cegli
New Member
The Bike:
Manufacturer: Felt
Model: Redemption 50
Model Year: 2020
Price Paid: 2600 USD
New/Used: Used
Score (out of 10): 5 (Down from 7, considering you will have to swap the calipers at your own cost)
Specs: REDEMPTION | 50 | 2020
MSRP: $4500.00 USD
Size Reviewed: Large
Bike Weight in Large Size (setup tubeless): 53lbs (24kg)
My Weight: 160lbs (73kg)
I picked this bike up for a great deal. It was an ex-demo bike with 500KM on it. It was in generally very good shape, and most parts were like new when I got it.
I'm an intermediate rider. I generally keep jumps under 12ft, drops under 6ft, and I struggle a bit on steep techy sections, very steep rock rolls, and long skinnies that go up high in the air, etc.
I'm going to break down the review into different components, and then how it all works together as a package.
Warranty Support: Poor. I'm adding a new section here, because some concerning things have come up. The details are below in the "brakes" section, but this bike comes with rotors that are incompatible with the brakes. The calipers will need to be replaced with a new model to keep the bike safe and working in the long term. Felt has so far dragged the whole thing out, and now refused to fix it. I believe all of these bikes should be recalled and the calipers changed to something compatible with the rotors.
Frame Geometery: I feel like they did a great job here. The chainstay lenth is 445mm, which is great. Some ebikes (*cough* Giant *cough*) have long chainstay lengths that make their ebikes ride differently than their non electric equivalents. The head tube angle (65.25 degrees) and seat tube angle (75.4) feel like a typical enduro bike, striking a good balance between climbing and descending. Not a ton of pedal bob while pedaling, so they did a good job there.
The reach is pretty long (464.2mm) and the frame is pretty roomy for a large (20") frame. I am a bit above 6', and I wouldn't want the bike any larger.
Frame Quality:
Pros:
On the upside, the battery is integrated into the frame, the finish is nice, and the welds/paint look solid, geometer is great. 150mm of travel is decent, and has held up fine to a couple drops/jumps that bottomed out the shocks.
Cons:
There were some disappointing parts of the frame, which I really think Felt needs to address. The biggest is that inside of the seat tube has weld intrusion from the shock mount. This means that you can only get the seat post in 8", instead of the 10" you should be able to get before the frame interrupts. This severely limits dropper post compatibility in the frame, and was quite the surprise when I got it home and went to swap dropper posts. I called Felt about this, asking if it was a warranty issue, and they said they only expected 8" of insertion. Basically, they are not reaming their seat post tubes from the factory, and consider that reasonable.
There were a couple of other small quality issues, like the rubber gasket on the bottom of the frame that surrounds the battery does not quite fit into the frame. The sizing of the opening is slightly off, so the top of the rubber gasket is always hanging open a bit. The engraving for the serial number on the rear of the frame looks like the machine slipped and dragged across the number a bit, obscuring it. These are minor quibbles, but it makes it seem like they are still figuring out their frame manufacturing, even though their frame architects are quite good.
I also think the weight of the frame is probably a bit heavy compared to competitors, looking at the weight. Many of the components are lighter than other enduro e-bikes, yet it weighs in a bit heavy.
Edit: Big cable rub problem as well! The rear cables (break and deraileur) come out near the rear shock, and rub like crazy against the seat post tube. I taped the frame here when I got it to help protect the frame, and I just noticed it sawed through the tape, through the paint, and has started to do a decent job of sawing through the frame. If you buy this bike, you'll need to seriously protect that area and keep on top of changing out the material there as it saws through it. There's a lot of pressure there, and the rear shock movement makes it saw back and forth on the frame with force.
Wheel Set:
Pros:
35mm internal width rims, Maxxis DHF/High Roller II plus size tires. They setup tubeless super easily, which is a huge plus. They were pre-taped, and the bead holds really firmly. I had to step on the tire with my shoes on to get the bead to break, it sits so tight. I could get it to seat with a standard pump with very little effort. Great job here Felt.
