Nice review! Transition really nailed it with this bike. I have the top spec PNW/Transmission build. I highly recommend you try riding this bike with a coil and a MX configuration. One of the awesome things about this bike is that with the battery out, it can be a park or shuttle bike. I’ve also had no issues with the Fazua system after a full summer session of riding. It’s everything I wanted out of an eMTB and more.
So we demo'd the PNW Carbon alongside the Carbon GX 29er build last week. Your observations of the 29er feeling taller and harder in those turns is spot on. We shot video of my wife trying an uphill tight switchback as well as a big stump tight spot to then over a huge root and she got it first time on the Mullet every time and couldn't get it on the 29er, its a night and day difference when you swap to the 27.5 in the rear. Also both Transition employees at the shop we spoke with took regular 29 builds and put 27.5s on the rear end. The bike does have a flip chip so you can easily swap 29 to 27.5, I wish they put the TRP DH-R Evos on the non PNW build though. I hate dealing with SRAM DOT fluid. The Ring controller is a concern especially for us as we have to take the front wheel off to put the bikes in the back our our truck and bolt the forks down. If we go with this bike we will have to carve a little foam mount to put down when we flip the bike over so the ring controller doesn't hit the ground. We spent about 2 hours yesterday as well talking with the guys at the Transition Outpost about the motor, ring controller etc. Everything is plug n play, no soddering wires etc. So if Fazua comes out with a different controller next year it should be able to just plug right into the existing wire and be an easy swap. We also asked about the range extender. Transition has a whole pre drilled in the frame for when it comes out. The large frame will line up perfectly they said, the small will not and the medium will be 50/50 when the actual range extender comes out. Apparently when the frames were designed Fazua didn't have all the mounting specs figured out yet so transition had to guess on the other sizes. So my question to you guys. We haven't seen and can't find a Santa Cruz Heckler SL in stock. What's your thoughts comparing the Relay and Heckler?
I ❤ this bike. Test rode it at the Transition outpost and instantly purchased when I returned. I was smiling the whole time. Plenty of power and so far I have her to get the battery under 50% with 1-3h rides. I got the PNW which I find very capable and fun.
Your point about the Fazua controller is true. I like how the Bosch system has two different ways to control the modes just in case the controller stops working. I even ride my bike without the controller and just use the top tube controller to make the cockpit look cleaner
@5:53 Yes... yes it really does. I do many stupid things every weekend on my Relay GXPNW. You are 100% correct sir. What's worse, I haven't gone back to my analog since I picked up this sexy monster. I'm only hucking this around the PNW cause there isn't anywhere it won't take me. I've been on more mountain dates with this thing in the past five months than my wife in the last 16 years.
Started with a GX build and put a Push Coil & Zeb on it for a 170/170mm 29” and the bike is absolute bonkers fun. The Fox Performance stuff on the GX build was pretty underwhelming and missing any compression adjustment. New shock and fork transformed it! Such a fun bike 🙌🏼
I bought the alloy pnw gx. Few teething issues that saw the bike spend some time in the shop, but now its all fixed with updated controller and new motor; i love this bike. So baller, so confident and rips hard. As you said, makes you do stupid sh#t but gives you the confidence youll be fine on the other side. Alloy goes hard too!
Thank you very much for this review. The Relay is on my short list of ebikes I’m looking at. I am concerned about the Fazua set up as well, mostly that plastic ring controller. If I’m not mistaken Fazua was purchased by Porsche. Hopefully they’ll introduce a bit more quality to that handlebar controller. You guys rock! Looking forward to the rest of your reviews and the round up at the end.👍
I own the pnw gx alloy build and it’s amazing, i’ve gotten to ride it a few times so far, but crashed the first week I got it so was out for awhile. I’ve rode it only with battery and it rides great but planning to take it to a bike park so, i’m excited to test it without battery on big bike park trails.
You say the bike is reasonably quite and no much issues over than the controller problem, but on the forums from day 1 I see every single rider complain about rattling noises and small issues around the motor/electronic. What gives? Did transition fix this up without releasing a new model? Honestly, this is what kept me from buying this bike when it was released. Check mtbr's thread on it, its just people trying to put foam in the frame, adding carbon to the cover, etc. At this price point this seems like a big deal.
I was looking at the specs on the different builds of the Relay. The one you guys reviewed is about 42lbs. The lower end builds can skyrocket up to 49lbs. I don’t really think that can be considered mid or lightweight. That’s basically a 50 pounder. I was a little disappointed. Saw some specs on the new Santa Cruz Heckler SL which is around 43lbs for a lower/mid build. I think that’s gonna be it for me. Looking forward to seeing a more in depth review of that one by you guys.👍
My 7 year old is absolutely ripping on this bike. He is improving at an incredibly rapid rate and that’s thanks to the bike and the number of laps we can get done in a short period of time. I’m extremely grateful that he has this bike. The XS is full 27.5 and it’s perfect for him.
