10/11/2008

2005 Devinci Wilson Review By Mike Wallace

It was a perfect match. I had lined up a one month stay at Whistler and a 2005 Devinci Wilson to test. The combination of the greatest bike park ever built together with a long and low full downhill rig had me more than a little excited.

Just to add another level of sweetness, the guys at Devinci were allowing us to keep the bike for two months ensuring that the bike would get a good workout on the slopes of the North Shore as well. This wasn't going to be one of those MBA type tests where a bunch of guys spend the afternoon riding the bike through some smooth dry single track with a few cacti to spice up the photos.

My current ride is a 2003 Santa Cruz Bullit with a Progressive Fifth Element in the rear and a Boxxer on the front. An awesome bike for the shore but not exactly your dream Whistler ride. The steep goodness of the Garbanzo zone has made Whistler more downhill bike-friendly than ever.

Out Of The Box
After pulling the bike out of the box the first thing I did was take it down to the boys at Steed Cycles - the North Shore's Devinci dealer - for a once over and a little set-up assistance. They spent a couple hours with me setting up the rear shock, checking the fork oil level and resetting the spacers on the E13 SRS chain guide. Of course, the once over would have gone a lot quicker if we hadn't spent so much time complimenting the spec kit.

Fresh out of the box.

The Wilson comes stock with a Fox DHX 5.0 rear shock, a Rock Shox Boxxer World Cup 203mm fork, an FSA Orbit 1.5 headset, a SRAM XO derailleur, a Race Face Diabolus X-Type cranks (40 tooth ring), Hayes El Camino HD 8" brakes and a Mavic Dee-Max wheel set. Tires are both Michelin tubeless DH Comps. Rear wheel travel can be set at 180 or 215mm travel.

One of the most obvious traits of this machine is its relative light weight. The specifications on the Devinci Web site show a weight of 41.5 lbs. I weighed the bike in at 42.5 lbs (medium frame size) on a very high tech digital bathroom scale. This is awesome. For reference, my Bullet weighs in at 39 lbs and a large Rocky Mountain Switch weighs in at 42.5 lbs. Neither of these bikes have the downhill ability or the rear travel of the Wilson.

First Test: Whistler With the bike ready to go (thanks again to Scott and the guys at Steed) I headed up to Whistler. The bike felt very comfortable right away. This didn't surprise me though as switching from a bike with relatively steep angles to a bike with slack angles almost always feels good, especially on steeper terrain. The very first thing I noticed as I headed down Schleyer and Clown Shoes is that the back end felt light - not what I expected from a balls out downhill bike. The bike felt quick and light getting up and over rocks and roots. The first couple of runs down A-line were also great. Again, the bike felt light in the air and was easy to move around. I was loving the lower bottom bracket height on the berms and the way the Horst Link Suspension dealt with the dreaded A-line braking bumps. I was pumped as I hadn't even taken it to the fast and rough terrain for which it was built. Ed Note: The bike Mike tested was the Canadian model which uses the Horst Link. The US model has the pivot on the seat stay and is thus not a Horst Link.

Taking the Wilson for a test flight.Photo - Ron Gosney

It was after hitting up Original Sin and No Joke that I really started to get a feel for the bike. On the really rough stuff I could just point it and hang on. The bike dealt with whatever came its way. In fact I got into trouble a couple of times during those early rides because I became a little too relaxed.

As expected, after several laps I realized I needed to make a few changes to the bike's set-up. The World Cup Boxxer felt a little stiff on the smaller stuff (especially when cold on the early parts of the ride), the rear shock was bottoming on the bigger hits and launches and I just couldn't seem to get the El Caminos' lever travel adjusted correctly. My streak of good fortune however was continuing. Fate was such that just when I needed a little technical assistance Crankworx came to town and of course all the component manufactures came along with it.

