First Look: Ibis Oso - Not Just an Electric Ripmo
The list of bike companies who don't have an eMTB in their lineup continues to shrink, and it's even shorter now that Ibis has joined the electric party with the Oso. The Oso has 155mm of rear travel, a 170mm fork, and Bosch's Performance Line CX motor. A 750 Wh battery ensures there's plenty of juice for longer missions.
The look of the bike is certainly a departure from Ibis' non-motorized offerings – there really isn't anything quite like it currently on the market. The large carbon swingarm and the shock position underneath the seatube and exposed to the world on the driveside are the two most immediately noticeable frame features. To me, it looks like the love child of the previous generation Specialized Demo and a Polygon Square One. Don't take that the wrong way, though; I actually like the look of the Oso, and it sure stands out in the sea of electric look-alikes.
The look of the bike is certainly a departure from Ibis' non-motorized offerings – there really isn't anything quite like it currently on the market. The large carbon swingarm and the shock position underneath the seatube and exposed to the world on the driveside are the two most immediately noticeable frame features. To me, it looks like the love child of the previous generation Specialized Demo and a Polygon Square One. Don't take that the wrong way, though; I actually like the look of the Oso, and it sure stands out in the sea of electric look-alikes.
Ibis Oso Details
• Wheel size: 27.5"/29" in sizes S and M, dual 29" in sizes L and XL
• Travel: 155 mm, 170 mm fork
• Carbon frame
• Bosch Performance Line CX motor / 750 Wh battery
• 64º head angle
• Size-specific STA - 78º size L
• Size-specific chainstays - 444 mm size L
• Sizes: S, M, L, XL
• Weight: 53 lb / 24 kg (size L)
• Price: $10,999 USD
• ibiscycles.com
• Wheel size: 27.5"/29" in sizes S and M, dual 29" in sizes L and XL
• Travel: 155 mm, 170 mm fork
• Carbon frame
• Bosch Performance Line CX motor / 750 Wh battery
• 64º head angle
• Size-specific STA - 78º size L
• Size-specific chainstays - 444 mm size L
• Sizes: S, M, L, XL
• Weight: 53 lb / 24 kg (size L)
• Price: $10,999 USD
• ibiscycles.com
There are two color options, Forest Service Green and Blue Storm, but there's just one build kit, which puts the price at $10,999 USD. Highlights of the kit include a Fox 38 Performance fork, Performance Elite Float X2 shock, SRAM GX Eagle drivetrain, Shimano XT brakes, and a BikeYoke Revive dropper post. Ibis' own Blackbird Send alloy wheels round out the parts package.
Forest Service Green
Blue Storm
Frame Details
The Oso's frame has all sorts of clever little features, including a fender to protect the linkage and shock, chainslap protection on the underside of the downtube, and even an integrated tail light and a 900 lumen headlight from Lupine. I suppose if you've got that big battery it doesn't hurt to tie some accessories into it.
The Oso's carbon frame is covered by a seven year warranty, and if any of the bushings happen to wear out Ibis will replace them for free for the life of the frame.
Other notable details include clearance for a 2.5” wide rear tire, guided internal cable routing (thankfully none of them run through the headset), and room for a 26 oz water bottle when a side loading cage is used on the M thru XL sizes, or a 22 oz bottle on the size small. The frame is approved for use with up to a 190mm fork.
The Oso comes pre-equipped for night rides.
Plenty of chainslap protection underneath the swingarm.
Ibis designed their own charging port, and it seems to be more robust and well thought out than some of the other styles on the market.
Bear vs. bird.
Geometry & Suspension Layout
The Oso is available in four sizes, with the small and medium frames rolling on a mixed-wheel setup, and the large and extra-large sizes on dual 29” wheels. The smaller two sizes have 439mm chainstays, and that number increases to 444 for the larger sizes.
