Thefront half of the Epic frame is pretty much the same as the front ofthe Stumpjumper hardtail range. It's M4 tubing, with the same funkycurved downtube going into the headtube. The back half is where the funreally starts. Rather than put the shock in the front triangle,Specialized have stuck it in the back between the seat cluster and reardropout. The main reason for this is that the Brain (about which morelater) needs to be near the back axle so it makes sense to put theshock there too. A handy side benefit is that the front triangle staysopen and there's space for two bottles in there, just like hardtails.The seat tube bottle mount is a little short on space for a 750mlbottle, but there's a third mount under the down tube and a fourth onebehind the seatpost (one of the bosses is on an extra bolt-on collarthat goes around the post).
You may have seen a design similar to this before. Halfords' Carrerarange last year featured the Bugaboo featuring a shock placement justlike the Epic (no cunning shock gubbinses, though). There is a tenuousconnection - the Bugaboo was a Merida design, and Merida own a chunk ofSpecialized. Despite the initial similarity, though, there are some keydifferences between the two designs.
For a start, the Bugaboo had an adjustable upper link with threetravel options which the Specialized does without - it's fixed at 90mm.Specialized have also gone to the trouble of mounting the shock onspherical bearings at each end. These allow the rear end of the bike todeflect sideways or twist or not travel exactly in a vertical planewithout transferring any undue loads to the shock. All of thesuspension pivots have sealed cartridge bearings.
Mud room is adequate if not massive, and you're getting the commonfull sus "shelf" behind the bottom bracket to collect gunge. The shockalso receives more than its fair share of muck - it didn't seem to mindduring our test period (we just had to excavate a bit to find therebound adjuster) but we can't help thinking that it's not the bestplace for a shock from a cleanliness point of view.
 Brainbox. Well, more of a tube |
And then of course there's the Brain. This is another of thoseFox/Specialized developments like last year's Itch switch travel adjustgizmo. The Brain is pretty cunning. It's essentially an automaticlockout for the rear shock. Inside the sticky-up canister is a valve, aweighted piston and a spring. The spring holds the valve closed,locking out the rear suspension. But hit something sufficiently hardwith the back wheel and the weighted piston accelerates upwards,popping the valve open and allowing the suspension to compress. Thevalve will stay open until the suspension stops moving at which pointit closes and locks out the suspension again. The Brain is right downnear the rear axle and angled backwards to line up with the axle pathin the first part of the travel. Only a bump hitting the back wheelwill trigger it - you can bounce on the seat as much as you like andnothing will happen.
The idea is that the Epic is effectively a hardtail until the groundreaches a certain level of bumpiness at which point it becomes a shorttravel full suspension bike. Although not actually all that short -90mm is quite respectable.
You can't help but be impressed by the amount of work that's goneinto the Epic frame. Everything's butted and shaped and we were mosttaken by the laser-engraved annotations on all the bits of the rearsuspension saying things like "This side out" so if you take the thingapart you can get it all back together again the right way up..