Cons:
Tires are dual compound instead of the nicer 3C MaxxTerra ones, and they're Exo instead of Exo+. Not a huge deal, but I'll definitely be upgrading them once they wear out. It's a reasonable compromise to keep the price down.
Motor:
The Shimano E7000 is almost the same motor as the E8000 (with a little less torque) and rides well. It still has plenty of torque, the controls are intuitive, and it doesn't drag above the speed limit like the older versions of the Bosch motor.
My only complaint with it is that it temporarily cuts out on extended, steep, high friction climbs. I still have to figure this out a bit... It might be related to having a not fully charged battery? I've had it do it when I'm at 40% battery and climbing a loose road with about a 20% grade multiple times. It's annoying to be pushing your ebike up hill because its overheating, so I'm going to keep an eye on that one.
Cranks:
At 170mm on a large, I'd say they are a titch long. I'd rather the 165mm cranks that come on the Small and Medium to help avoid pedal strikes on steep technical climbs. You don't need the extra leverage with an ebike.
Dropper:
It's 125mm, which is too short for a enduro/trail bike in my opinion, especially if you like steep descents and jumps/drops. If you put the stock dropper all the way down in the frame (with the weld intrusion), it sticks out 26mm giving you a stack height of 87mm above the seat post clamp, which isn't great considering it's only a 125mm dropper.
Finding a new one that will fit is an issue. My legs are long enough to easily run a 210mm+ dropper if it fit, but they're not even close due to the interrupted seat tube. OneUp makes the shortest insertion depth dropper post, with the shortest stack height, so they're the go to if you can't fit a post. With the weld intrusion, you can fit a 180mm One-Up v2 with it sticking out 47mm, giving you a minimum stack height of 80mm, an improvement over the stock post, but still not great. If the weld intrusion was gone you could run that same post fully slammed, and might even be able to fit other dropper brands.
My 170mm PNW Cascade post is not even useable, due to the weld intrusion, which was a shock
. I can't get it in deep enough.
Drive Train:
No complaints at all. A 10 speed drive train is totally fine on an ebike. It hasn't dropped my chain ever, and shifts smoothly. It's held up well too after 580km of riding. Not much chain stretch or wear.
Fork:
Considering the price point, I think this fork is acceptable. For people who aren't gear geeks, the Sektor RL has the same damper/design as the 35mm Yari, but with 32mm stanchions instead. It uses the Motion Control damper, which is decent and easy to service. The steering feels a bit "vague" due to flex when riding hard and pushing it. If I flip the bike upside down and put my feet on the handle bars, and twist the wheel, it flexes considerably compared to a 35mm fork like the Yari.
Edit: Some additional thoughts, after riding it for a while, and giving it a lowers/air-spring service: The "Debonair" air spring inside it is not great. That's one of its biggest weak points. It's using a plastic seal head, instead of the aluminum seal heads on the yari/lyriks. This increases the stiction and you can really feel it. On top of that, I think it needs more positive and negative air volume. The first bit of travel is quite harsh (not enough negative air volume), and it feel like it ramps up too quickly. I'm running 0 tokens as recommended. If I could keep the same air pressure with a hypothetical "-1" token, and more negative air, I think it'd ride a lot better.
Shock:
I think this year's Rockshox Deluxe Debonair is a great value, and I really can't complain about the performance. The extra negative air volume in it really makes an improvement in the small bump sensitivity compared to Rockshox older shocks, and it damps great. I'm sure something like the Fox DPX2 or X2 would ride a bit better, but at this price point Felt made a great choice here. There's no lock-outs, but it's an ebike, so no big deal!