The Brakes
My first stop was the Hayes tent. It turns out that on some of the El Caminos the lever reach adjustment screw was fitted with a spacer to prevent people from adjusting the levers too far in towards the bar. Once Hayes removed the spacer and installed the proper knurled knob reach-adjuster I was able to adjust the brakes until they felt good.

Note the silver Power Adjustment knob at bottom of the photo.

These sweet looking El Camino brakes also come with a separate adjustment called the Power Adjuster. By adjusting this knob you are essentially changing the pivot point position so that you get more or less torque. When the Power Adjuster is set to max though, the lever action feels very spongy. The idea is that you have both power and modulation. Modulation is obviously very important when riding steeps but I found the feel a little hard to get used to. When the lever is set to maximum modulation it cannot be adjusted too close to the bar or it will make contact.

I also learned from the experienced bike wizards over at FanatykCo bike shop that the brake pistons have a much longer range of travel than most disk brakes and can be adjusted to suit. In my case, reducing the stroke at the piston resulted in less travel at the lever and therefore less fatigued hands. Bottom line here is that these levers have a huge range of adjustment and everyone should be able to find a position they like. On the downside the El Caminos suffered some fade when riding long, fast top-to-bottom laps. Perhaps this is a result of the streamlined shape limiting heat dissipation? After a just a few rides I had to bleed both the front and back brakes. The good old Hayes Mags on my Bullit rarely require a bleed.

The Rear Shock
Second stop was the Fox tent. The rear shock was handling the small bumps well but I was bottoming out on some of the larger launches. The bottoming was a concern considering that there are very few launches at Whistler without beautiful trannies.

The first thing that Mike (a Fox mechanic) did was swap the 350 lb spring out for a 400 lb spring. The goal with spring selection is to have the correct amount of sag (3/4" in this case) with only slight preload. The adjuster nut is turned in enough to keep some tension on the spring. Once this is set the shock can be properly dialled in. The rebound was set at 6 clicks from the slowest and the ProPedal was also dialled in six clicks. Recommended air pressure is 130-150 psi with the bottom out adjuster fully open. With the bottom out full open the shock feel is plushest but also the most linear. They recommended to dial in the bottom out only if I found that I was still regularly bottoming out with the heavier spring.

The set-up tips all made great sense and I would definitely like to thank Mike van Lienden and the guys at Fox for taking the time to share their wisdom. After these adjustments the Wilson's rear end felt pretty much bottomless. Doing the A-line rock drop with speed instantly became fun instead of a test of my spine's ability to withstand a regular pounding.

The Front Fork The third and final stop was the Rock Shox/SRAM tent to talk about how to get the most out of the Boxxer World Cup fork. Once again I was the beneficiary of some excellent advice. The Rock Shock gurus recommend riding with the stock oil for at least 4-5 rides. They say the oil that comes with these shocks is not a particularly great lubricant and will not give the fork the smoothest feel but it is very good at cleansing and scrubbing the internals. In other words the oil effectively removes the little bits of metal or whatever comes inside the brand new fork. After these first few rides they recommend changing the oil for a quality fork oil. I did exactly that and was rewarded with a significant improvement in plushness on the high speed small to medium hits.

Sweet SRAM XO derailleur hanging off a massive rear dropout.

Speaking of SRAM products. The XO derailleur performed flawlessly. I never had to touch or adjust the derailleur once in that month of Whistler riding. Shifting stayed clean and crisp without any need for the usual cable adjustments. The XO's are not cheap but this is another case of you get what you pay for.

The Wheels
Now, on to the subject of wheels. The ultra-trick, light Dee Max wheels with tubeless tires, 32 straight pull spokes, unusual nipples and black and yellow colours are absolutely beautiful. Unfortunately they have been nothing but a headache from the first ride. These wheels are high maintenance. I found that the wheels (especially the rear) needed to be tensioned regularly. The spokes are sitting in a U shaped clip on the hub and they can actually fall out of the clip when no tension is applied. I couldn't find the proper spoke wrench to purchase and, at least at the beginning of the summer, most shops didn't even have one so keeping the wheels adjusted was a pain. With tubeless wheels the idea is save weight and cut down on pinch flats; no tube = nothing to pinch. The concept is a good one. At Whistler the shale cuts into tires so the only way to keep running tubeless is to change tires regularly - an expensive proposition. The bottom line is that these are high performance race wheels and like a lot of high performance equipment, they require a lot of attention.

