The trek site is only showing alloy Farley 5 frames in the 2020 bikes though.

Showing 20+ of each size except sml (showing 14) on the UK dealer site

It’ll be 2019 bikes carried forward probably. Trek have tried to stop the yearly thing and release new models through the year. I doubt the Farley will change though if they have that many in the warehouse.

Still regularly riding my calibre dune.

It’s my go to xc bike and I love it to be honest.

Have been looking around as I’d quite like a steel-framed one but yet to be sufficiently tempted yet as the dune is so good.

Like every trend it all goes mad then settles down, Fatbikes are proving the same but the difference is they don’t sell themselves so most shops are not interested. Most laugh and walk on by much like I did before I rode one. Just a 3 mile road ride on an old Salsa demo bike hooked me. Now several years on we have our own Fatbike brand, Smokestone Bikes and sales are growing all the time. Demo a fatty and you more than likely get it. There’s still a lot of choice but because we offer bespoke paint jobs and spec and a great frame geo we seem to have got something right. We are tiny in the great scheme of things but the customers we have are super happy and have a bike for many years of great riding. The ones that do come up second hand and its not many sell in less than 24 hours. For me as a 30 plus year mountain biker Fatties have proved ideal to explore just about anywhere you fancy, and thats the appeal.

Added a Vir Fortis early summer to the collection – totally love it.

Wityh 28mm 4 Seasons, the fork blades are close to the width of the tyre, with clearance for mud cakes either side. 😀

Theres a really good community in fat biking. I’ve met up with riders all round uk and Europe. Often bump into other fatties out riding or at events, everyone seems super friendly.

Theres also all the global fatbike day meet ups in December plus various other random meets through uk fatbike club on FB.

All my riding buddies have fatbikes now, although suits the terrain here (coastal beaches and boggy forest!)

Made some good friends through fat bikes. And have regular trips to the Alps for proper snow.

Trek GB site show 2020 Farley 5 and a Farley 9.6 which is a great bike have a 2016 one cheers.

Mine is sitting in my hallway all covered in mud having been ridden last night

Rode my Mukluk this afternoon at Bedgebury and it too is covered in mud (pretty much its natural state to be fair). Its perfect for much of my winter riding and I live in Sussex!  No maintenance, great on mud, still rubbish on green chalk but better than anything else I’ve tried. Plus its a good work out!

Just back from a spin on mine, use it for most conditions but when the snow turns to boiler plate i’ll go back to ice spikers on the hardtail.

Where are all the fat bikes?

Deep in the mountains where ordinary bikes fear to tread…

Haha spot on

Great pic. Srt of sums us up, just get out and have a laugh whatever the weather. Global Fatbike coming up, going to be slightly muddy 😉

My rigid fatty was a fat bike.

My front suspension fatty is just a very ,very good trail bike that just happens to have big fat wheels.

Global fatbike day ride at Formby beach (between Liverpool and Southport) on 7/12/19 if anyone is interested? its posted on the usual Farcebook Fatbike sites

Does anybody make electric fat bikes?

Felt do.

Deep in the mountains where ordinary bikes fear to tread…

Mibbe in your neck of the woods, apart from one guy locally, everyone else I know bought them as an excuse to be slow uphills and shit on descents.

My rigid fatty was a fat bike.

My front suspension fatty is just a very ,very good trail bike that just happens to have big fat wheels.

Pretty much echoes my recent experience going from my old 9zero7 to my new Cube Nutrail. Just feels like a mountain bike, but it has larger than average tyres.

Another +1 for the Calibre Dune here. Cheap enough to upgrade brakes and I’ve added a dropper. Fantastic fun and you can cruise passed the gravellers pushing their way up slippery technical climbs still with traction to spare…

I stripped my Calibre Dune last weekend. Can’t quite bring myself to take the cracked frame to the tip. Must buy another frame of some sort…

@slamman69 any plans to do a fattie frame with 197mm rear spacing…?

I would still be riding mine (a Pugs) if it hadn’t been stolen in the summer.

That said, I guess my current bike is fat (road) bike 😉

Here they are. 🙂

https://www.bikemonger.co.uk/fat-89-c.asp

“Great in mud”
I thought this was one of their weak points and that they slithered all over it being unable to cut through.The old school of thought was that a narrower tyre was better for that reason.
Please enlighten me.

I thought this was one of their weak points and that they slithered all over it being unable to cut through.The old school of thought was that a narrower tyre was better for that reason.
Please enlighten me.

Opposite way of dealing with the problem.

There’s 2 types of grip, friction derived from the trail and the tyre compound. And mechanical derived from the ability of the tread pattern to dig in and not slip. In mud it’s mostly the latter.

In deep mud the tread pattern will work up until the point the shearing load on the mud exceeds it’s ability to resit it. i.e. the tyre doesn’t slip, the mud slips over more mud. A CX bike works on it’s ability to exceed the shear in a vertical plane and sink down to ground solid enough not to shear in the horizontal plane. A fat bike works because you have such a big contact patch the horizontal shear doesn’t exceed the mud’s ability to resist in the first place.

