Construction and Features Just like the name implies, the Ripmo's look combines aesthetic elements from Ibis' Ripley and Mojo. According to designer Roxy Lo, “I felt like the era of straight, aggressive and angular, mixed in with a little swoop, might just be a fun and efficient way to approach this new platform.” The result is a carbon frame that still has a distinctly Ibis look, but with all of the features that today's riders are looking for in a longer travel 29er. There's a threaded bottom bracket, clearance for up to 2.6” tires, and plenty of room for a water bottle, even with a larger shock like Fox's Float X2 installed.
In addition, the Ripmo's short seat tube allows for the use of longer travel dropper posts – at 5'11” I was able to use a post with 175mm of drop on a size large frame with plenty of room left for adjustment.
Not all methods of internal cable routing are created equal, but Ibis went with one of the best options possible – molding tubes to the inside of the frame. Feed the housing from one end and it'll pop out the other, all without needing to resort to a combination of zip ties, dental tools, and magic to coax it out of the frame.
Bushings vs. Bearings Ibis chose to use bushings rather than cartridge bearings for the Ripmo's lower link pivots, citing the fact that bushings work well in areas with high forces and minimal rotation. That's true in theory, but removing the rear shock from the Ripmo and cycling the suspension revealed what I would call a significant amount of friction from those bushings.
Sure, the swingarm acts as a large enough lever to overcome that friction, and the rear suspension felt very smooth out on the trail, but I couldn't help but wonder if it could be even smoother. There's a reason we're starting to see more shocks released with cartridge bearing mounts – the reduced friction they create is noticeable, particularly when it comes to small bump sensitivity. Ibis does offer free lifetime replacement on the bushings, but still, I wish they'd gone with cartridge bearings.
According to Travis McCart, Ibis' Quality Engineer, they've recently implemented a change to the frame assembly that's designed to alleviate some of the friction I noticed, and the video below is of a frame that was recently pulled from the production line.
"Friction was a huge concern for us when considering to switch from bearings to bushing for the lower pivot. We knew from testing that bushings would have an advantage over bearings because they were stiffer, lighter, and would not become "notchy" feeling, but we also knew that they might be perceived as inferior to bearings due to increased friction. With all the steps suspension companies have been taking to eliminate friction, we realized we would have to spend a lot of time and effort refining and tightening our tolerances to minimize the friction in our system.
"After receiving our first test frames, we experimented with opening up the ID as much as we could so that there is minimal friction but also no free play, even after the break in period. Based on our test results, we decided that we could open the lower pivot tube spec by .2mm to achieve the performance we wanted. To do this, we have added a final reaming process, and we check every pivot bore with go and no-go pin gauges that are within a few hundredths of a millimeter of each other in diameter. The result is that all production frames have a very smooth suspension action with minimal friction."
We get it. You don’t like XT brakes. You can stop bringing it up now.
we need less hate, more bikes and beer!
I’m a customer. I talk sh*t because I spent real money on a product that didn’t deliver. It’s like I’m supposed to just say “they are a drunk, cut them a slack while they work out their problem”
Also, in full agreement with @mikekazimer that the previous generation Shimano brakes were flawless. That makes them fact they stuck with the current flawed design for years even more frustrating. SRAM fixed their problem.
When it comes to handlebars, 31.8 is better for alu, 35mm is better for carbon. Some call it polishing the turd, it being the carbon fibre bicycle handlebar. It doesn't matter if it's on a road bike, XC bike or DH bike. It's madness unless you change them after every crash. So if anyone doesn't get how dumb people fed by a*shole marketers dumb down the sport and make everyone take consequences, here you have an example: 35mm handlebar standard.
In both situations people set it upon themselves. Good luck. You may need it.
Another solution I’ve used is just swap the levers for M6000 Deore ones - I like this cus they’re very cheap to replace and don’t have the on the fly adjusters to snap off. For whatever reason the Deore levers don’t seem to suffer the same issue but it’s possible I’ve just been lucky with them.
I think a lot of people would echo the same thing
And if you bottom out an air shock the frame isn’t built good enough.
What would happen with a coil shock back there?
"Well son, you see there are other good people who have families they need to feed, and this allows them to do that."
"But can't they just eat a little less?"
