[Closed] Cotic rocketmax Longshot Geo longterm

Had mine a while now. Observations:

I think the geometry takes a long time to get used to. This is not a bad thing, it is just a very long bike and requires a bit of relearning. My previous best skill on a bike was nose wheelies. I still can't do them on the Solaris.

It is super confidence inspiring on easy-ish downhills. Less so on stuff that requires more techy bike handling skills.

It is very comfortable for long rides.

Oh goodness, I have just realised the opening post was about the Rocketmax. I will shut up now.

Ha ha that’s all good! I was blown away by how capable it was on the test ride. And as a flat out race bike it would be incredible but was just worried about mellow stuff and riding that isn’t flat out steep and gnarly. Cy said he rides his all the time and feels it works, he knows to be fair!

Not the same bike, but I’m thinking the geometry could be something like the Aeris which is super long / low / slack.

Initially I found it hard to turn into sharp corners but got that sussed fairly quickly - you need to ride more in the middle of the bike and not off the back at all. You need to really weight the front.

I found it easy to hop on and go quickly - smashing all my strava pbs.

However longer / slacker geometry speeds you up to where you’ve never been before - so when you stack it - it hurts! It also finds flaws in your technique that you’ve not found before because you go so fast.

I’ve found there’s a second stage of learning (for me anyway) and that’s unlocked another level of performance I think. I had some coaching recently on the bike and that’s now got me so I can manual it a lot better (long front centre means you need good technique that I don’t need on my hardtail so much) and cornering is improving the more I think and practice it since.

In terms of everyday usage it’s fine - done everything on it from a natural bridle way ride / 50k trail centre ride at brechfa and Cwm Rheadder / uplift days / local trail riding. It takes it all in. I now have a hardtail which I prefer on local easy trails for the pop and more playfulness, but I take the Aeris on most other rides.

I rode an Aeris before getting my AirDrop, Rode a lot of slack and long bikes so my riding style is already leaning that way. The rocketmax being 29er just felt like a crazy monster truck that could get through anything at any speed though, like a step up from anything else. I would say the length isn’t the issue. Long bikes feel so right to me. It’s that it felt slow on anything flat or mellow. It wasn’t slow, more that I wanted to go faster! Just want to know how that is everyday. Like I said as a race bike it would be incredible but I can’t afford two bikes!

Not really been out long enough for a long term review. I've had mine two days of which one day was building it :).
Everybody seems to think its a bike for blasting stuff and big hits, but what sold it for me during the demo was actually the slowest, tightest trail I can think of and it was superb. Long doesn't mean it can't dance.

I've also not got a rocketmax, I've got a longshot flaremax. Maybe it's because I came from a (shorter!) dh bike but I didn't really need to get used to it, it felt great from the off. Perhaps the 120mm travel helps it feel lively on duller tracks but overall it's left me wondering if I wouldn't have been better off with the rocketmax as I struggle to think of a time when I'd want it any shorter. Even uphill switchbacks are easy, I've ridden some more technical trails and it's loads of fun, I've ridden some trail centres and its still fun. I'm definitely not chris ackrig but lifting front or rear wheels seems fine to me. I think the longshot geometry will be fairly standard in a few years, see latest stumpy evo.

Marksnook - in terms of on mellow trails it’s ok but the hardtail I have is more fun.

I ride with a guy who loves 29ers and went from an older Specialized fs 29er to an AM9 recently. His feeling is it’s brilliant on the big / steep / fast tech stuff, but on more mundane trails it feels like hard work a bit. I haven’t had a go on it to see how different it feels to the Aeris. He thought the Whyte s150 was similar is him that feeling, but a bit more lively than the AM9.

Not sure if the Cotic will be similar to one of those 2 bikes. Probably ok for everything, but will come more alive on the faster / bigger stuff.

2 degrees slacker up front and 25mm longer wheelbase,linkage driven single pivot.I'm not sure how good a comparison the AM9 is.

If anything I’d have thought that the Cotic might feel even bigger then being longer and slacker.

They do feel huge, I was lucky enough to have a whole afternoon on one on Inners uplift and I was sold, not just for it's abilities in steep stuff, but on nadgery awkward tech too, the kind of stuff that hangs a bike up and you have to keep momentum as you can't get a pedal in.
Sold a Hightower for it, and very happy I did.

I'm Joe's friend with an AM9.

A large rocket is 6mm longer in reach, 13mm in Wheelbase, and 1 degree slacker than an ML AM9. BB is a bit higher on the rocket too. The L rocket is shorter than a L AM9 when you pull up the comparison on the geometrygeeks website. They're not going to be miles apart in geo, but I guess there will be a difference in suspension feel - maybe the rocket will pedal a bit better at the expense of the neutral feel of the 4 bar.