Normal MTB tyres sometimes struggle as they can neither dig down or spread the load sufficiently so you end up just paddle wheeling through.

It works. Although I’d caveat that with “it depends on the mud”. They work brilliantly on fast muddy corners where they carry speed, but show them a long steep muddy bridleway climb churned by horses hooves, and the CX bike will storm ahead.

Last year I would have agreed that fattys can wash out in mud.

Fitted an Edna and it goes straight through my slippiest  patch of mud.

“but show them a long steep muddy bridleway climb churned by horses hooves, and the CX bike will storm ahead.”

I find the opposite. With around 8-9 PSI my Dillinger 5 tyres and a 28 x 42 my Mukluk will climb pretty much anything except green chalk, especially muddy churned up bridal paths. My Pinnacle with 700c Nano’s will only climb well in mud if its super wet and the base layer rock is easily accessible underneath.

Where the fatbike slides around is on wet rock and roots but I prefer using a different bike in those circumstances anyway.

I am amused about the “fatbike community” and the recommendations of that facebook page. That facebook page is full of such numpties that it makes this place look reasonable. I got told all sorts of nonsense on there with such vitriol that I had to leave it. I was told I do not fit the fatbike lifestyle and that I should sell mine simply because I questioned the wisdom of advising a newb that they were great for commuting 15 road miles on!

Its just a bike FFS. a bike with fat tyres!

10 KG fatbike? I’d love to see the spec and some pictures

My Pinnacle with 700c Nano’s will only climb well in mud if its super wet and the base layer rock is easily accessible underneath.

Ermmm, not really a fair test comparing dillinger to nanos though is it?

And my point was not about getting up a climb, its about speed.

E.g. theres one climb on one of my local loops, fairly straight and consistent for about 3 minutes and all about 4-6″ deep in slop at the moment. The fatty will trudge up it in bottom gear no drama, the CX bike flies up in 36-30 (mostly spinning out, but the high cadence stops it stalling on the burried roots).

Coming down would be another matter!

But as TJ says, its just a bike, it doesnt have to be better at everything.

I’m on my 2nd fat bike. Had a Cube Nutrail which was great but I didn’t like the geo too much and then got the chance to upgrade to a Canyon Dude.

Now that is a seriously good bike!

It’s also very versatile. I’m building up a set of 29 wheels which can take anything from 2.25″ to 3″ tyres so with the fork travel at 120mm it’s similar spec to a Santa Cruz Carbon Chameleon which a mate has just bought.

10 KG fatbike? I’d love to see the spec and some pictures

There was a guy on the FB page who made a 10kg FS fatty.

My Nutrail is 13.2 Kg – but that’s 2x and with a dropper, so I guess there could be some weight to be lost if I cared enough 🙂  Feels and “rides” very light.

My Voodoo Wazoo is ~10.5Kg IIRC from default weight ~16.5Kg…
Fat wheels (3.8Kg) replaced with FatNotFat 29ers (2.3Kg)
Fat tubes (1.1Kg) currently replaced with 700x28mm latex (0.15Kg)
26×4″ Mission Command (3.1Kg) currently replaced with 700×28 Conti 4 Seasons (0.6Kg)
Alloy fork (1.5Kg) replaced with Fatty Carbon (0.6Kg)
Alloy bars (0.4Kg) replaced with Knuckleball “chewy” (0.2Kg)?
Saddle (0.4Kg) replaced with Charge Spoon (0.3Kg)?
PX bottle cage added (0.1Kg)??

Using non-stock stem and pedals, but think they are roughly weight neutral.

Over my ~2Kg lighter road bike, which has lighter ~1.5Kg wheels, I can easily lose 30secs+ over a 6min+ road climb.

Fat wheels (3.8Kg) replaced with FatNotFat 29ers (2.3Kg)
Fat tubes (1.1Kg) currently replaced with 700x28mm latex (0.15Kg)
26×4″ Mission Command (3.1Kg) currently replaced with 700×28 Conti 4 Seasons (0.6Kg)

Not a fat bike then?

Why would you run 700×28 in a fat frame? Even for a frankenbike parts bin build that’s a bit daft. Especially as you already have a road bike.

As for a 22lb fat bike, easy enough, what you gain in tyres (500g an end), you offset in the fork (-1000g), 65mm rims are ~500g, so only 200g over crests for the pair. And the rest is just a mid to high end XC bike and hang it off a carbon beargrease frame.

Full carbon, frame, rims, seatpost, bars = 12.2kg

Crankset is on heavy side, and it has tubes, so at least 1.5kg could be removed.

I love my Dune, as TJ days it’s just a bike with fat tyres.

I missed peak fat by the time I got mine. But then I was late to the SS party too.

Might try and get out on the Dune this weekend.

Full carbon, frame, rims, seatpost, bars = 12.2kg

Crankset is on heavy side, and it has tubes, so at least 1.5kg could be removed.

Could be under 10 kg with fewer spacers…

Against the grain of this thread now, my On-One fatty is 43lb…. Still don’t understand the why of the whole enterprise, still don’t care, still use it happily. It’s just a bike that takes me places, allbeit slowly.