There's a wide spread of reach numbers, ranging from 430mm on the small all the way up to 530mm on the XL. The jumps in between sizes are fairly substantial – there's a 40mm difference between the 460mm reach of the medium and the 500mm reach of the large. To help tame that long front center on the climbs, the Oso has a steep seat angle that ranges from 77 to 79-degrees depending on the frame size, along with a generous stack height.
As for the head angle, that checks in at 64-degrees with a 170mm fork.
Not surprisingly, the Oso uses a dw-link suspension layout, with two short links connecting the swingarm to the front triangle. It its stock configuration the bike uses a 205 x 60mm shock to deliver 155mm of travel, but riders looking for even more squish can run a 65mm stroke shock to bump that number up to 170mm.
Build Kit
Author Info:
Must Read This Week
www.gofundme.com/f/alicia-and-her-family-with-medical-costs
Get well soon Alicia!
Pulling for her... It's nice to see good news on the updates. She's a fantastic person and well-loved in the community.
Dang that Jill Kintner is a class act:
_____________________________________________
JILL Kintner
$200•1 hr
There are more stories to tell, and trails to ride my friend!! Pulling for you so we can get back to it!!! ❤️
_____________________________________________
Sad about the crash and having no employer support even more
That said, I really hope Alicia fully recovers. TBI is no joke.
@suspended-flesh dunno man, I was in Whistler for a trip and ruptured my spleen, the bills were absolutely shocking for just ambulance, observation, scans and blood work. An Irish friend f*cked his finger when he came to visit us and the French hospital didn't ask him a dime. Also, I lived in Ireland for a while and was shocked by how unheathy people were compared to France, Ireland is probably as liberal as the US, making plenty of money with tech companies, yet letting their people being in a terrible state of health. In France if you don't want to get treated or lesser options you can too but why would you want that ? Health is fickle enough with all the best options.
I know that you can suffer a pretty catastrophic head injury on the simplest of rides, but I’ve stopped sending big jumps and going full gas. Totally not worth it to me anymore
low income people can receive subsidies for their health premiums (someone close to me gets insurance for less than $30/month, for example). additionally, there are lots of programs that can provide assistance to people who, for whatever reason, can't get their medical bills paid. i have seen some hospital bills forgiven in their entirety, which is very generous.
the truth is that someone has to pay the bills. some places, like france apparently, do this at a national level, while others have different ideas of the best way to accomplish this. i would personally rather be responsible for myself because i am young and healthy but my health premiums are relatively high because the current system is trying to subsidize the unhealthy with the healthy. my taxes also pay for educating kids even though i don't have any. is any current system perfectly fair to everyone in every situation? not that i'm aware of
At 46 I've also shifted to taking less risks as well but without knowing the details of AL's accident we can all imagine scenarios and that underlines that are sport has risk. Even if taking it easy and maybe most then. I do know that it brings vibrancy to life so riding will always be worth it. I hope Alicia recovers fully!
10/3/22
"We are pretty excited Alicia has been able to answer some simple questions and even recognized her Dad today. She is still sleeping most of the time but the nurses have been able to wake her enough to feed herself which is a big step. Every small improvement adds up and we have high hopes for Alicia!"
Interesting to see that people are downvoting my posts about costs - those are facts, not opinions. If you don't like facts because they conflict with your opinion you need to change the opinion, not the facts.
The problem with US healthcare is the fact that it's been left up to Capitalism, to make money off of people getting sick. I'm a Capitalist through and through and multi-time business owner, but some things like healthcare, National defense, the Federal highway system, election laws, etc are better left to the Federal government as scale and lack of profit gives a better outcome for the most amount of people.
Anyways, the new Ibis looks great, and I love the swingarm. However, they missed the boat. 55# e-bikes that have the torque & initial acceleration (because of their light weight and low RR) as a 10 hp dirt bike are not appropriate for most multi-use trails, and take too much of the 'bike' riding experience away for healthy individuals.
Full power e-bikes are just a weird in-between product before mid power bikes take over the market place. Look how few comments there are about this actual bike in this thread, no one much cares.
