NS Shows Off Prototype Fuzz With 6-Bar Suspension - Vallnord DH World Cup 2022
Halfway through the World Cup season marks a tipping point where teams start to pull out all the stops to play catch up or stay on top. The NS Bikes UR Team has brought along their new secret weapon: a prototype Fuzz with a six-bar suspension design, similar to what Commencal is using on their Supreme V5. NS Bikes is calling this linkage system a "floating high pivot design" and it provides 203mm of travel and is built around a dedicated mixed wheel setup. Team members Kye A'Hearn and George Brannigan will be unleashing the bike on the blazingly fast Andorra World Cup track this weekend since they feel it's a beneficial place to test the bike to its full capacity.
The prototype bike appears similar to their current Fuzz, in its stealthy black veil, until you take a closer look and what's going on behind the seat tube. Deviating from their classic four-bar suspension system, they've added a short link between the main triangle and the chainstay, while keeping the pivot near the rear axle. A bridge connects from that short link near the bottom bracket to the middle pivot of the upper rocker arm. Interrupting the upper chainline between the cassette and the front ring is an idler that hangs from that rate controlling bridge. On that bridge, there are slots to move the idler vertically to tune the influence of the chain on the suspension. You might also notice that they are still opting to use the O-Chain device to reduce the pedal kickback, a component that is now widely used in both downhill and enduro racing.
An idler goes hand in hand with any high pivot bike to control the amount of chain growth.
The angle of the dangle.
A better look at that rate controlling bridge that connects the two links.
The current NS Bikes UR Team Fuzz race bike.
 | We are stoked to work with such a passionate and dedicated team. The people from UR not only inspire us to find performance gains in our race bikes and give us first-hand feedback from the tracks but are also enthusiastic about sharing their opinions on the whole product range. Thanks to this, we are not only able to find ways to cut seconds at World Cup races, but we also make better bikes for real world riders. |
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No motor
No ABS
No auto shifting
No handlebar display
No dropper post.....
its like the ones they used to ride in the olden days......even some of the cables are on the outside!
Total game changer…
With the 6-bar the lower and upper links are now coupled and very small tweaks to where that middle link is placed can have major impacts on the progression and shape of the leverage curve - you can tune in all sorts of curves that would normally need totally different linkage designs. Also, because of this tunability, frame designers also can exert more control over the anti-rise and anti-squat curves - they're less coupled to the design of the leverage curve. Like, with a standard horst link design, increasing progression or increasing rearward axle path or lowering antisquat all have predicable consequences, and you're just trying to pick the best set of trade offs to achieve the feel you want. With a six-bar, it seems to my less-than-professional eye, there are fewer trade offs that need to be made.
It will also affect the leverage curve, but most 6-bar bikes have leverage curves that can already be achieved using 4-bar designs.
In some cases (e.g. Yeti, Polygon) it's done because there's now a motor where you'd normally put a pivot.
The bottom photo is the old bike with 27.5 Rux and 29in wheel. Look at the clearance differences between the 2 photos
Mike Kazimer explained that here: www.pinkbike.com/news/spotted-a-new-165mm-travel-enduro-race-bike-from-deviate.html
Still got that all encompassing "Reviews & Tech" tag despite being definitely not a review.