Stepping it up on the Freight Train at Whistler. Photo - Ron Gosney

The Wilson is actually designed for a 150 mm rear hub. For some reason the 2005 came spec'd with a 135mm. To overcome this problem the dropout on the brake side actually curves in to accommodate the smaller hub. What this means is that the wheel needs to be dished a lot to keep it centred. Dishing a wheel to that extent cannot be good for wheel integrity and strength. I actually broke my 10mm axle on the brake side while riding A-line. This is a fairly strange set-up which fortunately has been remedied for 2006. The 2006 Wilson comes with Daredevil hubs which are mated up with Mavic EX823 tubeless rims. Rear hub width will now be 150mm.

Everybody knows that downhill bikes have slack head angles. The Interesting thing about the Wilson is that it has the slackest head angle of any bike I have seen. At 64 degrees it is slacker than the Demo 9, Norco DH and the Intense M3 which are 66 deg, 64.5 and 66.5 respectively. The bike actually looks chopped when sitting on the roof racks next to any of my buddies' bikes. The good thing is that the number matters little when you are flying down the mountain on a bike that manages to feel light and stable at the same time. You do notice the slackness of course when doing tight slow speed hairpin corners. For most people looking at this bike however, having to concentrate a little more on the really tight slow corners will matter very little.

Second Test: The Shore
For me the last true test of the Wilson was going to be a few days riding on the shore. I was looking forward to trying those slack angles on some of the steeper trails. Also, I had people warn me that I wouldn't like the bike on the skinnies so I was curious to give it a go. A slack head angle positions the front wheel further out in front giving a slack bike a tendency to flop to the side when moving slowly, especially on tight switchbacks or skinnies. Obviously the Wilson is not designed for shore style skinnies. However, if the bike demonstrates it can handle them it's going to appeal to wider range of riders.

On the rough Shore-style steeps the bike ripped. The combination of the angles and the plush suspension front and back made everything just that little bit easier. When riding steep rolls to flat (like the Cherry Bomb on Cypress) the bike pushes through beautifully. The bike felt fine on the skinnies. I found it all boiled down to concentration but this is the case on any bike. On the skinnies with turns I found that the extra wheelbase length warranted a little more rear end hopping but when the rear feels light and solid (due to the position sensitive rear shock) this is not a problem. For some reason I was under the impression that a lot of the corners on the shore are really tight and slow but on the Wilson, I found that very few corners actually need to be ridden slowly. Ahhh - the magic of a downhill bike.

Devinci has changed both the front and rear suspenders for 2006. On the front you will find a Fox 40 RC2. Devinci has boldly chosen a DHX Air 5.0 for the rear. There are significant weight savings to be made by eliminated the coil sping and obviously Devinci feels the air shocks are now ready for the abuse dished out by a full downhill rig.

The Verdict
Overall this bike is amazing. It is stable at speed, it efficiently absorbs both the small and big hits and it feels light both on the ground and in the air. For 2005 I believe there were some spec issues that were a problem unless you have a team mechanic, but these have been remedied for 2006.

In Canada the 2006 Wilson, with a Fox DHX Air rear shock and a 40 RC2 fork will run you CDN$5999.

*Specs: 4.0  Ride: 5.0  Price: 4.0  Overall: 4.5

Pros: Cons: - Bottomless rear travel - Handles very well at speed and on steeps - Light weight for a downhill bike - Trouble free frame and suspension linkage - Wheelset demands too much attention - Rear hub doesn't match frame design - Brakes not robust enough for this type of bike (fade on long steep downhills)