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All-New Bionicon Edison EVO Enduro Mountain Bike Adjusts Suspension, Angles & Wheel Size

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2015-Bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-enduro-mountain-bike

Bionicon isn’t a household name here in the States (though they do have distribution here), but they’ve developed some pretty interesting technology over the years. The latest mighty morphing enduro wonder bike, the 2015 Bionicon Edison EVO, takes adjustability to new heights.

Featuring swappable rocker arms, seatstays, suspension parts and more, the frame lets you set it up with 160mm or 180mm of travel, 26″ or 27.5″ wheels, change suspension parts and adjust ride height and geometry…some of it on the fly. Oh, and it’s lighter than before. They say it’s their best ever bike.

At the heart of the bike is their Bionicon Effect travel adjust system. It pairs custom made forks and shocks with their pneumatic release button to let you instantly adjust the angles of the bike to suit climbing, descending or anything in between. It’s body weight activated, and works minimal effect on suspension performance thanks to their clever 2×2 fork air cartridges and an extending shock mount…

2015-Bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-enduro-mountain-bike

The travel and geometry adjustments happen by simply pushing this button and shifting your weight forward or backward. The button opens an air valve, letting air transfer from a chamber in the fork to the shock’s extending mount and vice versa. Put your weight over the bars and it’ll drop the fork and raise the rear end to help you climb.

bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-mountain-bike-2015-o

The 2×2 cartridge gets its name from its dual positive air chambers. It’s a floating design, and you can fill each chamber separately to fine tune the feel and progression of the suspension. The upper chamber feeds the travel adjust hoses, too, while the bottom chamber is separate and only functions for the suspension.

2015-Bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-enduro-mountain-bike shocks in different geometry modes

The air is pushed from the forks upper chamber to the shock mount, which extends the mount to raise the rear end of the bike. Shock damping, spring rate and air pressure is unaffected, so its performance doesn’t change.

bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-mountain-bike-2015-n

The seat and head angles get steeper, and the bottom bracket height also stays about the same, allowing better clearance than on bikes that are only lowering the fork.

The overall effect is that the fork is lower, the rear is higher and your body position is more neutral for climbing. That means less uncomfortable hunching to keep your weight forward.

2015-Bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-enduro-mountain-bike standard shock mount adapter

The bike is built around that system, but they’ve made an adapter available to work with other shocks, too, including Cane Creek’s Double Barrel models. You’ll just lose the travel adjust.

2015-Bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-enduro-mountain-bike headset cup adapter

Headset cups let you run dual crown or standard tapered single-crown forks.

2015-Bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-enduro-mountain-bike swappable rocker links

Rear suspension travel is adjustable by swapping rocker links. Bionicon shied away from adjustable bolt positions for the same reason they left replaceable derailleur mounts off the table: Strength and stiffness. To switch wheel sizes, select the appropriate fork and swap in the appropriate seatstay. Each wheel size gets a dedicated stay so that everything’s where it should be.

MODELS

2015-Bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-enduro-mountain-bike

Shown above with the different wheel sizes, you’ll be able to pick one of two options for everything: Complete or frameset, red or gray, 26″ or 27.5″, 160mm or 180mm travel, and Spec 0 or Spec 1. All 26″ bikes get the Bionicon Double Agent dual crown fork and 27.5″ forks get a custom X-Fusion Metric HLR with 2×2 air cartridge. Both run a Magura TS RC shock.

2015-Bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-enduro-mountain-bike

Spec 0 gets a SRAM Guide RSC brakes, X01 drivetrain, DT Swiss or Novatec wheels (models vary by wheel size and travel), Schwalbe tires, KindShock LEV dropper post, Answer handlebar, house brand stem and Ergon GA1 grips. Retail is €3,500, but they’re running a pre-order special for €2,500 through August 31, 2014 for the first 200 orders.

2015-Bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-enduro-mountain-bike

Spec 1 runs X9, SRAM Guide R brakes, DT Swiss wheels and Schwalbe tires, Answer bar and Ergon grips. Retail is €2,900. Framesets get standard Rockshox suspension parts and retail for €1,900. Now, more pics:

2015-Bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-enduro-mountain-bike

2015-Bionicon-Edison-EVO-adjustable-enduro-mountain-bike

Bionicon.com

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Charlie Best
Charlie Best
9 years ago

Thank goodness they haven’t over-complicated things…

Equine Master
Equine Master
9 years ago

@Charlie Best

I love the sarcasm!