Brakes:
Rotors: 203mm Front and 180mm Back is a winning combination, but there are some serious problems here! They put "fancier" SM-RT64 rotors on the bike, but these are actually not compatible with the MT400 calipers they are using. The MT400 calipers are "wide track" calipers, that are supposed to be only used with "wide track" rotors such as the SM-RT56. Using a wide pad on a narrow caliper means less braking surface and slightly odd braking, because the pads contact the rotor spokes. This explains the strange ticking noise I hear when braking.
I spent a while musing why they would have done this. One reason could be that they don't understand the Shimano brake line-up. A second possible reason is that the SM-RT56 doesn't come in 203mm sizing, so they used an incompatible rotor for spec sheet reasons. Either way, it's pretty sloppy.
I recommend that anyone who buys this bike rectifies this. Either put SM-RT56s 180mm/180mm on both the front and back, or upgrade the calipers to MT420s or MT520s and keep the current rotor setup.
Levers: Shimano levers that feel good, and are actually an upgrade from the levers spec'd with the MT400 calipers. BL-MT501s with Servowave. Can't complain here.
Calipers: Budget Shimano calipers, which are decent for the price. They do a good enough job of stopping the bike, even on steep descents with organic pads. I bet they'd work even better with the right rotors! These calipers are a bit limiting, because you can't get metal pads for them, and you can't use fancy rotors (ice-tech, 203mm, freeza, etc). If you're happy with a 180mm/180mm setup with organic pads, then I'd probably keep them.
Brake Lines: They are using the MT400 spec'd SM-BH59-JK-SS, which is a slightly less stiff line than the standard shimano BH90 line. This seems to give the back a slightly spongy feel, like there is air in the lines. Maybe there is a bit of air hiding somewhere, but I've bled the damn thing four times, tapping the calipers/levers, while rotating the whole bike, so I'm starting to think this is just the best that the SM-BH59's can do.
Comments on the Whole Package:
This is a budget trail/enduro bike, and I think Felt did a good job saving money in the right places, without compromising the ride quality/durability much. The package is unfortunately marred by a blatant mistake with the brake system, and poor support from Felt. I dread to think what would happen if an even costlier problem came up with the bike (cracked frame, burnt out motor).
Disregarding this, it climbs well, descends well, and I'm happy with it for the money after the brake change. If they cleaned up their frame manufacturing a bit, cut down on the weight of the frame, and fixed the brake/rotor incompatiblity, I think they'd have one of the best deals for the price on the market.
Potential Upgrades:
I'm a gear geek, so here's the list of upgrades you might want to turn this thing from a budget bike into a beast
Fork:
The Sektor RL that comes on here is a 29/27.5+ fork at 150mm travel with a 51mm offset. That means you can fit a 170mm 27.5" Yari or Lyrik with 46mm offset and not change the geometery at all (except for a 5mm offset change)! The steerer tube seems to be about 7.7", which is pretty long, so finding a used fork will be harder than some other frames. This would be a great upgrade and make it much more "Enduro".
Brakes:
The calipers can be swapped for MT520s (which can be gotten very cheaply from bike24 or aliexpress) without making any changes to the levers or lines. This gives you 4-pot from 2-pot calipers, and changes the pots to ceramic from resin, which helps a bit with heat transmission to the brake lines. It also makes the incompatible rotors compatible, and lets you used finned pads and metal pads if you want.
If you do this caliper upgrade, the rotors can be swapped for RT81's or MT800's/900's if you are planning on very long descents or you drag your brakes a lot. I will probably swap my rear to an RT81 or MT900, because it's a cheap upgrade, and I often drag my rear brakes while descending (poor form)...
Dropper:
As mentioned above, a 180mm One-Up post is probably your best bet.
Tires:
I'll probably swap the front to a 2.5" DHF 3C MaxxGrip Exo+ once I wear the original out. It'll give me more grip, more puncture resistance, and make the bike a bit more nimble, at almost the same weight as the current tire. I'll also swap the rear something similar to the original 2.8" High Roller II, but 3C MaxxTerra in Exo+.
Edit: I put in new information about the brake incompatibility with the stock setup. Pretty sloppy there Felt!
