Yeti's Chris Conroy Talks About SB 66 Switch Suspension

Chris Conroy is the man who powered Yeti into mountain bike's modern era - a highly charged experimental period that produced a number of suspension designs. Yeti's hunger for the ultimate ride spawned a variety of simple single-pivot swingarms, and some out-of-the blue configurations like the 303 downhiller's sliding-track 'Rail Technology' and more currently, the use of a rolling cam to moderate the rate changes of its longer-travel trail and all-mountain suspension. 'Switch Technology' is the name that Yeti coined for its new eccentric-cam suspension and Conroy was on hand at Dirt Demo to share some of the back story of the design as well as to walk PB through its most important features.



Conroy says that Yeti was approached by Sotto Design Group, who showed him a raw prototype of the suspension system. At that time, Yeti's mid-travel ASR 5 was based upon a single-pivot swingarm that drove the shock via a rocker link. Conroy didn't bite the first time because the ASR 5's suspension rate curve was very consistent and he felt that its pedaling was as good as an XC-trailbike gets.



What changed Conroy's mind, was the fact that Yeti's cross-country suspension, like almost every contemporary design, compromises some degree of mid to end-stroke performance in order to provide firm pedaling in the beginning of the suspension's travel. Short-travel bikes don't suffer as much from this problem, but as travel increases, so does the unwanted rate change. The Switch suspension's eccentric cam had the potential to provide the same degree of firm pedaling action without causing the suspension to push through the mid stroke the first time that the bike hit a substantial bump. Shortly afterwards, when Yeti was developing its six-inch-travel SB 66, they realized that they could use the cam's two-way action to control the shock's leverage rate all the way to full compression.



Conroy admits that there are a couple of AM/trailbikes out there that may pedal a bit sharper than his SB 66, but that, he explains, is a compromise that Yeti can live with. To maximize pedaling firmness, he explained, one must live with a slightly harsher feel throughout the suspension travel. 'Like us or hate us,' says Conroy. 'Yeti has always made our bikes to showcase handling and suspension performance, even if those attributes may compromise pedaling slightly. In the case of Switch, I think we got both sides of that equation spot on.'





When asked about braking vs suspension action, Conroy shouted out a short, but enthusiastic string of adjectives that probably shouldn't be repeated here, but the gist of it was, 'Switch suspension performs extremely well under braking in any situation.' The fact that Switch suspension is a true four-bar system underscores the possibility of braking being decoupled from the rear suspension, and initial ride impressions bear witness to Conroy's battle cry.





The fact that Yeti's entire fleet of Demo SB 66 bikes were loaned out throughout the two days of Interbike's Dirt Demo indicates that Yeti did something right. We look forward to an in-depth review of the '66 this fall. In the meantime, visit Yeti's well-organized website to get the 411 on the geometry and specs of the SB 66.

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