Merida eOne-Sixty 875 review

We test out the Merida eOne-Sixty 875 AKA The Big Batteried Bomber AKA Heavy Metal Thunder AKA The Bendy Bus.

• Brand: Merida
• Product: eOne-Sixty 875
• From: Merida Bikes
• Price: £6,000
• Tested by: Benji for 3 months

Pros

• All of the range
• Great technical climber
• Will take on any descent

Cons

• XLong sizing not quite perfect
• Undeniably heavy
• Suspension not very lighter-rider friendly

This is a very full-bore e-mountain bike. There is nothing ‘mid’ or ‘SL’ about it. It’s a metal machine with big travel and a big battery. And with all of that, an unavoidable big weight. 26kg to be exact (57.3lbs in old money). It’s a bike for big hits and big hills. As the saying goes, it is what it is. There won’t be many punters buying this bike who aren’t fully aware that it’s a big ‘un.

Should you want a lighter, big-travel, full-power eMTB from Merida then it offers two other eOne-Sixty siblings: the carbon fibre (with 600Wh battery) at around 23-24kg, and the newer SL version (with 400Wh battery and Bosch Line SX mid-power motor) at around 20-21kg.

Back to this £6,000 Merida eOne-Sixty 875 we have here. The eOne-Sixty is being promoted with the tagline “Goodbye range anxiety”. While its 750Wh internal battery is not the biggest battery these days, there is an option to run a piggyback 360Wh range extender battery. Which, if my maths is correct, brings the total capacity up to 1,110Wh. This would also bump the weight up to around 29kg (63.9lbs).

Big batteries and especially range extenders are pretty rare for Shimano motor-ed machines. Though there does seem to have been a bit of loosening up of the control freakery reins from Shimano’s e-department in recent years, no doubt as it attempts to keep up with its rivals.

Anyway, enough about E for a bit. What about the bike? It’s an aluminium mullet. Despite being called the ‘eOne-Sixty’ the bike actually offers 174mm of rear travel. And has a flex-pivot design no less. That is quite a move. Literally. We’re used to seeing flex stays on short travel carbon XC bikes, so to see one on a longer travel alloy eBeast is quite eyebrow-raising. There’s a fair amount of flexing to be done – not to mention a fair bit of side-loading to deal with too.

Every eOne-Sixty bike comes in mixed wheel flavour. But the keen eyed amongst you will notice that there’s a flip-chip on the upper linkage. This is not geometry adjustment per se, it’s wheel size changing. You can flip this chip, source a new 29inwheel (and tyre) and go full 29.

Caution: you will need to get a suitably authorised bike shop to change the wheelsize in the software’s ‘brain’ or else the power assist cut-off will occur at a higher speed than 15mph. Another caution: the rear travel gets reduced to 160mm when the flip-chip is set to 29er.

Much like the Norco Sight VLT reviewed last year, the Merida eOne-Sixty uses a rear shock that’s rotated 90° so that the RockShox Super Deluxe Select’s piggyback reservoir lays horizontally. Also, Merida has slightly offset the whole shock to the non-driveside so that it protrubes evenly either side of the top tube. That rotated piggyback placement affords the generous amount of space inside the front triangle for a proper water bottle.

As is often the case, if you’re using a range extender battery you’ll sacrifice the bottle storage entirely as there’s not room for both. I think that’s a fair enough compromise; I’d rather have the lower slung top tube (improved standover) all the time, and – in the real world – one water bottle is not going to be enough hydration for a 1,110Wh-emptying ride.

Parking the battery and motor to one side for a moment, let’s have a peek at the vital stats of the frame. There’s a lot to like about the geometry numbers on the Merida eOne-Sixty. This XLong size has a decent reach of 499mm and a properly steep seat angle of 78.3°. The relatively high BB (9mm drop) is often a good sign on full-bore eMTBs too.

Although the seat tube length is a not-that-short 465mm the top tube is nicely low slung and out of the way. Decent standover really does do wonders for your confidence on a hefty ebike.

At either end of the bike were some numbers that didn’t quite gel for me. The 64.4° head angle felt steep when barrelling into steeper terrain. The short-for-eMTB 446mm chainstays also didn’t feel that well balanced to the rangey reach, nor the high-ish BB. The short 120mm head tube length and specced cockpit components also put the front end noticeably low.

I would caveat these moans by stating that I think it’d be less of a problem on the smaller sizes. On this XLong size, the middle of the bike felt ‘big’ while the ends of the bike felt ‘small’.

Yet in a serendipitous way, this sizing issue did have the unexpected bonus of resulting in incredible suspension performance. Basically, in an attempt to slacken the head angle and lower the BB to a height where it worked better with the other geometry numbers, I opted to run large amounts of sag. Something approaching 40%.

Being sagged 69mm still leaves 105mm of travel still to go (not that this is how suspension really works dynamically when riding but you get the idea). And the eOne-Sixty has a very progressive leverage ratio. So much so that running a generous amount of sag is arguably the only way some folk will ever get the O-ring to the end of the shock shaft.

