At 2,200g (4.85lb), the Magura Boltron upside down e-bike suspension fork isn’t totally outside the weight boundaries of aggressive, big hit forks for traditional mountain bikes, but it certainly is hefty. And it needs to be – it’s purposely overbuilt to handle the increased weight and speed that electric motor assist MTBs are capable of. But, could it work for trail and enduro bikes, too?
The short answer is yes. The long answer is it’s not the perfect solution, but they might be working on something…
Several things make the Boltron e-bike specific. For starters, it’s massively over built compared to traditional MTB forks, with a strong crown and upper assembly. They went with the USD (UpSide Down) design because their partner on this, WP Performance Systems, had proven the concept in moto. It uses a 20mm thru axle for maximum torsional stiffness.
Inside, the compression damping circuit is stronger because the bike weighs more, and there’s no external compression adjustment or lockout lever. Those things are the biggest reason why you probably wouldn’t want it on your regular mountain bike…it would feel too firm and you wouldn’t be able to adjust it to your liking or lock it out on the climbs. E-bikes are speeding up the hill as well as down, so they need to keep the suspension active, which is why they didn’t bother putting a lockout lever on it.
You can adjust the air pressure to set sag, air volume to set the spring curve, and there’s an external rebound control knob on the bottom. And that’s a step in the right direction. We’ve been generally pleased with Magura’s right-side-up forks in the past, and it only makes commercial sense to put all of these development resources into broader use. So, when we asked if there’s a non e-bike version coming, they simply said: “Let’s see what the future brings…. ;-)”