Ibis should source the TQ HPR motor and build a weight weenie version of this chassis using that motor, right away.
A few days later, in my home city I got a plate and 6 screws and there was no out-of-pocket charge at all. YMMV but there are many shades to US healthcare.
i have a lot of friends riding ebikes and none of them are interested in mid-power bikes. every single one of them wants full power and the one guy with a levo SL is trying to sell it to buy the ibis. perhaps that is a function of where we live. i think trek has a 1-year exclusive deal with TQ but after that, i wouldn't be surprised if a lot of new bikes turn to them (assuming no massive recalls or issues between now and then).
Perhaps I should have made that clear, but the point was that if you as a tourist (I was replying to a post where a US tourist was not charged) need treatment it can be very expensive.
Lol
As others have said, even pre-Obamacare, 55 cents of every dollar spent on healthcare in the USA was government spending- so we STARTED at a 55% government run, socialist healthcare system until Obamacare was enacted. By every measure, metric, and report available, insurance premiums and total healthcare expenditures per person in the USA have risen dramatically directly because of Obamacare.
The whole point of insurance is to guard against risk. I can graph my utility maximization demand curve, and risk is expensive. I'm willing to pay an insurance premium to protect my money. On the other side, people are willing to supply insurance only if the potentially insured events are truly unknown and risky. If you insure predictable outcomes it becomes too costly.
Imagine if your health insurance paid for your groceries. You could only go to the store twice a month, but they would pay your bill. You'd never buy sirlion or chicken, you'd load up your cart on ribeyes. Your expenses would get out of control, and then your insurance company would do battle with you on what is approved and what must be paid out of pocket. There would be forms, spreadsheets, and a hundred pages (written in legalease) on what you can and can't buy at the grocery. The Grocer in turn would crank up the prices on everything the insurance "covers", and keep the prices low for what you have to pay out of pocket.
This is exactly what we see in the healthcare industry- things covered by insurance (like insulin, medications, etc) get more and more expensive every year with no increase in quality, while things not covered, like LASIK, get cheaper and better every year.
Even more disappointed that Pinkbike isn't doing more. Radek Burkat just sold out (presumably millions$$$), Robin Thurston (CEO of Outside) throws money at everything, and yet when one of their employees has an accident (probably doing her JOB!), there's no help. Weak!
Hundreds of strangers will help another stranger (Gofundme) before some rich pr*ck steps up. People with too much money are a scourge on the planet.
Lastly, I can totally understand why pinkbike wouldn't post a link to a GoFundMe page. What I don't understand is why they haven't acknowledged she is hurt. They post an article about riders conditions all the time, from trivial injuries to fatalities.
Their path to walk/ride and each are different
I
@ATXZJ You're missing the fact that pretty much all rider injury updates PB posts are actually reposts of what the riders had made public themselves via their own channels. PB does not share anyone's health details without their consent. How about you let Alicia decide for herself whether she wants her injury publicized when when gets better. You already know about it anyway, why do you need an article? Stop demanding that PB turns their colleague's and friend's misfortune into content for your entertainment.
Yes, the VA operates on a tighter budget and this effects which services are available.
What is relevant is cost efficiencies and on this scale US ran insurance programs use on average 2% of the budget for admin, compared to about 18% for private insurance. Fact is that Single Payer insurance is much cheaper to operate and more efficient than the patchwork of private healthcare we have currently.
It stands to reason that if the US government had the same budget as private insurance companies, with their lower admin cost, no profit & economies of scale we could either have cheaper insurance, better insurance for more people, or both.
Frankly what we have through private insurance is quite literally the worst in the 1st World, at the highest cost in the 1st world by an astounding margin.
Alicia got really hurt. Her family and friends are also hurting right now.
Let's all just chill out the pissing matches, and try to remember that we all just want Alicia and those around her to know that we want her to get better.