I love my AM9 going down (both on flat out BPW style trails and slow technical steep stuff) and going up it is fine (it's a decent climber for such a big bike), but on the flatter trails I'd rather be on a smaller bike that accelerates quicker and allows you to generate speed without gravity. I don't mind pedalling hard and think that hardtails or short travel FS bikes are better in that context - they just give more back.

I can't see any long travel 29er with decent tyres being that engaging for the flat singletrack that is most of my winter riding in Bristol, but YMMV - if all my local riding was climbing followed by descending proper trails, the AM9 would be fine, but it is nowhere near as much fun on XC trails as a smaller bike for me with lighter rubber (currently riding a scout 290 most of the time, which is still pretty long and slack). I've given up on the idea of one bike for everything!

woots787
I’ve also not got a rocketmax, I’ve got a longshot flaremax. Maybe it’s because I came from a (shorter!) dh bike but I didn’t really need to get used to it, it felt great from the off. Perhaps the 120mm travel helps it feel lively on duller tracks but overall it’s left me wondering if I wouldn’t have been better off with the rocketmax as I struggle to think of a time when I’d want it any shorter. Even uphill switchbacks are easy, I’ve ridden some more technical trails and it’s loads of fun, I’ve ridden some trail centres and its still fun. I’m definitely not chris ackrig but lifting front or rear wheels seems fine to me. I think the longshot geometry will be fairly standard in a few years, see latest stumpy evo.

This is music to my ears as I've got a FlareMAX on order.

That's weird, I was taking my figures from the official Cotic and Bird sites so I wonder which is correct !?!?!

Ianpv, just looked closer, are you talking about a Rocket or a longshot Rocketmax?

Wonder if cy runs his on the same tyres all year round. Would skinny rubber and a couple of clicks of compression make the big bike acceptable on flat singletrack?

You know if it wasn’t for wanting to race a lot this year I think the flaremax would be a perfect bike. I found it just required a slightly more composed calculated ride than the smashing ability of the rocketmax. But racing and hitting stuff hard and fast made me think rocketmax.
I think the rocketmax on geometry geeks is the previous iteration rather than the Longshot.
I actually want to ride an am9. See if I can make it happen in the new year. Just not as keen on the look of it to the cotic (shallow but here we are!)

Testing it I rode some fod natural stuff and dh trails. It was so good at the steeper stuff but a bit of work on flatter stuff. I wanted to like the rocket more than I did as current bike wheels would work but the max was the one. Oils loved to have spent a whole bit of time on steep gnarly stuff!

Maybe I should just stop worrying!

I did wonder what effect plus tyres would have on the handling but it’s kot something I necessarily want to do.

That’s weird, I was taking my figures from the official Cotic and Bird sites so I wonder which is correct !?!?!

No skin in the game as I don’t own a long shot Cotic or any Birds, but aren’t the geo figures for Bird unsagged? Might be wrong but I’m sure I remember this coming up before...

I would be interested to hear why people chose the Cotic over the Starling Murmur as both these are on my shortlist at the moment.

I chose Cotic for customer service and I've had one of their bikes before.It was also easy for me to get a proper test ride on my local trails and when I mailed Joe at Starling he had no plans apart from his workshop or Forest of Dean.

@mos a friend recently had five minutes on mt Rocket and then shouted at me for letting him. He spent the rest of the ride debating how to sell his Swoop to fund a Rocket ;-P

"maybe the rocket will pedal a bit better at the expense of the neutral feel of the 4 bar."

The counter-rotating upper link on the AM9 means that in many ways it behaves more like a linkage-driven single pivot than like a true four bar design - the virtual pivot point stays much closer to the single pivot's fixed pivot point. On a normal four bar the VPP range is much further forwards which causes a big reduction in brake-suspension interaction.

That’s weird, I was taking my figures from the official Cotic and Bird sites so I wonder which is correct !?!?!

Ianpv, just looked closer, are you talking about a Rocket or a longshot Rocketmax?

Ahhh - I was lookin at the 27.5 rocket, not the max!

I’m looking at starling as well, haven’t got around to trying to sort a demo yet though. It’s a touch pricier though but no more than the transition patrol that’s on my list.
My old Kona Process was a linkage actuated single pivot, thought the suspension on the rocketmax worked so much better. No idea why as I don’t know enough!

Is the murmur just a simple single pivot frame (like an Orange)? Guess the usp is the custom geometry.

I don't have a Cotic,but have had a Pole and now on a Starling Murmur.

I found the Pole just too slack for all but the steepest riding. You'll get used to anything of course, but I found it really needed concentrating on weighting the front at all times to avoid wanting to push wide. Great when it's really steep of course.