Manufacturer: Felt
Model: Redemption 50
Model Year: 2020
Price Paid: 2600 USD
New/Used: Used
Score (out of 10): 5 (Down from 7, considering you will have to swap the calipers at your own cost)
Specs: REDEMPTION | 50 | 2020
MSRP: $4500.00 USD
Size Reviewed: Large
Bike Weight in Large Size (setup tubeless): 53lbs (24kg)
My Weight: 160lbs (73kg)
I picked this bike up for a great deal. It was an ex-demo bike with 500KM on it. It was in generally very good shape, and most parts were like new when I got it.
I'm an intermediate rider. I generally keep jumps under 12ft, drops under 6ft, and I struggle a bit on steep techy sections, very steep rock rolls, and long skinnies that go up high in the air, etc.
I'm going to break down the review into different components, and then how it all works together as a package.
Warranty Support: Poor. I'm adding a new section here, because some concerning things have come up. The details are below in the "brakes" section, but this bike comes with rotors that are incompatible with the brakes. The calipers will need to be replaced with a new model to keep the bike safe and working in the long term. Felt has so far dragged the whole thing out, and now refused to fix it. I believe all of these bikes should be recalled and the calipers changed to something compatible with the rotors.
Frame Geometery: I feel like they did a great job here. The chainstay lenth is 445mm, which is great. Some ebikes (*cough* Giant *cough*) have long chainstay lengths that make their ebikes ride differently than their non electric equivalents. The head tube angle (65.25 degrees) and seat tube angle (75.4) feel like a typical enduro bike, striking a good balance between climbing and descending. Not a ton of pedal bob while pedaling, so they did a good job there.
The reach is pretty long (464.2mm) and the frame is pretty roomy for a large (20") frame. I am a bit above 6', and I wouldn't want the bike any larger.
Frame Quality:
Pros:
On the upside, the battery is integrated into the frame, the finish is nice, and the welds/paint look solid, geometer is great. 150mm of travel is decent, and has held up fine to a couple drops/jumps that bottomed out the shocks.
Cons:
There were some disappointing parts of the frame, which I really think Felt needs to address. The biggest is that inside of the seat tube has weld intrusion from the shock mount. This means that you can only get the seat post in 8", instead of the 10" you should be able to get before the frame interrupts. This severely limits dropper post compatibility in the frame, and was quite the surprise when I got it home and went to swap dropper posts. I called Felt about this, asking if it was a warranty issue, and they said they only expected 8" of insertion. Basically, they are not reaming their seat post tubes from the factory, and consider that reasonable.
There were a couple of other small quality issues, like the rubber gasket on the bottom of the frame that surrounds the battery does not quite fit into the frame. The sizing of the opening is slightly off, so the top of the rubber gasket is always hanging open a bit. The engraving for the serial number on the rear of the frame looks like the machine slipped and dragged across the number a bit, obscuring it. These are minor quibbles, but it makes it seem like they are still figuring out their frame manufacturing, even though their frame architects are quite good.
I also think the weight of the frame is probably a bit heavy compared to competitors, looking at the weight. Many of the components are lighter than other enduro e-bikes, yet it weighs in a bit heavy.
Edit: Big cable rub problem as well! The rear cables (break and deraileur) come out near the rear shock, and rub like crazy against the seat post tube. I taped the frame here when I got it to help protect the frame, and I just noticed it sawed through the tape, through the paint, and has started to do a decent job of sawing through the frame. If you buy this bike, you'll need to seriously protect that area and keep on top of changing out the material there as it saws through it. There's a lot of pressure there, and the rear shock movement makes it saw back and forth on the frame with force.
Wheel Set:
Pros:
35mm internal width rims, Maxxis DHF/High Roller II plus size tires. They setup tubeless super easily, which is a huge plus. They were pre-taped, and the bead holds really firmly. I had to step on the tire with my shoes on to get the bead to break, it sits so tight. I could get it to seat with a standard pump with very little effort. Great job here Felt.
