China’s Pardus Cycles has developed the Pardus Cycleon, a Fox Live Valve compatible full-suspension bike with Scissor Link and hidden rear shock.
It’s a busy time of year with the downhill season kicking off, handmade bike shows and Lake Garda this past week, but did you also know that over in China the Shanghai Bike Show is in full swing?
I’ve been to the Shanghai Bike Show in previous years, but it’s a year that I’m not there that something really quite interesting appears! Typical!
While we all know that many of our bikes are made in China or Taiwan, we generally associate Chinese OEM bikes as being low-tech and budget orientated. The Pardus Cyclone cannot be described as either. Pardus actually revealed the Cyclone full-suspension bike in prototype form in 2017 at Interbike, but the production version is now available and it looks as though it retains all of the same features that originally made it so intriguing.
With its chunky downtube, the Pardus Cyclone does a pretty convincing impression of an e-Bike, but the only electrical help on this carbon Chinese bike comes in the form of Fox Live Valve, although a RockShox version of the bike is also available.
Once you realize there is no motor hidden away in the frame you’ll soon notice that Pardus actually has hidden the rear shock and its clever ‘Scissor Link’ suspension system down near the B.B, located neatly inside the frame.
A removable carbon cover allows for easy access to the shock settings, but when in place protects the shock from debris and rocks being thrown up, this would be especially important if you were running one of those expensive Live Valve Shocks. The Scissor linkage runs internally and was apparently designed by Steve Domahidy, one of the co-founders of Niner.
As well as protecting the shock, the position so low in the frame means the Cyclone has a pretty low center of gravity and should help improve the life of your shock seals.
The hidden scissor linkage gives the Cyclone 135mm of rear wheel travel, while the front end of the bike is designed to accept either a 140 – 150mm travel fork.
The clever suspension system also has a flip chip for geometry changes, and also means that the Cyclone can either be run as a 29er or as a chunky 27.5+ bike without upsetting the angles. We assume the Cyclone can also be run in ‘Mullet’ mode, a larger wheel on the front.
Although Pardus originally designed the Cyclone back in 2017, the geometry is still pretty good by today’s standards with a large frame boasting a reach of 460mm, a head angle of 65.5°, seat tube angle of 75° and short 436mm chainstays.
Pardus says the Cyclone is part of its global range of bikes which also includes a gravel bike, but we’ve only seen Chinese pricing for the bike. So for anyone wanting one, you had better brush up on your Chinese and prepare to stump up 88,000 RMB which is around £9900 for one.
What do you think of this clever Chinese carbon whip? Let us know in the comments section below.
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It’s just a single pivot bike with a link driven shock. Nothing fancy going on with linkages changing the axle path or anything like that. So quite a bit of complexity and added bearings added for minor benefits.
I do like the idea of protecting the shock though – kinda surprised there’s not more of this. After many muddy miles in the UK I’d love better mud protection.
But this design also places 2 linkages right down at the bottom – in the firing line for BB strikes and mud ingress.
I think the flippable dropouts are a good solution for changing BB height for different tyre sizes – but this isn’t related to the core concept.
And I don’t agree with the fuss that gets made around “low centre of gravity” in bike designs. And I know how much of a difference it makes on heavy motorcycles. So yes low centre of gravity is important but how much difference does moving a few hundred grams of suspension actually make in comparison to the whole rider + bike? Plus there are some negative consequences of having more weight further away from the rider. This creates leverage effects – imagine having a kettlebell on an extension pole. This is much harder to move around quickly than a kettle bell that is closer to your body.
On the last point I don’t have enough experience riding similar bike setups with different centre of gravities – if someone has good experience maybe they can add some actual experience in here 🙂
So overall a bit Blah, so what on this design. Although I hope it creates interest in more protected shock designs but with fewer other bad design compromises