My Murmur is longer, at 500 reach as opposed to 480 iirc. IT has 170mm front vs 160 on the Pole. I had it built at 66 degrees though. With a 30mm stem it steers better than the slacker bike, but feels really stable with the extra lenght in the reach.

@ Joe, yes the Murmur is single pivot. Feels great with a Fox X2.

“I found the Pole just too slack for all but the steepest riding. You’ll get used to anything of course, but I found it really needed concentrating on weighting the front at all times to avoid wanting to push wide. Great when it’s really steep of course.

My Murmur is longer, at 500 reach as opposed to 480 iirc. IT has 170mm front vs 160 on the Pole. I had it built at 66 degrees though. With a 30mm stem it steers better than the slacker bike, but feels really stable with the extra lenght in the reach.”

Would it be more useful to think in terms of front centre, rather than reach and head angle (and fork and head tube length)?

Though doing some rough figures, I believe it’s the same for both bikes, unless the Pole has a longer head tube?

I’m riding a 29er with a 65 deg HA and 455mm reach (at 5’10.5”) with a 50mm stem and am finding the front wheel grips brilliantly - however it has 455mm chainstays and 5kg odd of motor and battery, so that might change things a bit?

I know it's not a rocket but I've just taken my new to me Solaris Max 2 around the block (also long shot geometry).

My god it's hard to get the front wheel in the air, very planted and it's gonna take some serious adjusting of weighting and riding positions to get used to!

I'm on a medium at 5ft10, anyone go large at a similair height?

Haha, me too! Can’t wait 😊

@chilled76

"I’m on a medium at 5ft10, anyone go large at a similair height?"

Does it feel too small?

Chilled76 - if it’s got a long front centre and long chainstays you’re going to need good technique to manual it fully. However it is possible - I’ve had the same issue with my Aeris. 20 mins of coaching and feedback and I can now pop the front much better - just need to work on holding the balance.

Clink.

It's not that it's too small, more I feel I could have gone longer.

The seat tube has about an inch on my 170mm dropper so could have ran a 170 on a large.

I'm fitting 650b semi+ (2.6) tyres and want it playful so I think medium is right. As per normal I always think I seem to fall inbetween a medium and large!

I fitted a medium rocketmax best, however standard rocket I felt better on a large. I’m 5’8. Think I could get large rocketmax but it would be long!

Just remember long often means fast, but not necessarily as fun, and harder work on twisty / pedally trails.

So, was out on mine for a few hours last night, less than ideal conditions but what a blast.
I'm running a coil on the back of mine and it climbed the 1500 feet or so of fire road with very little bob, felt good out of the saddle too. Very good traction from the back end on ice.
Position on the bike when climbing felt weird for about 20 mins.

The trails I was riding were mostly Innerleithen DH tracks, gold, cresta etc and it felt massively stable, maybe lacking a bit of pop at the back end but speeding up HSC should sort that. Also rode Angry sheep and Mince baby mince which rely on maneuverability to be fast. Everything clicked when I kept myself centered on the bike which let me weight the front.It has no problems with tight corners at low speed either which was a big surprise.

There's no getting away from the fact that it's a big bike, I'm 5'11" and 84kg on a size large and it feels spot on for me, but I think the most pertinent thing is as always, where are you going to be riding it. For me living in Inners it's that little bit more bike that the Hightower never could be, the slightly sluggish climbing is something I'll put up with, but I'm already musing over a short travel XC......

I ride a big mixture I guess, a lot natural Forrest of dean stuff, some steep some not so steep. All fire road grind blast down kind of stuff. Race similar stuff, afan, cwmcarn, bikepark etc
Local stuff is steep but not very tech. Got a couple more to test but as long as it works alright for everyday I’m good. I rarely ride mellow stuff as it is so not the end of the world!

Good to hear it works with coil. Got one on my edit and really like it.

A dozen or so rides in on my XL RocketMAX and loving it. It's my only bike but my local riding is fairly steep and/or tech. It's fine on the bits that aren't steep or tech as well - maybe not quite as 'poppy' on that stuff as the previous shorter\steeper\higher bike but that could well be down to the trail conditions changing recently 🙁 As Brake-neck mentions - keeping centred is key and I also took it on my slowest/tightest local trail during my demo where it just worked. 6'3" tall BTW

It’s not that it’s too small, more I feel I could have gone longer.

I'm taller than you, and have a medium. The Large feels huge. Longer than the Large in the other Longshot models (apart from the RocketMAX). The medium is perfect for me. 170mm dropper with loads to spare is normal. Proper low top tube. Love it.