The bigger difference is that a proper DH bike will probably be used by a rider who is riding it how it should be ridden, and an AM bike is more likely to be minced round trail centres when a HT would suffice 🙂

My big bike is a 160mm “all mountain bike”, i wouldn’t really question using it anywhere. I’m hitting 25ft+ gaps, 10ft+ drops on it, without ever thinking the bike is beyond its comfort zone. The same goes for any DH track i’ve ridden (alps, llangollen and many others).

POIDH 😛

The bigger difference is that a proper DH bike will probably be used by a rider who is riding it how it should be ridden, and an AM bike is more likely to be minced round trail centres when a HT would suffice

I dunno, when I went to bike parks in Andorra there were quite a few people properly mincing down dragging the brakes on big DH bikes. I obviously pwned them on my all mountain bike because I’m AWESOME. 🙂

I said big drops and jumps.