I'd be curious about sizing. One comment was that the bike felt long. You all were riding a Large, how tall are you guys and did you feel like going down a size would be an advantage. My style of riding is mostly flow jump lines and not a lot of tech.
How will a Range Extender even be used by the Relay if the charge port is hidden inside the frame? Kind of a let down that Fazua and Forrestal/Bafang have no range extenders when Bosch/Shimano/TQ/Specialized all do.
Has anyone put some decent mileage on the Fazua DU? I'm dealing with my 5th Bosch DU on a Trek Powerfly (25,000 km) Looking for a new ride that is more reliable. Cheers!
Well, slightly different intentions. The Ari is a 140/150 bike whereas this has significantly more travel. The Ari is a more precise nimble play bike for great all around trail riding. For big jumps, drops and hits, or gnarly DH, this takes the edge purely because of travel. Very similar feeling bikes otherwise.
Man the Relay I demoed rattled so bad, the motor was loud, and the Fazua controller kept getting stuck and shutting off the bike while I was riding. Maybe it just had been beat on really bad by demo riders but that was enough to scare me off
I had one of these for 2 hours and I was happy to hand it back. The thing railed the fast rough stuff and could jump for days, but it wasn't as much fun as Trek Fuel EX
Cannot see how they will add a battery extender to the current bike without some port to connect to the system. I think the battery extender would have to come with a new version of the bike with a port somewhere in the frame.
I’d really like to see you guys do more real world range testing with these bikes. Especially in the max power, max assist, max everything mode. I ride an eMTB to make boring cross country trails fun. My Decoy set at 56nm with all other settings on max only gets 20-25 miles range on flat CC trails. I always leave wishing I had more battery to spin a few more laps. The SLs would be awesome for how I use an eMTB but I wonder if they have enough range to be worth it.
Thanks James and we’d love to. However our experience is that any range testing we do will only lead to people having higher expectations, calling us liars and being disappointed or saying we are crazy because they can get 10 more miles than we do. For example, you said you get 20-25 miles out of yours, however if we took it on our test loop we could have killed the battery in 11-13miles… plus rider weight, tire compound/patterns and even soil conditions (soft/Sandy, hard pack or soft soil) will all affect mileage and it’s just hard to really explain that in every review and video. Hope that makes sense? We will continue to brainstorm and work on ways to do this, or feel free to share an idea if you’ve got one too!
@@TheLoamWolf I think the motor nm and battery watt hours is a good indicator for range these days. Although apparently SC is fibbing a little bit on the new Heckler SL numbers. If we get concrete power numbers from manufacturers everyone should have a pretty good gauge of what kind of range they can expect.
@@TheLoamWolf Makes sense and I appreciate the effort you guys put into this. I wasn’t trying to be critical at all and I do really like this Transition. That was my point though, I think the way I ride my eMTB on my local trails is probably the best case scenario for range and it will only go down from there on other trails.
Unfortunately looks like there won’t be a range extender for the Relay as there’s no external charge port. That said, this bike rips. We got a couple for of the PNW versions in for demo, and one of my guys hasn’t touched his own bike since. 😂
There is a hole in the frame to connect the range extender if and when it eventually appears. Will require some kind of connecting cable I assume there is a spare plug in the bike that looks like that is what it connects to.
Thank you so much! We hope you like them! We wish they could be cheaper, and even looked at all other offerings. Sadly we’re all fish and until we can place orders for hundreds of units, we just don’t have a ton of room to go lower. But, thanks to your support we’re one set closer! We appreciate you!!
Looks like awesome bike, I would love ….. but I won’t run out to buy it yet. I had a fazua bike and it was plagued with problems, I’ll wait a few years until Porsche get a grip on the company. As an aside one thing reviewers never test… the walk mode is absolutely rubbish. How can you give something a 9 if you haven’t tested every feature this expensive machine is advertised as having. I know It’s not relevant to a lot of people, but for folk who live in v steep terrain a good walk mode is a game-changer to access those awesome trails too hard to get to on an analogue bike.
By process of elimination I would say the frame, including battery mounting, cabling, headset and few other miscellaneous bits and pieces is about 4200grams, I haven't fully stripped everything back and weighed it though.
I ride mine on the regular with out the battery, on one of my local moderately techy climbs I’m about 30min on the Relay no battery & 27min on my 2016 Smuggler. I’m a pretty average climber so I’m never going to set any KOMs on either. Smuggler is going to get sold and Relay will be my main MTB; it’s that good.
These SL underpowered bikes with small batteries (that need range extenders, And therefore adding even more weight) are not that different in weight to some of the full powered that are available. The Merida e160 10K for example 22.4 (with a 36mm fork). I'm just not convinced that it's worth it. Looking forward to the day where we can get good quality powered e-bikes with batteries at 15 kg-16kg. Don't get me wrong I love all ebikes, but I think the value for money and use is the lighter full powered versions. 🤠
Some of would not disagree with you there. I'm sure we are not too far away from bigger batteries in lighter weight packages. Just have to hold out a bit longer. There are still instances where SL's would be a good option for some, just depends on where one rides, and what their typical ride looks like. Certainly not an option if you want to be on the trail for 3+ hours.
