chacou

@Frank191: exactly. Son's 24" w/ 10 speed 11 - 42, 150mm cranks, 28t chainring has a 1.4 gear ratio in lowest gear. My 29" w/ 12 speed 10 - 50, 165mm cranks, 30t chainring has a 1.3 gear ratio in lowest. * I could put a 10 speed 11 - 46 cassette on his bike to put him at 1.3 gear ratio, but I don't have one in spare parts, and he's getting used to it, coming from a 20" wheel with the same 10 speed 11 - 42 gearing that was a 1.1 in lowest. He's also 8 years old and I feel like the trade off of less mental load needing to cycle through gears and weight savings is worth the slightly increased effort on some climbs, we don't have too much sustained steep climbs around here that I'm taking him up, it's more the mellow climbs, and when it does get steep or tiring, it teaches hike-a-bike. If you're not hiking, you're not really mountain biking ;)

@eh-steve: 100% I would also add that those ProMax brakes are really great spec for the kids. My son has/had those on his Cannondale hardtail and they have plenty of power for a little kid and a really nice light lever feel and lever shape with good bite so you can get them positioned well to promote 1 or 2 finger braking. These touch points are very important for small hands. Also helps to cut the bar down, I think the Reaper we got from Trestle Bike Park for my son came with a stock 680mm bar which was way way too wide for him. Aside, I highly recommend following what BikeDads and Andrew Major share about kids bike setups.

@cyclesdevinci: Appreciate the response and agree swapping out that BB (assuming it's the SX power spline) could save a lot of weight. IME, 12 speeds is simply not necessary for this age of rider and 24" - 26" wheels, so I'd go as far as to swap the entire drivetrain to save weight. Dropper post is questionable too, on my son's Reaper I've removed the dropper to save weight and he just doesn't use it, so it's one less thing that he needs to think about, quick release clamp works great for him for now.

My 10 y/o daughter is on a hardtail, I just picked up a used Rocky Reaper 24" this winter for my 8 y/o son that rides more and wants to go to the bike park. He's thrown a leg over and coming off his hardtail he comments on how heavy it is, and that's after I've swapped out parts to lighten it up. Haven't weighed it but it's probably about 27-28lbs. This Devinci is 32lbs!

On Devinci site they have it list at 31.97lbs!

Looks very nice, but a 32lbs build is very heavy for a kid. I have 8 and 10 year olds and for them it's all about weight first, touch points second, suspension kinematics third. I'd ditch the SX drivetrain for maybe a 10 (put Shimano Zee 10 - 42 on both kids bikes and it's plenty low enough gearing) or even 9 speed wide range. With 12 speed, the kids would be pedaling at such a high cadence in the big ring and barely be moving and trying to manage all that weight. At least they indicate that the suspension is tuned for light riders, and I wonder if their lifetime warranty is transferable, since the only reason to get your kids a nice bike is because of re-sale value.