Topic: Lenzsport Leviathan 3"FS 29er

[EllsRider]

Wheres the pivot points on this design?  The rear chain stays, how are they attached to the frame? Looks like the same as as the Lenzsport which looks like the same as my bike.

[EllsRider]

I went to the Intense home page and looked at suspension tech page. Looks like they have  little pieces for the top  and bottom pivot points on the chainstays.  Since the pivot point is going to be varying between the two connections at the top and bottom, it is not at a fixed pivot point,  is this where they get the term Virtual Pivot Point? Or is it referring to something else?

[BillT]

I went to the Intense home page and looked at suspension tech page. Looks like they have  little pieces for the top  and bottom pivot points on the chainstays.  Since the pivot point is going to be varying between the two connections at the top and bottom, it is not at a fixed pivot point,  is this where they get the term Virtual Pivot Point? Or is it referring to something else?

They call it a virtual pivot because the effective pivot point changes/moves as the suspension cycles through the travel.  This results in a suspension path that is kinda shaped like a reverse letter 's'.  The wheel travels up and back initially before starting to arc forward.  VPP bikes require a bit more sag that other suspension designs as they have a sweet spot in the travel (about 25 - 30% of the total travel) where chain torque eliminates bobbing, yet is easily overcome by bump forces so that the suspension stays pretty active.  Having said all that, I think that VPP designs are ideal for longer travel applications where you want to maintain good pedal efficiencies, but may be overkill for shorter travel designs especially with today's shock technology.  I love my Blur, but I feel that the Ellsworth that my Blur replaced was a better bike for xc purposes; however, my Intense VPX is light-years ahead of my old Bullit in every conceivable way even after I had the Bullit's shock custom tuned by Push (which greatly improved everything about the Bullit).

Here's a picture of the VPP frame so you can better see the linkage:

[CrazyWhiteGuy]

Ventana please