Cons:
Tires are dual compound instead of the nicer 3C MaxxTerra ones, and they're Exo instead of Exo+. Not a huge deal, but I'll definitely be upgrading them once they wear out. It's a reasonable compromise to keep the price down.
Motor:
The Shimano E7000 is almost the same motor as the E8000 (with a little less torque) and rides well. It still has plenty of torque, the controls are intuitive, and it doesn't drag above the speed limit like the older versions of the Bosch motor.
My only complaint with it is that it temporarily cuts out on extended, steep, high friction climbs. I still have to figure this out a bit... It might be related to having a not fully charged battery? I've had it do it when I'm at 40% battery and climbing a loose road with about a 20% grade multiple times. It's annoying to be pushing your ebike up hill because its overheating, so I'm going to keep an eye on that one.
Cranks:
At 170mm on a large, I'd say they are a titch long. I'd rather the 165mm cranks that come on the Small and Medium to help avoid pedal strikes on steep technical climbs. You don't need the extra leverage with an ebike.
Dropper:
It's 125mm, which is too short for a enduro/trail bike in my opinion, especially if you like steep descents and jumps/drops. If you put the stock dropper all the way down in the frame (with the weld intrusion), it sticks out 26mm giving you a stack height of 87mm above the seat post clamp, which isn't great considering it's only a 125mm dropper.
Finding a new one that will fit is an issue. My legs are long enough to easily run a 210mm+ dropper if it fit, but they're not even close due to the interrupted seat tube. OneUp makes the shortest insertion depth dropper post, with the shortest stack height, so they're the go to if you can't fit a post. With the weld intrusion, you can fit a 180mm One-Up v2 with it sticking out 47mm, giving you a minimum stack height of 80mm, an improvement over the stock post, but still not great. If the weld intrusion was gone you could run that same post fully slammed, and might even be able to fit other dropper brands.
My 170mm PNW Cascade post is not even useable, due to the weld intrusion, which was a shock
. I can't get it in deep enough.Drive Train:
No complaints at all. A 10 speed drive train is totally fine on an ebike. It hasn't dropped my chain ever, and shifts smoothly. It's held up well too after 580km of riding. Not much chain stretch or wear.
Fork:
Considering the price point, I think this fork is acceptable. For people who aren't gear geeks, the Sektor RL has the same damper/design as the 35mm Yari, but with 32mm stanchions instead. It uses the Motion Control damper, which is decent and easy to service. The steering feels a bit "vague" due to flex when riding hard and pushing it. If I flip the bike upside down and put my feet on the handle bars, and twist the wheel, it flexes considerably compared to a 35mm fork like the Yari.
Edit: Some additional thoughts, after riding it for a while, and giving it a lowers/air-spring service: The "Debonair" air spring inside it is not great. That's one of its biggest weak points. It's using a plastic seal head, instead of the aluminum seal heads on the yari/lyriks. This increases the stiction and you can really feel it. On top of that, I think it needs more positive and negative air volume. The first bit of travel is quite harsh (not enough negative air volume), and it feel like it ramps up too quickly. I'm running 0 tokens as recommended. If I could keep the same air pressure with a hypothetical "-1" token, and more negative air, I think it'd ride a lot better.
Shock:
I think this year's Rockshox Deluxe Debonair is a great value, and I really can't complain about the performance. The extra negative air volume in it really makes an improvement in the small bump sensitivity compared to Rockshox older shocks, and it damps great. I'm sure something like the Fox DPX2 or X2 would ride a bit better, but at this price point Felt made a great choice here. There's no lock-outs, but it's an ebike, so no big deal!
Brakes:
Rotors: 203mm Front and 180mm Back is a winning combination, but there are some serious problems here! They put "fancier" SM-RT64 rotors on the bike, but these are actually not compatible with the MT400 calipers they are using. The MT400 calipers are "wide track" calipers, that are supposed to be only used with "wide track" rotors such as the SM-RT56. Using a wide pad on a narrow caliper means less braking surface and slightly odd braking, because the pads contact the rotor spokes. This explains the strange ticking noise I hear when braking.
