2010 Flatline Good, Bad or Ugly?

I've not ridden the Flatline so I'm probably no help at all. However, if the suspension feels anywhere near as good as it does on the Slayer SXC's I would be all over one.

Friend of mine has 1, has been riding it daily for about 2 years, its a nice bike, he liked it, but its heavy. frame is 13 pounds 10 oz. Almost a demo 9, nice bike, probably wont break on you, but its got some heft. His build had it at 48 lbs, not exactly portly on the parts either.

yep the old one is heavy. I've rode a 2008 model and other than the weight it was quite a nice bike. It is a linkage driven single pivot, so if you have rode other linkage SP bikes the suspension feel is quite similar to most of them. The frame is STIFF from what i can remember, It isn't as slack as many of the newer frames coming out but that isnt the be all end all in my mind. If you can get a deal on one i would say go for it.

for the new version did they eliminate the crease area at the gusset on the downtube / headtube? a buddy had the old version. he hit a tree with it, and it went from DH head angle to an XC head angle of about 77° when the frame folded at that crease...

Ridden both the old and new ones. Really nice feeling bikes. Personally I dig the steeper seat angle. Feels very natural when things get steep and you're standing up. Or any other time on the bike when you're standing for that matter.

Seen them put through the paces pretty well over the course of a couple years without much of an issue. The old one came with some really cheesy hollow shock bolt that (predictably) broke. No idea about the hardware for the new one. New one lost some weight too I think and got a little slacker in the head angle.

What surprised me the most is how well that bike eats up chop for how low of a pivot it is.

The new ones look great. I had an 08 and as mentioned, it was a tank. 14.5 lbs for a large! Biggest thing I didn't like: 18.2 inch chainstays.

Raingauge said:

The goofy integrated fender has been removed.

http://www.bikes.com/DATA/BIKE/566_large.jpg

http://www.bikes.com/DATA/BIKE/938_large.jpg

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if that's the new one, then the issue i mentioned above has not been resolved.

jonKranked said:

if that's the new one, then the issue i mentioned above has not been resolved.

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I believe the 2nd pic is the new one, first is the creasy one.

jonKranked said:

for the new version did they eliminate the crease area at the gusset on the downtube / headtube? a buddy had the old version. he hit a tree with it, and it went from DH head angle to an XC head angle of about 77° when the frame folded at that crease...

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that hit would have broken any bike. he hit that tree dead on coming off a drop.

IH8Rice said:

that hit would have broken any bike. he hit that tree dead on coming off a drop.

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oh absolutely, but there's still the possibility it could fail at lower speed impacts as well

i bought a 2010 fatline pro a few weeks ago, it rides nice, but havent really had much time on it. so far its been great