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New Niner JET9 Alloy, ROS9 Steel Freeride 29er – Details, Photos & Actual Weights!

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New Niner JET9 alloy full suspension 29er mountain bike

Niner has introduced two new bikes, one expected and one completely fresh.

Their recent fan-sourced bike naming contest clued everyone into the hardtail freeride bike they were working on, and now it has a name: ROS9, short for “Run Over Stuff” or some other noun that starts with “S”. The other one, shown above, clues us into what we can expect from future alloy full suspension models.

The all-new JET9 alloy jumps to 100mm rear travel, gains a 142×12 thru axle with hollowed out dropouts that use an integrated, post mount brake mount…much like the carbon versions. It also gets the same air formed process to shape the tubes as the recently introduced RIP9 alloy, something that’s becoming a trend in their alloy series that you’re likely to see come across other alloy full suspension models to come.

New Niner JET9 alloy full suspension 29er mountain bike

Their focus was simply to keep the handling just as good but drop weight and update the feature set. The airforming lets them maintain very precise tube wall thicknesses and butting profiles, much more so than hydroforming. This let them drop a quarter pound from the frame even with all the added features. It’s about the same stiffness as the outgoing model, which is fine, because it’s damn good.

New Niner JET9 alloy full suspension 29er mountain bike

It also gets the a direct mount front derailleur and full length cable housing (not shown on this preproduction sample). So it essentially has the same exact spec as the carbon frames…save for one new feature:

New Niner JET9 alloy full suspension 29er mountain bike

The top tube cable stops have dual channels, letting you run a dropper post remote line alongside the front derailleur cable.

New Niner JET9 alloy full suspension 29er mountain bike

New Niner JET9 alloy full suspension 29er mountain bike

New Niner JET9 alloy full suspension 29er mountain bike

Like the new RIP9 alloy, the dropouts are machined out from the inside to save weight.

New Niner JET9 alloy full suspension 29er mountain bike

Bearings are Enduro Max, which packs more balls in the same amount of space. This helps spread the load over more material, perfect for the low rotation, high impact application of a suspension rocker arm. The seat tube is no longer just round with a welded-on pivot axle. The entire tube is now airformed with an integrated axle mount for the rocker pivot, and it’s very sleek looking even with a fresh coating of Utah dust.

New Niner JET9 alloy full suspension 29er mountain bike

The airforming continues all the way through the rear triangle, with shaped stays top and bottom and a tapered, curved intermediary beam to hold it all together. The post mount brakes are a nice touch, designed for 160mm to 185mm rotors.

It’ll be offered in three build kits:

• X0 w/ SID XX and American Classic Race wheels for $4,899
• XT with SID RL and Stan’s Arch wheels for $4,199
• SLX with Fox Float EVO, American Classic Terrain wheels for $3,099.

Frame only is $1,849, same as before, and all bikes will have the Monarch RT3 with a three position external setting for compression. They worked with Rockshox to tune the second part of the stroke. The first part of the stroke is mainly affected by setting sag and air pressure, so they felt they could impact the ride more by controlling the mid- and end stroke. They set it up to control the progression so it has a bottomless feel without blowing through too much travel when you hit something big. Colors are Tamale Red and Arctic White.

New Niner JET9 alloy full suspension 29er mountain bike

The Large frame with shock came in at 6.57lbs (2,980g), and the Medium complete bike with X0 build was 24.07lbs (10.917kg).

Look for a ride review of both bikes soon, but brand manager Carla Hukee says the goal with this (and the new RIP9 alloy) was to let people get a top notch alloy frame and not feel like they had to compromise by not getting a carbon frame. Our first impressions suggest they’ve done just that, but we’ll be getting a bit more trail time on them this week and a full write up shortly thereafter.

Niner ROS9 Steel 29er hardtail freeride mountain bike

The new ROS9 (Ride Over Stuff) is like a SIR9 on steroids. It’s a double butted 4130 chromoly tubeset, same as what high end BMX bikes are made of, and it’s made to take abuse. The lines and tube shapes are similar to the SIR, using the same seatstay bridge, but has a new asymmetrical forged chainstay yoke that provides a good bit of tire clearance.

Niner ROS9 Steel 29er hardtail freeride mountain bike

It’s hollowed out to save a bit of weight, but the main goal was to get chainstays as short as possible. They ended up at 427mm, which makes it easy to manual and get the rear wheel up and over things. And that measurement is as the center of the BB, but they use their Biocentric II eccentric bottom bracket, so you could slam it back and have an effective chainstay length as short as 418mm. The benefit is that you can micro adjust the crankset position to raise or lower it and run the bike singlespeed.

Niner ROS9 Steel 29er hardtail freeride mountain bike

The frame has an integrated bash guard mount, and they’ll offer a bashguard/mount package separately that was co-developed with MRP.

Niner ROS9 Steel 29er hardtail freeride mountain bike

Stealth dropper routing comes up through the bottom of the seat tube, and the frame comes with two covers to hide that and the front derailleur mount if either aren’t being used. It also has dual channel, removable housing guides under the top tube to run external dropper post cables and a front shift cable.