If we had a true free market in healthcare (USA is nowhere close) then what is most efficient to be covered by insurance will be, and what is most efficient to pay out of pocket will be that too. Obviously this would cause problems for the very sick or those with preexisting conditions. If you want government to address that ( I don't believe in legislating morality, but if you do) then the only way to help people in these situations without distorting market prices and risk aversion is a direct cash subsidy that the recipient is free to spend however they choose.
This is effectively a UBI for people with qualifying medical conditions, and like any UBI its going to have a host of costs/benefits as well.
Private healthcare for me going forward
Its good that you have the discretion to make your own health care/risk assessment choices again.
That B.S. is being spouted by the GOP and their wealthy donors for decades now an funnily regurgitated by lots of poor saps who would actually profit from it the most.
The US of A is a strange country indeed…
I'm a silent enemy of ebikes and I try to keep it to myself unless A) I discover an ally, or B) I get an opportunity to publicly announce it in the PB comments section. Just like vegans.
(But secretly I actually think this Oso looks sick asf! Good work @AJMIAC !!!)
I have one question regarding BB rock protector ; why interrupting its shape before the exposed radius of the downtube ? not only for Oso....but for all frames
Hello Monsieur Proto! Thanks for the compliments, I'm glad you like the look of the Oso!
For most of the rock protectors, we start with a bare frame and just go ride it. The whole thing gets really scratched and dinged up, and from the biggest damage to the paint we can see where the coverage needs to be... Over the course of several bike models, we have tuned in to where the coverage needs to be for 95% of riders. There may be some that live in rocky areas that need more coverage, but we also want to keep the guard from becoming too huge, since that will be costly and ugly.
Still, it's a learning process and so we aim to improve every chance we get. Do you have any direct feedback to give? Please DM me, I'd love to hear it!
I'm 39.
EMTB allows me to go for extra long ride and enjoy the fun uphill and downhill. The extra long ride with EMTB helps me build endurance while MTB ride build strength. Another good thing is I can do EMTB more than a few days without putting too much stress on my body.
So I'm getting the best of both worlds. Highly recommend to do both.
One complain though about EMTB is the damn price.
Should be really obvious with the emergence of "ebike specific" stuff, cause apparently your wheels or fork can somehow tell if the extra weight is on the bike or the person.
ETT does a bad job of accounting for STA and seat height adjustments. ESP for y’all people. A steep STA and super long reach may have a huge ETT but still be relatively shorter when seated with the dropper up than a bike with a slack STA and short reach with a smaller ETT that feels stretched when the post is extended. Just saying Ibis are trying something new size wise that works really well, but people get confused about what these numbers mean in the real world. My saddle height is way up there so ETT doesn’t mean much compared to knowing my seat tube angle/ reach/ stack and bar position stem length.
Ride it and see for yourself!
i think seb had an article a while back about how inaccurate travel claims can be. from memory, i think one of the examples he gave was the 2017-2019 enduro that his friend tested, which was only achieving 148mm out of a claimed 165mm.
We don't publish the exact LR curves because that is part of what makes DW's designs so good, so we have to preserve some of the secret sauce...
Could a third party measure the curves with some suspension telemetry, cable-pull potentiometers, and LabView installed on a 2003 Dell laptop with a cracked screen? Yeah. That'd be fun, I think.
1) You can only get so accurate with a photo, and the suspension kinematic is extremely sensitive to actual position. We have a tolerance of +/-0.1mm on suspension pivot placements so that one bike doesn't feel different from another. So, you're limited on what you can find out from a photo. Seb's 3D scan is certainly more accurate, but is still working from a bike that may or may not be in tolerance.
2) The suspension analysis software everyone uses is flawed and gives inaccurate charts. They have a set of assumptions of what the fork is doing that skews the LR curve towards more-progressive, especially late in the travel (last ~30% of wheel stroke?). In general, the AS curve shows 110%+ on most bikes, but this would be very much un-rideable if the true AS was over 100%. So, they are good for comparison between bikes, but they are not showing what actually is happening.
3) Having numbers is great and all, but knowing/feeling the difference between bikes and then correlating that to a chart value/shape is the real value. Until you know what all these bikes FEEL like, then you can start reading charts to try and guess what a new bike will ride like.