Yes. Bikes even this good shouldn't cost that much. Yes, tech is cool and gets expensive but come on. $5000 is enough.
or buy an intense frameset for $2500 and buy your parts from Germany.
Also, if those fit dudes were having fun on their “overkill” bikes, what’s the issue?
Q: "soooo to further clarify, you go to the local bike park to watch fit guys?"
A: No. I consider myself, my buddies, and pretty much everyone I saw that day as reasonably fit, so if you count the following - watching replays of videos that my buddies took of all of us riding the trails, gaping as a friend rode into a tree, or flew off a jump and landed in a manual, which he then rode down the rest of the trail, or admiring the way some guy was throwing perfect whips off monster gaps or making a techy section seem effortless - then maybe, but no, I don't watch in the way you are alluding to, and I definitely do not go to the bike park primarily to watch others; I'm much too focused on having fun on my bike!
Q: "Also, I those fit dudes were having fun on their 'overkill' bikes, what's the issue?"
A: There isn't really one. For some of those riders, were their bikes overkill for what they were riding? Yes. Could they have been fine with a less expensive bike that would've served their needs just as well if not better? Probably. They didn't need those bikes for what I saw them riding, but there were plenty of features there that would've fully warrantied those bikes, and maybe they ride harder at other times. At any rate, those bikes provide more comfort and margin for error, and were obviously what those riders wanted. At the end of the day, it's their money. I have no problem with them "having fun on their [...] bikes". I was just laughing because I saw them having big bikes and not utilizing them to the fullest, and I knew that I had been sucked into thinking that my bike was grossly inadequate and I desperately needed a bike like that when I should've just been happy with what I've got.
Hope that cleared everything up. Anything else, anyone?
Fuuuuck that.
Worse yet, two of my riding buddies (same weight & riding style as myself) and my girlfriend (30% lighter and certainly riding with more finesse) manage at most a season on their big-brand, all bearing bikes.
So now about guys from IBIS claim that shorter offset make bike feel like it has slacker HA...
Does it make feel slacker or not? Because if it make it feel slacker, than Sentinel should feel like it has 62 HA O_о
If someone can explain this to me, I would be grateful.
Thanks in advance.
Transition, and others are trying it the other way around, IE a very slack head angle for descending, and then shortening up the fork offset & reducing the trail the biggest thing I've noticed on the ride quality is it doesn't seem to "flop" in corners. There are some other things it does, blah blah blah, but I've never read before that it would do some magical slackening effect. That may just be a typo AFAIK.
I bet ol' PVD could yak on for hours about it.
Except that a shorter fork offset means a longer trail.
I've also been confused about how one person will say it increases trail (which it does) which should have a similar effect to increasing trail from HA, but then the next person says it will speed things up a bit especially on slack bikes.
shorter offset tracks straighter w/ heavier steering, hence the comparison to slacker HA.
longer offset/less trail makes it easier to pick and alter lines IME.
How this affects you will be significantly determined by your riding style and ability, which can change.
This is what happens when a 5mm change doesn't make one ounce of difference (except to the best riders in the world), and people are searching for things to say about how the performance changes. Like you said in your post, the change is really, really minor. It's the hot thing for bike companies to talk about these days.
The RipMo is not that bike! It’s something quite different. Had two wet ride so far and I absolutely love it. Climbs better than my Mojo3, seems to rip grip out of the ground, is super composed on the steep stuff but still fun to ride on the more mellow trails. I deliberately didn’t go for a Sentinel as it’s only going be really good when I’m really scared!
Mine was frame only, DPX2 shock. Went 2019 (42mm offset) Lyrik rather than fox. 175mm KS post. DHF 2.5 and DHR 2.4 WT’s. 29.8lbs. QC on mine is very good. Paint is even and thick. Early days but I’m absolutely sold so far.
Also notice they weight it with a hub and rotor. Also note that the swingarm length will provide a nice lever to overcome the noted friction. The engineer in me says bushings are best in this application for the long haul but the LTS/Turner experience in me says give me bearings for the best feel and I'll replace them as needed. I've ridden my HD4 almost daily for 8 months now and the bearings still feel great.
When was the last time you tried to compress a shock with your hands? Surely you can see how much of a bullshit point this is?
And BTW, when is the Rallon review coming?