Niner ROS9 Steel 29er hardtail freeride mountain bike

Dropouts and brake mounts are the same custom machined parts from the SIR, and they’ll offer three different driveside dropout options: Singlespeed, standard or direct mount rear derailleur.

Niner ROS9 Steel 29er hardtail freeride mountain bike

Niner-ROS9-steel-29er-mountain-bike14

Niner ROS9 Steel 29er hardtail freeride mountain bike

The headtube is a straight tube designed for external headset cups, and the geometry is based around a 120mm or 140mm fork. Head angles are 68º or 67º respectively, but they’re also running them with 130mm Revelations, which splits the difference.

Niner ROS9 Steel 29er hardtail freeride mountain bike

Frame weight is 6.1lbs claimed, this size Medium came in at 6.68lbs with the EBB, collar, FD mount and all other hardware except Maxle.

Niner ROS9 Steel 29er hardtail freeride mountain bike

Niner ROS9 Steel 29er hardtail freeride mountain bike

Adequate tire clearance, particularly up top.

Niner ROS9 Steel 29er hardtail freeride mountain bike

Dual channel, removable cable guides run under the top and downtubes, giving you maximum flexibility to run whatever you want wherever you need to.

It’ll come in Rally Blue and Forge Gray. Frame is $899, which includes the EBB, headset, Maxle and seat collar, plus the standard hanger and singlespeed nut. The bash guard kit will be $59.99. DM rear mech mount is available separately.

Both bikes should be available in late summer, around mid-September to be more precise.

Niner has also announced that they raised a little more than $29,000 in their IMBA bikes auction, the most ever for that program.

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21 Comments
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Quinn
Quinn
10 years ago

the ROS9 would have been cooler as 29+, then you could Really Ride Over Stuff

Bicycle Playground
10 years ago

Sweet! Just ordered the new Jet 9 for my shop!

Dave
Dave
10 years ago

“Freeride 29er” – uh huh

fanboy
fanboy
10 years ago

mmmmm 29+

Rick
Rick
10 years ago

I really like what Niner is doing. Cool new tech in both of these models. 29+ would be pretty darn cool if it could work.

Dr.Unk
10 years ago

Hmmm. 6.6lb hardtail frame or 5.5lb carbon 5 inch travel frame? Hardtails are for trials, bmx and road. I must be getting old…

XCDebunks
XCDebunks
10 years ago

So they renamed one of their steel bikes to POS; big deal or was there something more to this?

g
g
10 years ago

That ROS9 is such a letdown. Bummer, I was looking forward to it.

Truerider
Truerider
10 years ago

Hey Zack:} you should change the name of your site to Mountain Bike rumor and get it over with! BTW Dr.Unk is a really clever name .

John
John
10 years ago

Bikes look good. You’re doing a great job holding that scale spicy chops.

Ant'ney
Ant'ney
10 years ago

So….. why would anyone buy that ROS over a Nimble 9?
More bike for less money, in the same style.

Padrote
Padrote
10 years ago

Chromag has been making a couple of bikes like this for a while, though I don’t remember them getting ragged on when they came out.

pfs
pfs
10 years ago

I just want to sum up what I see here in the comments:

It should have been 29+
At the same time the chain stays should be around 12 inches
It is too heavy and not carbon enough
the rear end on this hardtail does not have enough travel
the guy holding the scale looks spicy and is doing great

Man – that is kind of a mixed bag. Sounds like they should have released a 36er unicycle with a 20deg HT angle.

satisFACTORYrider
satisFACTORYrider
10 years ago

just get a canfield.

Hoffa
Hoffa
10 years ago

It does seem to be similar to the Yelli Screami

Stan
Stan
10 years ago

Ant’ney -I like the design of this bike better than the Nimble 9. The revised N9 has an TT to ST gusset that just doesn’t flow with that frame IMHO. It looks funny. What is the wieght of the new N9?

David
David
10 years ago

pfs wins. +100 internet points for you.

Seth
Seth
10 years ago

Am I the only one that find the Jet 24.07lbs weight impressive if not hard to believe?

dan
dan
10 years ago

If I didn’t already buy a tallboy on the blowout sale I would probably look into the new Jet9. excellent looking frame in every respect.

pfs
pfs
10 years ago

@seth – I suppose that is why the spicy man is holding the scale in a photo. Looks like we might have another moon landing on our hands

JJ the Clyde
JJ the Clyde
10 years ago

The N9 doesn’t have the rear maxle and for us Clydesdale’s that important. Plus many of us are SS whores and the EBB makes singlespeeding so much easier. But if you like the N9 go buy one its a sick bike too. I talked to the Canfield Bros. before going with the ROS9. They aren’t going to be adding a thru axle on the rear any time soon. Kona Honzo is great too but they ran out of frames until late Q3.

And yes pfs gets more internet points for calling it as it is.

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