You’d almost think that they’re German…

SB
SB
9 years ago

Yeah, they’re German…but all my Magura stuff is among the simplest bike parts I own. Straightforward suspension, brakes with a minimum of moving (and wearing!) parts. How’d they get involved in this?!

Matt
Matt
9 years ago

I think its a fantastic idea! Its just because its not one of the big players people are suspicious. If Rockshox/fox released a system like this everyone would be all over it

rincon5
rincon5
9 years ago

(deleted)

Bonzo
Bonzo
9 years ago

The Bionicon system is working pretty well and has matured over a long time and therefore is reliable 🙂 The company is also well known for their great support… So I wouldn’t be worried 🙂

Paulymath
Paulymath
9 years ago

The amount of hoses/cabling is a bit much. It’d be nice if Bionicon could maybe wrap or clip the 2×2 cables together, and maybe some internal cable routing would clean things up as well. Owners could probably simplify the routing themselves, and also go to a 1×10 system for one less cable. I’d actually be totally satisfied with a fork that I could remotely control the travel from 180 down to say 140, as I more worried about HTA than LSC on climbs. The dual travel adjust is pretty sweet, although not new, in this category. It is unfortunate that Bionicon currently doesn’t sell the frame as a 180mm bike with the CCDBA, but I’m sure it’ll happen eventually.

Photo-John
9 years ago

I rode a Bionicon Golden Willow (worst bike name, ever) for about 8 years and am only just this summed replaced it. If Bionicon had of come out with their new bike last year, I would have bought one, site-unseen. Their system works perfectly and there’s really nothing else that climbs and descends like a Bionicon. It may seem more complicated but after you ride it for a while, you realize it doesn’t matter. It’s so reliable, requires so little maintenance, and works so well that it’s a non-issue. I have a new non-Bionicon bike now that I love. But I am definitely looking forward to demoing the new bike as soon as I can get my hands one one.

Fraser C
Fraser C
9 years ago

As someone who has ridden one of the earlier versions (which in principle works the same) I will tell you that this system is very good! Bars down/seat up for climbing, seat down/bars up for descending – brilliant! The one I rode had a full moto fork, and was pretty heavy, but now they’ve lightened them… I’d say take a serious look, and test ride one if you get the chance.

Sacki
9 years ago

Thanks for the feedback.
I am engineer at Bionicon and responsible for the edison EVO and the suspension technology behind it. If you have any questions, wishes, you may ask them here, I´ll try to check them and reply asap.
It´s nice to finally see some stuff published in English media, and thanks to the Bikerumor team, it also already explains a lot about our system and simplicity of it. You may also check out the edison EVO website for even more detailed technical information in our Technology -> Bionicon-Features rubric.
greets
Sacki

Peter
Peter
1 year ago
Reply to  Sacki

are you ever going to use this system again? Mine is getting old but I LOVE it.

Tastic
Tastic
9 years ago

Owned and ran Bionicon Golden Willow & then went on to the Edison.
GW much smoother with the 4 bar linkage rather than single pivot on the Edison.
Edison c/w the new Gravilube2 fork system , just so easy to keep up with lubing & general maintenance .

Would love to of gone with the new Edison Evo. (waitied too long & bought a 29er ) vv tempted though as the bikes are so easy to keep up with, and the Suspension system just works at the press of o button…so no forgetting to lock / unlock this & that and getting it all wrong in the middle of some tech descent. !

Both climbed really well and took a battering in the 4 years of ownership, Scotland , Lakes , Peaks & Spain with no dramas .
Proper good bikes ….highly recommended.

Ricardo Dinis
Ricardo Dinis
9 years ago

Anyone knows the bike weight? more precisely the Bionicon Single Crown 180mm 27.5″?

Sacki
9 years ago

Hi Ricardo,

The weight of the 27.5 bike with 180/180 travel (front/rear) will be pretty much exactly 14.0 kg (maybe even little bit below) without pedals, but including 150mm dropper post in size L. We do not have the latest components yet (such as the 2015 wheelsets, Guide brakes), so I can´t tell the weigth on the spot. Just changing to tubeless should make the bike for sure below 14kg.
I am riding 180 26 with complete series spec (just Elixir 9 Trail 200/200 instead of guide RSC and tubeless instead of standard inner tube) and the bike weighs in at 14,15kg including 400g Pedals in size L.

Otto
Otto
8 years ago

Was running an 08 supershuttle last year and loved it, it slew just about every trail I road. I honestly was looking at getting an EVO but seeing as how no more US distribution I caved and went with another bike. Maybe the next bike will be an EVO hope to see Bionicon in the US again sometime.

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