Known for their motorcycle race suspensions, Japanese brand KYB is expanding into four wheels with new kits for Toyota & Ford trucks and SUVs…and human-powered bikes, too!
Their debut products will be an inverted trail fork and coil-sprung rear shock. Like the MTB debut from Eibach, details are sparse here, but there’s a lot we can tell from looking at it.
For starters, it’s shown on a Marin Alpine Trail eMTB, which is a 160mm travel bike with 170mm fork. So, they’re starting with enduro travel ranges.
Second, the heavily shaped crown should keep the legs stiff. Interestingly, the uppers themselves are skinny compared to recent inverted forks from Cane Creek and Fox. So, they’re likely lighter, but… stiffness?
It’s also interesting that the legs clamp into the uppers, which could be great for serviceability. Damage one? Blow a damper? Just replace that side.
KYB’s moto forks use coil springs with speed-sensitive compression damping, and that’s included here, too. I couldn’t feel any knobs on the bottom of the legs, but there are two adjustments on the top of the right leg – one for compression, one for rebound.
On the left, there’s a single adjustment, however they couldn’t (or wouldn’t) say what it did. The fork uses a “coil spring with air support”, so it could be a fixed air spring with swappable coils and a preload adjustment to dial it in.
The lowers have rock guards and a thru axle that looks like it has a standard bolt holding it in rather than a typical thru axle bolt interface. The opposite side of the thru axle has an open end and it’s completely hollow all the way across, which makes its function even more of a mystery. But, it does clamp into both lower legs, so it’s some sort of floating design.
Despite the lack of firm details, they said the fork is pretty much done and ready for production. For the European market, they’re likely starting with aftermarket availability, and it was teased at Sea Otter Europe earlier this year, too. But for North America, their current plan is OE placements, and you can guess who might be an early bike brand partner…
The rear shock is a little behind in development, so what you see here may change before production. But the basics are all here.
Adjustable spring preload, likely dual compression (high and low speed) using the outer blue knob and inner bolt, and low-speed rebound on the bottom (red knob).
This bike is headed back to northern California (which is conveniently where Marin Bikes is HQ’d…) for testing after the SEMA Show we spotted it at. No word on pricing or availability, and there’s nothing on their website about them yet.