Again, this is an aspect of the XLong sizing; Merida deliberately increases the progressive leverage rate as the frame sizes increase. Speaking as a light-and-lanky human I kinda wished Merida had foregone the proportional progression and gone with proportional chain stay lengths instead.

Up front is a 170mm travel RockShox Zeb Select fork. As with all 38mm stanchion forks I quickly ended up removing all of the volume spacers and still (lighter rider alert again) rarely troubled the upper end of the fork’s travel. Despite being a bit short-changed in the travel stakes, the damping was perfectly fine. Supple, grippy with no unexpected events or inconsistency. It basically rode like a good 150mm fork for my 73kg.

In terms of the rest of the build kit there’s not a whole load of blingon show. Which is totally fine by me. It’s mostly Merida in-house stuff with Shimano XT 4-pot brakes and 11sp Linkglide drivetrain. All the XT stuff was great. Kudos to Merida for speccing big rotors on the brakes (220mm front, 203mm rear) and also a steel chainring from FSA for better durability.

The Merida branded stem, bars and lock-on grips were okay and while 30mm rise bars are better than other brands’ speccing, I had better handling once I’d put a higher rise bar on. The excellently long 230mm dropper post was a highlight and was simple (no tools required) and quick to adjust for other test riders’ limb length.

And yes, that is a semi-integrated front light under the cockpit. Don’t worry, it can be removed pretty easily by unplugging a couple of wires from the drive unit and pulling out of the headset top-cover etc. It’s not bright enough to do much more than illuminate a commute.

There is also a multi-tool in a little case underneath the rear of the saddle. The multi-tool is nice. The location, not so nice. It just gets covered in filth.

The wheels (Merida rims on Shimano XT hubs) were fine throughout the test period. The tyres they were shod with are impresasive: a proper MaxxGrip Assegai up front and a suitable DoubleDown casing DHR II on the rear.

On the trail, the Merida eOne-Sixty defied a lot of expectations. Unlike the ostensibly similar aforementioned Norco Sight VLT, the eOne-Sixty was not a ground covering electric cross-country specialist. The eOne-Sixty was a big fan of steep gradients. Both up and down.

Climbing. Despite having not-long chain stays, the Merida’s steep seat angle and high bottom bracket (and 165mm cranks) made for an exceptional technical ascending machine. Immense grip. Excellent at slow bumps, small bumps, bigger bumps, speedy haul-ups and pretty much anything you could point it at to squirt up. The Shimano EP801 motor is in a different league in terms of power delivery compared to previous EP8 series motors.

Descending. This bike lives for steep, technical descents. With a few setup tweaks (higher bars, super sag rear sus) the eOne-Sixty’s long dropper, excellent standover, great brakes, good tyres and inspiring rangey reach had me hurtling down all sorts of madness. Madness that I usually do not even fancy attempting on a heavy eMTB.

This bike also likes fast descents. In fact, it likes them more than anything else. It does the whole pitter-patter thang on loose terrain to find immense line-holding traction. It can swallow big, unexpected hits without complaining or getting weird. The brakes are so good that you realise you don’t have to cover/drag/use them. You can brake at the very last split second and it’ll be fine. But yeah, generally just stay off the levers and let rip.

Overall

The Merida eOne-Sixty is a surprising bike. Not only does it not have the 160mm of travel that you may expect from the name, but it also has a battery capability that implies more of a high mileage map-crossing vibe. As it turns out, the eOne-Sixty is actually something of a bikepark hot-lapper. Use that big ol’ battery to spend the day smashing descents and then whizzing back up to the top. Taller riders may need to tweak the spec/setup a bit but the rest of you can hop on and hit your local steeps.

Merida eOne-Sixty 875 Specification

• Frame // eOne-Sixty Lite IV aluminium, 174mm
• Shock // RockShox Super Deluxe Select
• Fork // RockShox Zeb Select, 170mm
• Wheels // Merida Expert TR II rims on Shimano XT hubs
• Front tyre // Maxxis Assegai 3C MaxxGrip EXO+ 29×2.5in
• Rear tyre // Maxxis Minion DHR II 3C MaxxTerra DD 27.5×2.4in
• Chainset // Shimano, 165mm, 36T
• Drivetrain // Shimano XT Linkglide 11-50T
• Brakes // Shimano XT 4-pot, 220/203mm
• Stem // Merida Expert eTR II 35mm, 40mm
• Bars // Merida Expert eTR 35mm, 780 x 30mm
• Grips // Merida Lock-on
• Seatpost // Merida Team TR II, 34.9mm, 30-230mm
• Saddle //Proxim Nembo Steel
• Bottom Bracket //Shimano
• Motor // Shimano EP801, 85Nm
• Battery // 750Wh
• Size tested // XLong
• Sizes available // XShort, Short, Mid, Long,. XLong
• Weight // 26kg

Geometry of our size XLong

• Head angle // 64.4°
• Effective seat angle // 78.3°
• Seat tube length // 465mm
• Head tube length // 120mm
• Top tube // 632mm
• BB height // 353mm/9mm BB drop
• Reach // 499mm
• Chainstay // 446mm
• Wheelbase // 1,288mm