Cotic Launches the New BFeMAX Hardcore 29" Hardtail
PRESS RELEASE: Cotic
Today we launch a brand new product for Cotic - the BFeMAX: It's our radical, rock smashing, fast-as-you-dare hardtail.
The BFeMAX, our new hardcore 29er hardtail. It's the result of gene-splicing our award-winning, super-fast SolarisMAX 29er trail hardtail, with our tough-as-old-boots, 27.5" wheeled BFe do-it-all fun machine.
The BFe (pronounced Beefy) has a long and storied history at Cotic, introduced in 2005 as the tearaway toughnut foil to the subtle charms of the iconic Cotic Soul. As long ago as 2007 our rider Robbie Rickman did the Megavalanche on his BFe26. Imagine what you could do with a BFeMAX!
The BFeMAX acts as the same kind of amplified partner to our quintessential hardtail all-rounder, the SolarisMAX. It's the rowdier younger brother. You know the one - loads of fun, but a bit on the wild side? That's the BFeMAX.
If you're looking for the fastest descending hardtail possible, then you're in the right place. Designed with 140mm forks in mind, but with the brawn to run up to a 160mm fork, the BFeMAX screams 'Come and have a go'. There isn't really anything this bike won't jump into with both feet: Jumps, drops, big mountains, hacking about in the woods and steamrollering down just about anything, this is the bike you need to embarrass your full suspension riding mates.
There's enough room for meaty 2.6” tyres and still space for mud. The big wheels carry momentum up and along, then let you grab it by the scruff of its neck on the way down, with speed and stability all day. We have brought over the legendary toughness of the BFe with it's Reynolds 853 down tube spine, and Cotic FM custom-butted heat treated cromoly tubeset throughout the rest of the frame for the classic Cotic ride feel.
BFeMAX turns the speed up to 11 with the big wheels; it doesn't really understand it's a hardtail!
In a nod to our history of producing hooligan hardtails, one of the launch colours is our Bright Blue. It's been a mainstay of every new style of BFe since the 2nd generation frame arrived in this classic Cotic colour, way back in 2009. It was also worn to stunning effect by the Gen5 BFe, the bike that pioneered our Longshot geometry in August 2017.
The other colour option is beautifully classy Gunmetal and Copper
Here's the all important numbers:
Frame pricing is £549 / approx EUR630 / approx US$623, and delivery is included within the UK, Europe, USA and Canada.
Bikes pricing is:
£1,849 / approx EUR 2,125 / approx US$1,925 for the SLX based Silver build
£2,699 / approx EUR 3,110 / approx US$2,810 for the Gold Eagle GX bike
£2,749 / approx EUR 3,160 / approx US$2,865 for the Gold XT bike
£5,299 / approx EUR 6,099 / approx US$5,520 for the dream build eeWings/X01 equipped Platinum bike
Full information is over on our website: www.cotic.co.uk/product/BFeMAX
As with the recently launched RocketMAX Gen3, Rock Shox Lyric Ultimate is now a fork option, and we now have a selection of Shimano XT and SRAM Guide RSC G2 4 Pot brakes for those wanting a bump in stopping power, but have particular lever feel preferences.
You can play with our configurator here: https://www.cotic.co.uk/order/framebuilder/BFeMAX/
Pricing and specs may still be a little variable for the moment due to parts availability. Hope is back making bike parts again, but current lead times are a couple of weeks for some items, for instance. The Platinum build bike is priced with HUNT TrailWide or EnduroWide aluminum wheels because the usual carbon option isn't due for another couple of months. We assemble to order in the UK, and you can change the spec of your bike to your heart's content, and if we need to make a substitution we will always contact you and let you know. We find that we have a great conversation with most of our customers about their builds, so it's just part of the Cotic process.
Frames are available right now in all sizes and colours. We're fully loaded. First ordered frames will be with customers end of next week, bikes are currently taking 3-4 weeks because we're so busy.
We hope you're all well and staying safe. Cy will be around in the comments as usual for the next few days, so get your questions in. Ask away!
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Two buddies of mine have bought the last orbea laufey (pretty cool too but in alu :-/ ). You cant go wrong with these new 29ers. We were riding with a mate on a old kona honzo 2 days ago, were impressed by the progress of the the new geometry, specially going uphill. Even with 2,6 tires, its fast rolling. And in downhill, its pure fun.
The colors are great for the last models !
The numbers are pretty similar except the fork (cotic accept bigger forks).
I can say that this kind of bike is really faster than you think. And ready to almost anything !
Good work cotic ! Like usual ! :-)
Saying that #26aintdead
It could be that the shocks Cotic offers are the only ones they feel confident to support those loads
We are a small company, and these things are a major concern. Especially when as the bike designer and company owner it would be me up in court with a judge asking if i had done everything i could to prevent [insert horrible rider injury here]. It's not something we have experienced before as a business, so we had to take steps to control the risk for us and for our customers. We will be introducing more (air) shock options as we get a chance to test them, get a base tune on them and sign them off with the bike. Pretty much everyone here prefers the tunability of air shocks and the big can shocks have such great performance that we want to offer that first because in our opinion that works best on our bikes. If that doesn't line up with your preferences, that's cool. We are all different, and although we're sorry to lose you as a potential customer, you would be better off on another brand that supports your shock preferences (hopefully with the same level of testing and insight we put into our bikes). Ultimately we want to build rad bikes we like, share them with like minded riders and keep everyone safe, healthy and having fun.
Hope that gives a small insight into where we are coming from, and that you are willing to see our point of view at least.
