While touring around the expo zone, we caught sight of two new bikes from Banshee that were tucked away from the rest of their offerings. After a little bit of cajoling, we talked out way into getting some photos and specs on the two rigs.
The Phantom
The Phantom is Banshee’s 100mm travel 29er prototype. Designed around the KS link platform, it sports an adjustable 67/68 degree head angle, a 13 to 13.5″ adjustable BB height, and a 120mm fork. Ride it up, ride it down, ride it hard.
Gotta love the Kash Money finish on the RaceFace bars. According to the chaps at Banshee, the width was more than welcome during a mission down Jack the Ripper earlier in the week.
Internal routing for a Reverb Stealth dropper post. Sexy.
A tapered head tube gives riders the biggest range of options for forks.
Adjustable drop outs are another feature carried over from the current Banshee range.
The guts of the KS link. All the hardware was designed to be as simple to replace as possible– no weird bearing sizes or proprietary bolts on this bike.
A unique anodized finishing process gave the Phantom the ultimate stealth look. Rest assured, it’s even sexier in real life.
The Darkside
Also out and about was the new Darkside Prototype. Sporting 180mm of rear-end travel, it will likely be a replacement for the Scythe in Banshee’s lineup.
The Darkside also runs on the KS platform, albeit in a far burlier iteration than previously seen.
Adjustable dropouts will make it simple to tune the head angle and BB height to the rider’s preference.
Alternate view of the KS linkage.
The Darkside was also finished with the same anodizing process as the Phantom, ’cause when you’re riding loamers, you’ve gotta be stealthy.
Another unique touch on the frame was the use of ODI bar ends as fork bumpers. The ends are simple enough to remove, and given the massive spectrum they come in, you can ensure everything matches perfectly.
After seeing these bikes, is anyone else tempted to anodize their life?
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