Manitou Jack Dropper - Revive Revisited

Why Jack?

In a vast sea of uppy-downy options, I love that Manitou looked at ways to put a unique stamp on the category and then decided instead to put their brand onto one of the highest quality, best functioning dropper posts on the market. It's a category that no suspension brand can ignore - and I'm positive the likes of Öhlins and EXT will follow suit - but where some of the most expensive options aren't great, or well-supported, and are very expensive to service.

The Manitou Jack, or BikeYoke Revive, sits towards the premium end of the price range but it's so smooth, with light action, so reliable, customizable, and fully serviceable - while being quite lovely to work on. It's an awesome dropper post.

If I was stoked to write the first look piece for the Manitou Jack dropper post, I've been significantly less enthused about crafting this follow-up review. The BikeYoke Revive is an excellent dropper that we have a lot of experience with at NSMB, and I have a lot of experience working with in shops. It's very well-supported with small parts from BikeYoke, Manitou, and their various distributors and service centers. In other words, it's boring stuff.

Why Not Jack?

There are two compelling reasons to skip the Manitou Jack, and by extension the BikeYoke Revive dropper. The first is price. This 185mm dropper post is 435 USD, including a remote, and the 160mm version will run you 400 USD, also with a remote included.

The Jack is in roughly the same initial price range as the also excellent Wolf Tooth Resolve, and the smooth functioning but more expensive to own Fox Transfer. That's relatively expensive compared to the best-performing, best-supported, min-max medalists like PNW's Rainer Gen 3, Crankbrothers Highline 3, and of course, the OneUp V2.

For those that can afford it, the significantly smoother action of the Jack and its serviceability are very nice features that make it easy to justify the extra outlay. For those looking for a reliable, well-supported, system to move their seat up and down on the fly for the least amount of scratch, it's hard to look past my min-max favourites.

The other reason some folks, particularly those short of leg or seat tube, will choose to skip the Jack is that it's a relatively long post both above and below the seat post collar. For riders looking to package the maximum amount of drop into the minimum amount of space, the Wolf Tooth Resolve and OneUp V2 are currently the unbeatable twosome depending on price point.

On that note, since I've seen it a couple of times lately, be aware that choosing your drop on a full-suspension bike isn't just about achieving the right saddle position for climbing and then maximum bike body separation for descents. Be sure to let the air out of your shock or remove your coil spring, and confirm tire-to-saddle clearance at the bottom out. You want to ensure that your suspension bottoms out before your tire bottoms out on your saddle.

Packaged Remotes

The remote that Manitou ships with their Jack post is smooth, ergonomic, robust (read 'heavy'), and of excellent quality. Also, I wish it wasn't included. For most riders, the Jack is going to be an aftermarket upgrade and in that situation, they're already going to have a compatible dropper post remote.

If their stock remote is good, or good enough, or even just passable for now it means that a rider could upgrade to the Jack at a lower price. There are also many riders who have already upgraded their remote to something better in a quest to economically upgrade their dropper experience, or who have a remote they'd personally prefer to run.

In the future I'd encourage Manitou to sell their remote as an affordable add-on, it is very good. But for those of us who love our old DOSS levers, Wolf Tooth ReMotes, OneUp V3 remotes, etc., there'd be more value in Manitou not including one.

Spacers & Racers

Out of the box, the Manitou Jack feels and functions identically to a BikeYoke Revive, as I'd expect. I ended up taking it apart and putting it back together a number of times over this review to change the travel, and at the same time, I played with some lighter fluid options to speed up the post so it would be more similar to the Resolve, especially in colder temperatures. I had great results.

The Jack is available in 80mm, 160mm, and 185mm configurations. I ran this 185mm post at full length and every 5mm interval down to 165mm as part of adapting it for different frames, personal preferences, as well as to review the Aenomaly SwitchGrade. As with any task done repeatedly, I've become pretty damned fast at it.

Not as fast as with posts like the PNW or OneUp, which only require the loosening of the main seal head to perform the switch, but it's certainly not a chore. Especially since most folks will only change travel initially or when they switch the post between bikes either for fitment or preference.

Forever Posts

Dropper post travel, like frame geometry, seems to be approaching a sort of settled consensus at least for the trail and Enduro bike markets. I have long-legged friends who've tried up to 240mm travel dropper posts, and a couple of them have even stayed there, but most folks I've talked to have settled in the 160mm to 200mm drop range, largely down to leg length and personal preference. While the longest Jack ships at 185mm, BikeYoke has an option for 213mm of travel.

I have arrived at a preference for 170mm dropper posts on frames with slacker effective seat tube angles (STA), like my hardtail, and 180mm dropper posts on much steeper effective STAs like the Banshee Titan or the El Roy I'm using to test parts. The promise of mass adoption of 35mm (34.9mm) internal diameter seat tubes seems to have waned and the outer tube on my 30.9mm Jack can be easily swapped for a 31.6mm. So, based on serviceability, survivability, smoothness, and support, I'm comfortable considering the Jack to be a long-term investment.

The Manitou Jack, aka BikeYoke Revive, is far from the only great dropper post design on the market. I've ridden a few equally smooth dropper posts. But it's fair to say it's the first great dropper post design on the market with many of those original Revive posts still in regular use on the trail. I love that the folks at Manitou chose to sell the dropper post that they wanted to ride. Even if that meant taking an existing product and putting a logo on it.

The Manitou Jack sells for 435 USD in a 185mm post, and 400 USD in a 160mm post, and both options include a remote. For more information check out Manitou, and please hit me in the comments with any questions.