With those limitations in mind, by all means go nuts and have fun with it!
Yeah, the errors in that software are pretty funny. So close...but yet so far!
Anyhow, I'm preaching to the choir here...
And yeah, when Fox told us that Eye-to-eye length had a tolerance of +/-5mm, we were all IT WUT. That was wild
www.pinkbike.com/news/video-friday-fails-120.html
You're failing to realize the bike is11k with a lot in-house parts specced, including the wheels and hubs. It should get the nicest fork available, you're paying for it.
But I predict in the near future all of their Ripmos won't be specced with factory suspension. Those days are probably over. Just like their head tube badges.
Enjoy the time you have and worry less about 2028 trailhead bros you weirdo.
I read somewhere that DW was trying to break into the moto world and it was not working. I guess he took that design and Ibis snapped it up?
I get it though, the target customer for this walks into a shop with zero idea what they're looking at but with full intention of buying a cool looking expensive toy. The sales staff will tell them it's from a premium brand, throw in some buzzwords and close the deal. That customer has no clue different levels of drivetrains or suspension even exist but it says "performance" on the fork so it must be good.
Yeah and a stupidly small 426mm seattube to make sure that tall riders can't ride without having the creaking seatpost experience of their life.
Like seriously. My neighbors 26 kids bike has the same length. Lol
that's why you use a 240mm dropper hahah, added creaking right out of the box!
And they also need their own website...pinkybike.com
On a serious note, you don't have to buy all new fork and shock to get the longer travel settings. A new air spring from Fox and a shock service that takes out the travel limiter in the shock are MUCH cheaper than all-new parts (~$400 vs ~$1600)
Why are there so no good options for ebikes with 200mm+ of suspension travel?
If the whole purpose of an ebike is to enable you to hit things harder/faster/longer why not have the componentry best suited to the task (more travel, dual crowns, ~62 degree head angle, etc)?
I understand that many people don't have terrain that requires a pedal-able DH ebike, but that's also the case for many Enduro ebikes as well.
The only bikes that come close IIRC are the:
Pole Voima (only 190mm rear)
Husqvarna Extreme Cross (27.5 only, 65 degree headangle)
Haibike Dwnhll (27.5 only, not available in the US)
Specialized Turbo Kenevo Expert (only 180mm front and rear, overpriced, 27.5 only)
i already have a 180 travel ebike and there isnt much reason i see to go shorter travel on a full fat 50 plus lb ebike that i can see
I would love to see/have/ride a 200mm ebike, mainly because I have the terrain and trails to use something like that, and for that I am lucky. I can foresee that would be the end result that we will eventually get to in 5-10 years time...?
I'm a mulleted Kenevo owner (Boxxer @ 180mm) and a 170mm plus 10mm headset spacer Marin Wolfridge owner and Mech Eng lol. The Oso hits all the marks for me, duuude!
Copy the shock stroke spacer swap to get to 170mm but when you mention "Long Travel" shock re one owners mods, are you referring to the eye to eye length and subsequent stroke increase by using a longer shock?
I'm also looking for a full on 200/200 eDH bike. Home brewed ok with me as long as the geo stays close to what we know works. Expecting the Big S to bring the new gen Kenevo out as a mullet and perhaps up the travel...But the Oso is just so good looking! And I get to do a custom build to trick it out.
For the 170mm rear travel, the eye-to-eye (205mm) stays the same and we just increase the stroke from 60mm to 65mm.
Or rather, we take out the travel-limiting spacer that keeps the 60mm shock from stroking to 65mm. The shock does need to be taken all the way apart, so I'd recommend a qualified Fox Service Center or Fox themselves to make that switch.
