BikeYoke will not be a brand that jumps to mind when you are researching your latest dropper post, but perhaps they should be on your radar. It’s first entry into the every growing dropper post market does what all good droppers do and (so far) continues to do so after many months of grit, snow, mud, and slop.
Who is BikeYoke?
Before I get too carried away, let’s take a step back and familiarise ourselves with the BikeYoke brand and what they do.
Based in Germany, BikeYoke started out as a manufacturing company specialising (no pun intended) in creating aftermarket suspension yoke for Specialized bikes. Why? Well as any Specialized owner will tell you, their bikes use a special yoke and a proprietary rear shock design that prevents owners from easily upgrading to a different shock. Swapping out the OEM yoke for one of BikeYoke’s own solved that problem.
After gaining a name for themselves as the go-to people for suspension mods, the company has branched out into creating modifications for Canyon’s Shapeshifter suspension system, custom rollers for SRAM 11-speed and 12-speed rear derailleurs, and now a dropper post.
Features
As you can tell, BikeYoke takes a good hard look at what’s currently being used on the market, finds any faults and then figures out the best way to solve those issues. So for the Revive dropper post they had the usual specifications brief that they wanted to stick to. As in, it needed to go up and down, it should hold a saddle, it should continue to work after months of use, and it should be easy to look after. But – and this is the very clever bit – they also decided to solve the very annoying ‘pogo’ action that can creep into some dropper posts over time.
Anyone who has used a dropper post from other brands will know that they can eventually develop a bit of a ‘pogo’. This can happen if you leave your bike upside down, or just over time, as air is able to creep into the IFP chamber. If you’re lucky, just leaving your bike upright for a while can get rid of it, but the only way to fix it properly is to pull the whole post apart and bleed the damper cartridge inside.
BikeYoke looked at this and decided that they must be an easier way to fix the issue, and this is what they did.
First of all, they reduced the number of hydraulic parts down to a minimum. So rather than a hydraulic remote and a hose running to your handlebar, the Revive comes with the companies own Triggy lever. This is an extremely well-made alloy lever that operates the cable remote system (of note is that there is also an aftermarket conversion kit for most other droppers on the market including the Reverb).
There isn’t much to go wrong with a cable, just make sure you keep it clean and greased and you are good to go.
So the only hydraulics in the Revive system are in the seat post itself, which means that any pogoing can be tracked down to air in this part of the system. But how do you fix it?
Simples! The boffins at BikeYoke created the Revive with a simple ‘Revive’ valve at the very top of the seat post shaft. You’ll need a 4mm Allen Key, but that’s all you’ll need.
The Revive valve is basically a bypass that allows any air that’s trapped in the inner shaft to be pushed back out to the outer shaft, and because the inner and outer assemblies are connected it won’t matter if oil moves between the two. Ok, that’s quite complicated to explain in words and even harder to understand, so best watch the video below;
So if you have had to pop your bike upside down to remove a wheel or perform some trailside maintenance and the post becomes springy it’s a simple process to sort it out.
- Step 1: Extend your Revive post.
- Step 2: Insert a 4mm Allen Key into the revive valve actuator.
- Step 3: Turn valve (it’s a very short and positive movement) and compress your post.
- Step 4: Enjoy your fully operational post.
BikeYoke offers the Revive in either 125mm, 160mm or 185mm of drop, and in either 30.9mm or 31.6mm diameter options. The post only comes with stealth routing (please don’t be tempted to drill your frame if stealth routing is missing from yours) and being a hydraulic post offers infinite adjustment. The only adjustments available on the post are air pressure and a barrel adjustment on the cable to get rid of slack.
Installation
The Revive ships with everything you need to get the seat post up and running including an inner and outer cable, and a custom adapter to adjust air pressure.
Ease of routing really depends on your bike, but on my Whyte T130 the process was very easy and pain-free, and as you’re dealing with a cable rather than a hose you can simply chop it to length and not have to worry about bubbles in the system or bleeding it up.
The inner cable is inserted from the lever end of the system which means there is a small barrel and grub screw to secure it all at the seat post end. While everything goes together well it is well worth measuring a few times before cutting anything down so that you don’t cock the installation up.
Being clever German engineers, the Bike Yoke boffins have gone and added a nice outline of how much cable you need to be exposed at the seat post end of the system. Too much and you’ll have to take up the slack with the barrel adjust over at the lever. Not enough and the seat post will won’t stay in position. The markings help you double check everything is correct before moving forward and takes some the stress of the set up away.
Once you have all your cable routed properly and the seat post in the position you can take your first Bike Yoke Revive drop. Did you feel that? That’s what mountain bike journos in the 90’s used to call “buttery smooth”. The super smooth function of the Revive is so smooth that I found myself dropping the post more than necessary just to remind myself that this is how a dropper should feel.
The Ride
I’m not sure if I’ve already mentioned this, but the Bike Yoke Revive is smooth, smooth with a capital “SMOO”. There are other dropper posts that feel as good as the Revive, but with no maintenance and just your bog standard clean after very dirty rides, the Revive has survived a winter that has sent other posts packing.
The ample 160mm drop gets the saddle well out of the way for super techy death gnar or playing on the BMX track, and when fully extended get’s me into the optimal position for grinding back up the trails again.
Bike Yoke’s alloy lever is tough and still has a satisfying action, and even though this is a cabled setup, I’ve not experienced any issues with dirty cables slowing things down.
The only item left is the Revive feature. Well, our test version was one of the first few Bike Yoke Revive posts to leave the factory and I’m happy to report that the Revive system works as advertised. Anytime I experienced a pogo sensation I was able to alleviate it with a twist of the Revive valve, and it worked every time. My only issue is the frequency that the post needed this operation to be carried out.
I quickly noticed that after leaving the post in a warmer environment i.e, car, conservatory etc, it would need a quick Revive session, and in fact, even if the bike hadn’t been ridden for a few days it would need a Revive before it would perform as it should.
Speaking with the chaps at BikeYoke, they were aware of this in the earlier production models and have already solved this on newer posts. They stated that newer Revive posts won’t need to be Revived as often, though also claimed that the operation of the post will remain as silky smooth.
Overall
After 10 months on the Revive dropper post and having no issues with it – except for the need to use the fantastically useful Revive valve way more than I had expected – I am extremely impressed with this new entrant to the dropper post world. The post has remained smooth throughout my testing and the action is as good today as it was when I unboxed.
The attention to detail is excellent and neat features such as the markings on the post for cable position really help this post stand out in a very crowded market place.
Compared to other dropper posts on the market, the Revive is more pricey, but if you want something that remains buttery smooth from day one, there are few posts that work better. And if BikeYoke can deliver on its claims of reducing the need to ‘Revive’ the post with its updated internals, it’ll have quite possibly one of the best dropper posts on the market.
Review Info
| Brand: | BikeYoke |
| Product: | Revive Dropper Post |
| From: | www.bikeyoke.de |
| Price: | €349.00 - €369.00 |
| Tested: | by Andi for 10 Months |