Neither bike felt to long either, and that's saying something because I'm coming off of a 2013 rocky mountain with a close to 430 reach on a large. The Orbea and the Ibis honestly felt about the same seated. The Ripmo is slightly longer when standing which helps descending.
The orbea was the first time i ever encountered a seat tube so short there were comparability issues with seatpost and my longish 765mm seat rail height. That was until i bought the Ripmo. On the large Rallon i had the stock Aeffect post to the max line. On the Ripmo, the stock 150mm KS wouldn't fit. My Bike Yoke 160mm would not fit, for some stupid reason bike yoke says the 185 wouldn't fit either, for $80 extra the 175mm KS would barely clear. So my options were slim. Instead of spending $450 on a 9point8 long travel i got a fox transfer 150mm that cleared by less than an inch. If your a shorter build you'll appreciate the low seat tube though
But I’ve bever been able to get too excited about Ibis bikes anyway, don’t know why but they just don’t move the lever for me.
Easy answer, more bling, more expensive and people want an X2 to show their riding buddies.
I have ordered with a DPX2 and Perfomance fork. But I also have a custom damper cartridge on order.
www.pinkbike.com/photo/15730305
Seeing what happened to the paint on my HD, the talk of bushing tolerances makes me really nervous.
I know I’m being OCD and there aren’t many other people who look at their bikes like I do , but look at a Santa Cruz and then look at a 3600$ Ibis frame and tell me which one you feel good about.
I think the Sentinel is the wrong bike for comparison even though the travel numbers are similar. I think the Rallon is the closest bike to it, followed maybe by the new Mondraker Foxy 29. I just think from my short time on the Sentinel it’s a little more of a sacrifice on the climbs.
If I was going chase Enduro glory, I’d be tempted to play with an angle set to try 0.5-1 degree slacker HA, but I don’t think it’s really needed. I’ve never felt limited by the bike at speed yet. I’ve even got a few top 10 DH segments locally, not bad for a 44 YO ex XC guy, not a former DHer.
This bike does make me want to try riding a long travel 29’er again.
A note on the X2 shock: Most people ride with and love it because of its high and low speed adjustibilty on rebound and compression ( also why so many like the Fox 36RC2).
My XT brakes have been set and forget, with a bleed once a year. The code brakes on my dh bike are warranty replacements , hot weather/locked levers.
This is definitely my next bike anyhow.
We have sent back to Sram lots of Code crappy levers . We are sick of their So called, "Minor issues"
The condom exo one stretches a tiny bit fatter than the DD one.
Great size for U.K. winter I thought, just enough slim enough to cut through mud without sacrificing too much cushion but will probably suffer the extra width of the 2.5 come autumn and see what it’s like.
Thank you so much
Not sure I get 35mm for non-DH bike, just how rigid do you want your bars? I want a little give to help smooth out chatter, it’s like wheels where too stiff is possible.
The Pole Machine and Evolink 140 on paper look crazy. A large Evolink 140 reach is 510mm and the wheelbase is 1317mm. By all other manufacturers standards they're crazy. Fortunately Leo Kokkonen hasn't based his bike designs on other companies standards and now we're looking at a revolution in mtb design!
Before you make a judgement, go ride a Pole bike. It will feel different and it will amaze you at just how much more fun you'll have on a bike! Climbing, descending, switchbacks, in the air, flowing trails, just cruising the flats, all of it! I demo'ed the Pole's at Mulberry Gap, GA for a few hours and the results were... I ordered an Evolink 140 EN. Welcome to the revolution
I would be happy to agree with you, but that's not been my experience.
So what we have here is a bike journo comparing a fresh (and possibly even unloaded) product against a bike manufacturer who has made a decision based on long term benefits. If you're going to argue against that, you'll need to base that on long term testing too. Now I'm not going to say I've done the testing but so far the pro-bushing statement makes sense and statement against them doesn't. Especially when pedal bushings (which actually do perform full rotations) are brought into the discussion.
There seems to be a sentiment of "expensive bike, we need the expensive option" but the expensive option isn't necessarily the best. Loose leave tea against teabags, shaving soap against shaving foam from a pressurized container... I could go full hipster dentist on this one. But considering it is an Ibis, I feel it is justified.
In theory... in practice needle bearings seize up with a water ingress and rot in no time. I think IGUS bushings make a lot of sense in this low rotation application, and they have a lifetime warranty.