I spent a while musing why they would have done this. One reason could be that they don't understand the Shimano brake line-up. A second possible reason is that the SM-RT56 doesn't come in 203mm sizing, so they used an incompatible rotor for spec sheet reasons. Either way, it's pretty sloppy.
I recommend that anyone who buys this bike rectifies this. Either put SM-RT56s 180mm/180mm on both the front and back, or upgrade the calipers to MT420s or MT520s and keep the current rotor setup.
Levers: Shimano levers that feel good, and are actually an upgrade from the levers spec'd with the MT400 calipers. BL-MT501s with Servowave. Can't complain here.
Calipers: Budget Shimano calipers, which are decent for the price. They do a good enough job of stopping the bike, even on steep descents with organic pads. I bet they'd work even better with the right rotors! These calipers are a bit limiting, because you can't get metal pads for them, and you can't use fancy rotors (ice-tech, 203mm, freeza, etc). If you're happy with a 180mm/180mm setup with organic pads, then I'd probably keep them.
Brake Lines: They are using the MT400 spec'd SM-BH59-JK-SS, which is a slightly less stiff line than the standard shimano BH90 line. This seems to give the back a slightly spongy feel, like there is air in the lines. Maybe there is a bit of air hiding somewhere, but I've bled the damn thing four times, tapping the calipers/levers, while rotating the whole bike, so I'm starting to think this is just the best that the SM-BH59's can do.
Comments on the Whole Package:
This is a budget trail/enduro bike, and I think Felt did a good job saving money in the right places, without compromising the ride quality/durability much. The package is unfortunately marred by a blatant mistake with the brake system, and poor support from Felt. I dread to think what would happen if an even costlier problem came up with the bike (cracked frame, burnt out motor).
Disregarding this, it climbs well, descends well, and I'm happy with it for the money after the brake change. If they cleaned up their frame manufacturing a bit, cut down on the weight of the frame, and fixed the brake/rotor incompatiblity, I think they'd have one of the best deals for the price on the market.
Potential Upgrades:
I'm a gear geek, so here's the list of upgrades you might want to turn this thing from a budget bike into a beast
Fork:
The Sektor RL that comes on here is a 29/27.5+ fork at 150mm travel with a 51mm offset. That means you can fit a 170mm 27.5" Yari or Lyrik with 46mm offset and not change the geometery at all (except for a 5mm offset change)! The steerer tube seems to be about 7.7", which is pretty long, so finding a used fork will be harder than some other frames. This would be a great upgrade and make it much more "Enduro".
Brakes:
The calipers can be swapped for MT520s (which can be gotten very cheaply from bike24 or aliexpress) without making any changes to the levers or lines. This gives you 4-pot from 2-pot calipers, and changes the pots to ceramic from resin, which helps a bit with heat transmission to the brake lines. It also makes the incompatible rotors compatible, and lets you used finned pads and metal pads if you want.
If you do this caliper upgrade, the rotors can be swapped for RT81's or MT800's/900's if you are planning on very long descents or you drag your brakes a lot. I will probably swap my rear to an RT81 or MT900, because it's a cheap upgrade, and I often drag my rear brakes while descending (poor form
)...Dropper:
As mentioned above, a 180mm One-Up post is probably your best bet.
Tires:
I'll probably swap the front to a 2.5" DHF 3C MaxxGrip Exo+ once I wear the original out. It'll give me more grip, more puncture resistance, and make the bike a bit more nimble, at almost the same weight as the current tire. I'll also swap the rear something similar to the original 2.8" High Roller II, but 3C MaxxTerra in Exo+.
Edit: I put in new information about the brake incompatibility with the stock setup. Pretty sloppy there Felt!
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