For a 200mm eMTB, I was half-expecting Transition to come up with something like that, it would fit into their ethos (and the local riding terrain). My 190/170mm Oso is awfully burly and I've taken it on all the local shuttle and DH tracks. It's not quite the same as my DH bike (Commencal Supreme), but nothing really is! The added capability of the longer-travel Oso plus the ease of getting to the top (so I'm not blown from an hour and a half of grunting up a stupid fire road) has opened up my capabilities so much and I'm hitting bigger jumps and features as I've progressed. I can definitely recommend it! Check out the Fanatik video, they interviewed me and we got some riding shots, you can see the longer-travel version in action.
Is a 222mmx70mm shock mod possible? (X2/DHX2 and TTX22M Coil) For sure a can of geometry details gets opened up but I'm looking to get closer to a 200/200 Supreme like eDH bike for the Park and no lift chunk and jump lines, cause man, a full on DH is sooo nice.
100% re downhill capabilities increased due to the ease of eMTB climbing - long travel eMtb has been awesome for me to ride with my shredder son in non lift assist riding spots as well the lift assist parks. My HR is not red lined and I'm fresh to mob down. Win win - the e haters can hate - I ride for fun. My 1994 GT RTS 3 is just art in the garage now...been there done that
My suggestion is to offer a "frame only" ebike frame. That would be nice. Since new ebikes are coming up, I'd just prefer to swap my parts from one bike to another. Just like my non-ebikes.
Also, if you all are interested in more "cost effective, yet sweet ebikes" I'd look at Commencal's lineup. Just sayin'
I wouldn’t even consider it even if I could get over the looks or the price tag.
Why add lights and especially a taillight? My guess is people buying a $10K already have multiple lights.
The cockpit wiring is a mess and the fix makes it worse.
Why didn't they use i-spec mounts to eliminate the bar clamp, especially for professional photos?
Why didn't they hide the taillight wire rather? Instead, they mold a channel for it.
The Bosch display and remote look like they were designed in 2000. Trek and Specialized are in another league. Don't give me excuses that they are larger manufacturers.
The top tube logos are too much and they seem out of order - logo, OSO, Ibis. That's like saying Ranger Ford.
What are these BLK BRD handlebars? Why wouldn't you use Ibis brand bars for your professional photos appearing everywhere?
Seriously, A Fox Performance fork on this level of bike.
Okay, I feel better airing my feelings.
If the bike were for tall people it wouldn't have such a short seattube length.
That being said I’d have done the same thing as Pinkbike did. We all work hard for a reason!
Please get well Alicia! And I hope this community shows it’s love by supporting you! I don’t know this woman but everyone, please support by donating!
TBI is something many of us will deal with, even in if it's in much less severe situations.
PB you should at least dedicate a podcast or two to the subject and recovery protocols
@mikelevy @brianpark
Can brands please release size large bikes for us 6ft riders?
Like the EVO for e.g 475 then a huge jump to 498 for the s5/xl but then also the wheelbase blows out to bus lengths of 1280+
trek are pretty close with using the M/L that compares of other brands large sizing.
If you cant tell much of a difference between 23mm reach/ETT then you cant be that good of a rider.
500 is to long and 470 is to short for a 6ft rider IMO of curse before you continue to get upset... i feel stretched out on a 500 ish, but feel like im riding a kids bike on 470. if the guys i ride with didnt think the same id say it was just me but clearly isnt.
I never said i (or anyone else) can't tell the differance, i said 23mm is small enough that anyone can adjust to ride either size if they are in between, arguably a good rider can adjust and ride anything quick.
Sometimes you just have to pick the bike that has the size where you want it, i've certainly disreguarded bikes in the past becuase i'm between sizes but it's not like we are short of choice of different bikes unless you have your heart set on one bike that doesn't have your ideal fit.
Two, maybe unpopular, but why are all ibis other bikes so damn ugly but they make a not bad looking e bike??
Damn here's to a fast and successful recover for Alicia, Man that's tough to read. injuries suck and life threating injuries are, obviously, more sucky, rely on friend support and do what ever it takes to get better..
@brianpark please make aware additional potencial donators publishing it on the front page!
Most interesting detail on the whole thing!