Cheers
Cy Turner
Founder and Director
Cotic Bikes
Yeah for sure you guys can really dial in the feel you want if you focus on fewer shocks. You've by no means lost me as a potential customer and I still love your bikes
PS: I'm just a PinkBike engineer but In the future if you are looking at more shock options a Megneg Super deluxe option on it it would be awesome. I'ts my favourite shock and If i knew anything, (which i don't), I think it would really suit the Cotic.
Cheers Guys
@nmilot92 not a civic LOL
Hardtails reward standing up more when climbing gets steep and/or technical so the utility of the steep seat tube angle is not really the same.
There is no problem for me with asia. ;-) Im just curious.
And your pictures are awesome !
Surely the overlap is massive here. What can this handle that a 140mm Solaris can't?
Big wheels, huge wheelbase, short-ish chainstays: takes flat turns like an oil tanker.
Stem length doesn't effect wheel tuck, pretty sure that's determined by head angle and trail... XC bikes tend more towards tucking the front on steep twisty descents because it's got steep angles and short trail, not because it's got a 90mm stem...
As for stem length, that's not my experience. Even going up to a 50mm stem on our current bikes shows a significantly increased tendency for the wheel to tuck when you loose front end grip. Once your hands get in front of the axle on the steering axis, as soon as you loose grip your bars tend to accelerate the situation (tuck, then crash) rather than just transmit the information. I've lost the front end on my bike a few times, and with the short stem, you just kind of realise, then pick the bike back up. It's like everything happens in slow motion compared to the 'front wheel side tuck SMASH' of the old days.
Short chainstays compared to what? Rootdown is 42cm.
The longish chainstays allow for a straight seat tube, which might mean one could use a longer (40mm) stem, which helps with weighting, which is easier with slacker htas anyway. Based on the longer-than-average toptube, I wouldn't take a chance on in, but it's consistent with their other offerings and its stated intention.
Well, that's odd, because front-center to rear-center ratio (or wheelbase to chainstays depending on how you look at it) can have a pretty big effect on handling. One would think that wheelbase should definitely be considered as part of the process. It has a large impact on turning (not steering!) feel.
Everyone’s a geo expert now and everyone’s (understandably) looking for gains in areas that they have personally found to be advantageous. It’s gotten to the stage where we’re quite comfortable telling a guy who started his own very successful bike company where he’s got it wrong.
Mtb is not like road where the rider is always in one position on one type of terrain, it’s vastly more dynamic in both respects. Add to that there is a wide variety of technique - even within those that are proven to work - I think we would all do well to remember there is not one geometry that will suit all riders. This is the job of a good bike designer, to come up with a balanced bike for as many possible riders on the terrain the bike is designed to encounter as possible. But as above, the very nature of mtb makes it impossible to truly suit everyone’s taste and/ or needs.
My point is that the way one rider interacts with their bike may be completely different to that of their peer. They may even compete at the same elite level, be of similar height and weight and yet ride two quite different geometry bikes and at that level they’ll have tried everything available to them that they thought would give them the gains.
We should applaud variety, if this bike ain’t the one for you, look elsewhere. Be a real shame if all bikes weren’t the one for you. And if you still can’t find it there are a number of custom options out there.
It's a damn fact that a longer wheelbase makes for a slower _turning_ bike. And a steep head angle and/or short trail makes a quick _steering_ bike. These are both aspects of _handling_. A bike with a 1400mm wheel base and an 80 degree head angle (asumming 46mm middle-ground offset) is going to _steer_ very quickly. But it's not going to _turn_ super fast. On the flip side, a bike with an 1100mm wheel base and a 60 degree head angle (same 46mm offset) is going to _steer_ fairly slow, but _turn_ damn quick. And they're both going to _handle_ differently.
By "steer" quickly or slowly I mean the front wheel is going to start trying to change the direction of the bike with less input (quick) or more input (slow). By "turn" quickly or slowly I mean the bike is actually going to change direction more or less for a given steering input. Both are aspects of _handling_.
Everyone likes to say "Oh it's got a steep head angle, it's going to steer so fast and be twitchy", or "It's so slack it's going to be hard to turn", without taking the wheelbase (and front & rear centers) into account.
And now to hear a bike designer doesn't even look at the wheelbase until the design is done and it just comes out that way... that's disappointing. Makes me wonder how they even chose the reach numbers for the other sizes (since they obviously just extrapolated off the first size they created, obviously to fit themselves), since with the same chainstays everywhere the front-rear balance is different for every size. Reach and stack are down to the millimeter, but chainstays are "make them all the same, who cares" and then wheelbase is just "f*ck it, it is what is". In fact, what size is "the size" that they based the handling goals on? I'd assume medium with a full XS-S-M-L-XL range, but maybe it's L in this M-L-XL range... Because the XL is going to handle a bit differently than the M with their quite different wheelbases and front-center to rear-center ratios.
I know lots of people love their Cotics, and I've heard the guys on quite a few podcasts, so I figured they were a little better than the big manufacturers with design and sizing. Instead it turns out they also just say "f*ck all the sizes that aren't the one I ride, they are what they are."
With chainstays staying the same, XL riders are proportionally shifted towards the back of the bike relative to the wheels, and XS riders are shifted to the front. So shorter riders are missing out on some of the benefits of new long front-ends and still have to fight long chainstays, and taller riders are dealing with the extremes of huge reaches with (relatively) tiny chainstays. There is a reason many DH bikes have adjustable chainstay lengths and/or adjustable reach/wheelbase through swappable headset cups. Minnaar has _custom_ chainstay extenders!
Chainstay length _is important_!
And I have to say that they really suck.
...but I still love 'em. I got into the conclusion that hardtails make you happy just the moment you get over that drop/obstacle/rock section. But the moment you feel the rough under your wheels and the loose of control over rocks and roots you are to concentrate/scared to enjoy the riding.
That's why at the end of the day I always choose my full suss bike