It’s been a while since we caught up with the UK’s Identiti Bikes, but a modern trail bike overhaul of their 160mm travel alloy Mettle all-mountain bike seems like a good chance to catch up. Call it enduro, all-mountain, or just a mega trail bike, the new 2020 Mettle is built for big all-day rides and now gets a slacker front end, steeper seat angle & long reach to make it ever more capable…
2020 Identiti Mettle 160mm 27.5″ alloy all-mountain bike
The Mettle is Identiti’s workhorse mountain bike, designed to run the gamut from trail to enduro with 160mm of proper Horst-link four-bar rear wheel travel. First debuted back in 2017, the aluminum full-suspension trail bike is built from 6000 series alloy for a mix of lightweight, stiffness & indestructibility.
What’s new on the Mettle this year?
Identiti had already said that the original Mettle was slack & long when it first came out, but it was time to give the bike a bit of a facelift and so it gets a tad longer, slacker up front & steeper under the saddle. The general thinking was that with the three changes together, Identiti effectively keeps the resulting fit on the bike unchanged while making it climb more easily and descend even faster.
The bike now gets a 64.5° headtube angle (about a half degree slacker than before) paired to an effective 76° seattube angle (just 1° steeper), and stretches out frame reach by 10-15mm to keep the rider in better control in roughly the same place as before. The alloy Mettle is still offered in three stock frame sizes (S-L), all of which tend to lean towards long top tubes.
Tech details
The alloy Mettle features traditional mount metric shocks, sealed 6902 bearings in every pivot, a threaded bottom bracket, tapered headtube with a zero stack headset, ISCG05 chain guide tabs, a set of bottle cage bosses under the downtube, and Boost 148 spacing.
And for ease of use, every hardware bolt on the bike uses a simple 5mm hex key to adjust – leave the multi-tool at home.
Pricing & availability
Beyond the new geometry, the new Mettle adds two new paint colors: Satin Rich Rust bronze and Gloss Night Time Navy blue. Either color appears to be available now in a £1800 frameset with a RockShox SuperDeluxe Ultimate air shock, or one of two complete builds.
The £3200 Mettle R gets a 170mm travel RockShox Yari RC fork, a SRAM NX Eagle groupset & Halo Ridgeline wheels. The £4800 Mettle RCX upgrades to a 170mm MRP Ribbon Air fork, SRAM X01 Eagle, Renthal cockpit & Halo Vortex wheels.
