Eurobike 2011: Intense – Carbon and more carbon

Last week we brought you news of Intense’s new Hard Eddie carbon hardtail and before that the new carbon Carbine. Well there’s already another new model. Its’ the Carbine SL. Once again it’s a Taiwanese carbon frame that’s then assembled in the States with US-made bits and pieces. The Carbine SL, as you might expect is a lighter version. It comes with a carbon rocker link and a few other weight savings, like 135mm dropouts, rather than bolt-through, and the frame weight drops to 4.75lbs (the regular Carbine is about 5.5lbs. Travel is 4.75in-5.25in, while the regular Carbine is 5.5in-6in.

Here's the regular Carbine in fancy red

And the stripped down SL

A close up of the Carbine SL dropout

Weight savings include this carbon link and full carbon dropouts too

135 QR dropouts

And a fancy head badge

Here’s the Hard Eddie in the flesh. It looks very neat and the tattoo-style graphics are a departure for Intense. Jeff Steiber also told us that he’s working on a full carbon rigid fork to go with the Hard Eddie

Looks great in the flesh

Chipps Chippendale

Singletrackworld's Editor At Large

With 23 years as Editor of Singletrack World Magazine, Chipps is the longest-running mountain bike magazine editor in the world. He started in the bike trade in 1990 and became a full time mountain bike journalist at the start of 1994. Over the last 30 years as a bike writer and photographer, he has seen mountain bike culture flourish, strengthen and diversify and bike technology go from rigid steel frames to fully suspended carbon fibre (and sometimes back to rigid steel as well.)

Comments (6)

NorthwindNorthwind September 3, 2011 at 3:34 pm

Sounds like a good idea, if it’s all carbon then it won’t be welded up squint.

tangtang September 3, 2011 at 8:02 pm

That hard eddie looks fantastic. any links to the vital stats?

mikewsmithmikewsmith September 3, 2011 at 10:27 pm

like northwind was wondering if they are straight, at least with a ht you’ll probably not be able to tell

MrOvershootMrOvershoot September 3, 2011 at 11:09 pm

That cable/hose entry on the last pic looks like it was drilled by one of my most inept technicians who then sanded off the gouge marks with some 60 grit !!!!

petaypanpetaypan September 4, 2011 at 10:57 am

Carbines look great, but what’s with that rear mech cable routing?! Looks like an after thought – I’d have a tree branch get stuck and rip that off in that in no time…

wozzer10wozzer10 September 5, 2011 at 8:27 am

Any hints on UK/Europe pricing for the Hard Eddie yet?

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