If you haven’t figured it out by now, fat bikes are getting big and they’re also getting light. Fatback is branching out into carbon with their new Corvus carbon fatbike and carbon fatbike rims. The Corvus above is their answer to Borealis’ Yampa and 9:zero:7’s White Out carbon fatties. Unfortunately, carbon samples weren’t quite ready yet so an exact 3D model of the Corvus was on display instead.
To go along with the Corvus, Fatback is also introducing some carbon rims that just showed up at the end of Dirt Demo along with a tubeless compatible tire collaboration with Vee. Head past the break for more details!
If the production bikes work out to be like the mock up, the Corvus will feature an angular style that should set it apart from other bikes. The fork was a carbon sample and was fairly production ready. It features a 135x15mm thru axle, 6 inch post mount brakes and clearance for 4.8″ tires on 100mm rims.
Most of the other fatbikes are using bad clamp or e type front derailleurs but the Corvus will feature a direct mount unit. Bottom braket is a 100mm wide threaded shell.
With thru axles front and rear, the Corvus frame should be plenty stiff even with huge rubber clawing the trail. 197×12 axle is used which is like the 142mm standard – the hub spacing is 190mm wide, and there is a 3.5mm shelf on both sides of the frame for the axle to rest. The wider rear end results in clearance for 4.8s on 100mm rims with a symmetrical build.
The frame will also feature rack mounts with metal inserts bonded in the carbon.
All a sudden it seems tubeless carbon fatbike rims are everywhere, or at least rims that can be run tubeless in the case of Fatback’s new carbon hoops. The 77mm wide, single wall rims had just showed up and were immediately set up tubeless with Fatback’s new Sterling tires.
Target weight for these rims is around 550g though these testing samples came in a bit more. Fatback is offering custom Stan’s rim tape for their fat rims and once the tire is inflated and the bead pops over into the bead lock, the tires are capable of running extremely low pressures with Stan’s sealant.
To go along with his new rims, Greg wanted to design his own tires so Vee rubber was enlisted to build a 4.25″ sealant compatible tire. Called hte Sterling, the tire uses a 120 tpi casing, tubeless ready kevlar bead, and weighs in around 1300g.
