As someone who has mostly ridden rigid for the last 8 years (A Jones and a rigid Stanton Sherpa) I went for a Smuggler as my first modern full suspension bike because of its reputation as a short travel hooligan bike. Some thing that would be a bike more forgiving of line choice on the downs at high speed, some thing that I’d feel a little less beaten up on on the downs and would still be fairly efficient on the ups. 

I’d say with the last item, it’s fine, but I’m not sure I feel much of the advantages of the first two. I’m also not loving the sort of vague where is the rear wheel feeling I get.

As I said, it’s my first modern full sus since a gen 1 blur, so maybe I’m not used to getting the best out of them, but I’ve been riding it since December. I rented a shock wiz so I know it’s set up right. I did buy it second hand, so maybe if I’d tested a bunch of bikes I’d have a better idea

My hunch is to try something longer travel to see if something more different from my Sherpa makes for more fun without too many drawbacks. Any thoughts from the STW hive mind?

They are (were!) quite a long Bike and I found I needed to adjust a little to riding it. I’d over weight the front (as is corners like a mono rail on fly paper if you do! 😂) and the back could start to break a bit earlier than I was used to, but I was going a lot (proportional to my “fast”)  faster than before. I used it as a alert more than anything as if minions are starting to go I’m close to the edge!

Does that make any sense??

How is the smuggler on flatter tighter trails? I’m looking for a 29er trail bike and I want something that is fun to ride on my local woods trails.

Can’t say I’ve ever ridden a smuggler, but I have both a hardtail and a long travel enduro style bike. In the last 4 or 5 years I went from a racer to a Kona u’hu, to a Boardman Pro Fs to the aeris 145lt, and then I picked up a cheap hardtail to mix it up. So I’ve gradually upped the travel and gone towards more modern slack geometry bit by bit.

I know where the back wheel is on both bikes when riding, just the hardtail makes you very aware of what you’ve ridden over as it bounces up / bangs a bit.

I prefer the fs by miles as an only bike, but I do like riding the ht on twister flatter trails as it feels faster on them (it generally isn’t unless it’s really pedally) and does respond quicker to how you are riding it.

Fs and ht are just different – the whole point of suspension for me is not to feed back so much any bumps that you’ve gone over and allow you to go quicker for longer.

Quite liked mine, it was a fun playable 29er rather than a steep angled XC style bike or just a big burly tank that flattened everything out. Quite often hit the rear limit and never found it vague, hooligan would be the right word if you’re riding near the bikes (or your) limits. Wasn’t bad on flatter trails either. Cable routing was always a bugbear on mine though and the limited tyre clearance out back was a bit annoying.

Love mine, but it did take time to adjust after being on a 26er

I think you’re expecting the rear end to feel like a rigid bike, simple as that, which it never will as it’s a very good suspension design and works very well at soaking up bumps! Forget about the rear wheel. I ride hardtails to work and sometimes off road and after a weekend on the smuggler I’m always amazed how jarring the rear end is on the hardtail.

Smuggler really comes alive with a bit of speed and rolling terrain, my favourite trails to ride mine on are faster medium steep ones with lots of corners. On low speed very tight stuff it’s a big old thing to haul around, though mine is an xl. I think it’s a great bike though I am Scout curious as I do really enjoy smaller wheels for hooning around.

This reminds me of the first full suspension bike I bought (2016 Stumpy). I’d had two hard tails previously and had a go at the Stumpy on the same flat local woods.  I remember feeling underwhelmed by it after hoping it would be a revelation.

Once I’d got a few more rides on it and took it to some better riding spots, I started to gel with it.  Found that once I was used to it though, the frame was too small, but I’ve not been too long without a full suspension since.

In my experience it’s not a bike for mincing about on. The harder you ride it the better it gets.

I sold mine after about 30 rides, which is short for me. Never really gelled with it. No doubt a great bike, but I think @rene59 hits the nail on the head.

So I went up to Kirroughtree this morning to give it another go. Skewered the sidewall of the 2.6 nobby Nic on the front at the top of the first section of climbs and the rain started to fall heavily.

Minced down the the breakpad and switched up both front and rear tyres (I had a generation 1 2.35 No by Nic on the bac) while I was there Sam, who owns the shop said “your bars a very rolled forward, doesn’t that muck up the handling?”

what do you know, a set of Maxxis and a rotated bar and I took 4 mins of my best time on the red loop. Bike feels much better in the corners, in fact everywhere. Only downside is I’ve shrunk the reach so it now feels a bit short, but what an improvement in handling.

Glad you’re getting on with it now. I loved mine. Apart from the rubbish rear tyre clearance and it being a bit porky, hard to find fault with it. Just a fun bike to ride and – as others have said – the more/faster you rode it, the better it was. You were never going to break it!

It was riding the Smuggler that saw me buy my Ibis RipMo which was just a longer travel, lighter and with tweaked Geo. I’ve still got the smuggler frame tho. Might get rebuilt at some point. Also if you get the chance to put a coil shock on it, then go for it. Makes the rear even plusher.

Love mine! Best bike EVA

Not ever had an issue on tight or flat trails to be honest that wasnt related to Pilot Error!!

To be honest Ive now gone even longer reach wise with my current project Bike based on how well I’ve gotten on with the short stem long reach set up.