how geometry is measured. Is suspension sagged or not? If the (straight bit of the) seattube doesn't intersect the bottom bracket, how is seat tube angle measured? The few companies who do tell have very different ways so the same obviously goes for companies who don't. The main thing I look at when deciding whether I'd like a frame or not is how low the top tube is compared to how long it is. You can derive it from standover, but I'd have to subtract bb height from that for it to make sense. But companies don't get you the bb height, instead you get the bb drop. And as you don't know the axle height (dependent on the tyres mounted) you don't know a thing. In that respect Trek does well here. In fact, I think I'd like the amount of room Trek gives me on board. The fixed seatpost on the alu version is a waste though. I have nothing against fixed seatposts as long as you can drop them down. And this frame design doesn't allow for that so this particular post would get chopped down considerably or be replaced right from the start.
So structural design is near impossible to discuss just from looking at a picture on the internet (though the discussion was amusing, thank you for that) and geometry is a can of worms. Especially on bikes with suspension and in particular if (and which is usually the case) it is not given how the geometry numbers are measured. There is one major flaw that turns all these "carefully designed" geometries into major bullshit. And unlike structural design, it doesn't take a degree to see this. Which is that the chainstay length remains fixed throughout the sizes! Really, whereas wheelbase increases by about 100mm from smallest to largest, the chainstay (which is well over 2/3 of the wheelbase) just remains fixed. Yes some very carefully designed frames like the incredible On One 456EVO2 get that treatment, but this care is not given to the design of some random Trek Fuel or S-Works Stumpjumper FSR. Ok, I'm provoking a bit here. I do understand that changing the chainstay length affects the suspension design. But isn't that worth it? We probably all agree that geometry is more important than suspension design. Or well, at least I do think so. Yes it may imply that the amount of travel is going to change between sizes and my guess (yeah, guess, sorry) is that companies are just afraid for bad responses if they're the first to differentiate between sizes. "Hey, my husband and I bought identical frames, same kind of money. But I'm only getting 128mm of rear wheel travel whereas he gets a whopping 132mm. Yeah he is taller than me, but that doesn't differ with other brands. Why are you treating women differently?" Oh boy, how are you going to set that straight? Somehow Norco does actually size the rear end proportionally (without affecting travel though probably effecting suspension kinematics), probably after input from (relatively short ex team rider) Ben Reid. So that's a company that actually designs all their bikes, not just designs a single one and slaps the same rear end onto their different sized front triangles. Just look at their "Range" bike, the rear center goes from 419mm up to 436mm. From the companies that stick with a single chainstay length (@jason-at-specialized, now that you're here anyway), it would be fair if they'd tell which size gets the proper geometry and which get the compromises.
Back to the curved or straight downtubes. I'm not too interested in the results from the survey Jason started. As frames are released per model year, it is probably like figuring out whether ABP or DW-link was first. I just like the tubes straight from an aesthetics point of view. This Trek does fairly well for me. There was a time when Specialized came with a BigHit and an Enduro SX (maybe it is when they dropped the "Enduro" name and forgot what "SX" was about) when the downtubes were so curved they were a bit ugly in my eyes. Which doesn't mean they may have been beautiful for someone else. And regardless, they were probably fine from a functional and structural point of view. I love that new Orange Four, for instance. And that is purely a matter of taste. Others might not like the Orange and prefer the tubes much more curved than on this Trek. That doesn't mean either the Trek or the Orange would fail prematurely.
And in my experience very often someone from a company would comment on PB after a product release. I recall Suntour does. Cesar Rojo from Unno bikes answered my questions perfectly well. Then apparently Trek doesn't. So it both happens. Obviously if the shitstorm as already started and the commenters don't really seem to stand to reason, I can imagine those people from those companies may feel it not to be worth it.
I was curious to see if people cared or remembered the shift from straight tubes to curved tubes. Apparently not so much.
If history is any indication, we also won't care or remember if/when the pendulum shifted back from curved to straight, should that become the case in the future. And that is OK. Some evolutions happen organically without great fanfare.
Block Lock type headsets becoming a norm on complete bikes in 3 years, YES please. Down tube/ Headtube interface bollocks - go fiddle yourself. Stiffness... for fuks sake I can't believe I got drawn into this.
I also don't notice that the rear travel is slightly less.
Seat tube that doesn't have enough depth, looks like that post isn't far off full insertion.
Crazy slack seat tube so once you have the seat up you are in a terrible pedalling position relative to the bb.
Kink in the top tube adjacent to the head tube for no apparent reason.
Headset stop system to stop fork hitting downtube. Rubber guards on downtube.
2x11 = reverb lever in poor position.
Horrendous cable routing around the bb area.
Big tyres with little knobs- umm for good grip on hardpack?
You're right regarding the ergonomics. What really needs to happen to correct all this is size specific rear centre lengths which some of us have been asking for for years. No doubt we'll get a load more bullshit like the Knock Block before we see any progress on that though.
I raises the BB and HTA) when pedaling to avoid ground clearing issues. But instantly drops the BB when coasting or hitting a obstacle that overrides the chain tension.
Best of both worlds with out any flippchipping or "OnTheFly" remote decisions fiddling. One Bike, infinit options, always...
This looks like a solution to a problem that didn't exist any more until Trek decided to recreate it.
As far as the rest of the bike goes, ya, two wheels... meh, it's another bike. But this cock block thing is just a bandaid for something that should have never made it to production. But hey, that's just my opinion!
Edit: After taking a closer look, I have to say the kink in the top tube really kills the design of the frame. That being said if someone was handing these out for free, I wouldn't say no.
Sorry but that's a good idea. People love complaining about new things (my eyes pointed at the ceiling when I first read about SuperBoost). Like disc brakes (who needs that), suspension (useless extra weight) or dropper seatpost.... Plus this one is not even a new "standard" taht makes it fully uncompatible with your old bike parts. You can still mount your fork on it.
The trek fuel ex is shown in 29 on the website...
Slack, short, and low = fun and fast
Is there any science left in the world?
yayyyyyyyy.
How bout 26 plus tires. ?
29 plus tires? Those out yet?
Nothing like increasing your outer rotational mass to (improve?) The performance of your bike.
Did you know that the toyota camry is the best selling car in the US? Honestly, cars don't get much uglier that that. No accounting for taste.
And judging by the comments, plenty of others think it's a pig too!