Way too expensive for the 42 lb top model. The alloy size large is 50lbs and the same price as some full size ebikes with more battery and power. Meh. I really dont consider this a superlight if it only applies to to very top model. Slap a battery extender on and you have a fullsize in weight. All but the top price SLs are approaching or arguably within fullsize territory. Full circle has been made.
Nice review! Transition really nailed it with this bike. I have the top spec PNW/Transmission build. I highly recommend you try riding this bike with a coil and a MX configuration. One of the awesome things about this bike is that with the battery out, it can be a park or shuttle bike. I’ve also had no issues with the Fazua system after a full summer session of riding. It’s everything I wanted out of an eMTB and more.
Interesting-I have been looking at this today. Currently own a Rise M10..
So we demo'd the PNW Carbon alongside the Carbon GX 29er build last week. Your observations of the 29er feeling taller and harder in those turns is spot on. We shot video of my wife trying an uphill tight switchback as well as a big stump tight spot to then over a huge root and she got it first time on the Mullet every time and couldn't get it on the 29er, its a night and day difference when you swap to the 27.5 in the rear. Also both Transition employees at the shop we spoke with took regular 29 builds and put 27.5s on the rear end. The bike does have a flip chip so you can easily swap 29 to 27.5,
I wish they put the TRP DH-R Evos on the non PNW build though. I hate dealing with SRAM DOT fluid.
The Ring controller is a concern especially for us as we have to take the front wheel off to put the bikes in the back our our truck and bolt the forks down. If we go with this bike we will have to carve a little foam mount to put down when we flip the bike over so the ring controller doesn't hit the ground.
We spent about 2 hours yesterday as well talking with the guys at the Transition Outpost about the motor, ring controller etc. Everything is plug n play, no soddering wires etc. So if Fazua comes out with a different controller next year it should be able to just plug right into the existing wire and be an easy swap.
We also asked about the range extender. Transition has a whole pre drilled in the frame for when it comes out. The large frame will line up perfectly they said, the small will not and the medium will be 50/50 when the actual range extender comes out. Apparently when the frames were designed Fazua didn't have all the mounting specs figured out yet so transition had to guess on the other sizes.
So my question to you guys. We haven't seen and can't find a Santa Cruz Heckler SL in stock.
What's your thoughts comparing the Relay and Heckler?
Great observations. Thank you for sharing them
Thanks for those details, your comment answered pretty important questions
I ❤ this bike. Test rode it at the Transition outpost and instantly purchased when I returned. I was smiling the whole time. Plenty of power and so far I have her to get the battery under 50% with 1-3h rides. I got the PNW which I find very capable and fun.
Thanks for sharing!
Your point about the Fazua controller is true. I like how the Bosch system has two different ways to control the modes just in case the controller stops working. I even ride my bike without the controller and just use the top tube controller to make the cockpit look cleaner
@5:53 Yes... yes it really does. I do many stupid things every weekend on my Relay GXPNW. You are 100% correct sir. What's worse, I haven't gone back to my analog since I picked up this sexy monster. I'm only hucking this around the PNW cause there isn't anywhere it won't take me. I've been on more mountain dates with this thing in the past five months than my wife in the last 16 years.
Haha. That’s what we keep trying to tell haters… it’s crazy!?
Started with a GX build and put a Push Coil & Zeb on it for a 170/170mm 29” and the bike is absolute bonkers fun. The Fox Performance stuff on the GX build was pretty underwhelming and missing any compression adjustment. New shock and fork transformed it! Such a fun bike 🙌🏼
This or the Heckler SL?!
I bought the alloy pnw gx. Few teething issues that saw the bike spend some time in the shop, but now its all fixed with updated controller and new motor; i love this bike. So baller, so confident and rips hard. As you said, makes you do stupid sh#t but gives you the confidence youll be fine on the other side. Alloy goes hard too!
Thank you very much for this review. The Relay is on my short list of ebikes I’m looking at. I am concerned about the Fazua set up as well, mostly that plastic ring controller. If I’m not mistaken Fazua was purchased by Porsche. Hopefully they’ll introduce a bit more quality to that handlebar controller. You guys rock! Looking forward to the rest of your reviews and the round up at the end.👍
Thanks very much!
I own the pnw gx alloy build and it’s amazing, i’ve gotten to ride it a few times so far, but crashed the first week I got it so was out for awhile. I’ve rode it only with battery and it rides great but planning to take it to a bike park so, i’m excited to test it without battery on big bike park trails.
You say the bike is reasonably quite and no much issues over than the controller problem, but on the forums from day 1 I see every single rider complain about rattling noises and small issues around the motor/electronic. What gives? Did transition fix this up without releasing a new model? Honestly, this is what kept me from buying this bike when it was released. Check mtbr's thread on it, its just people trying to put foam in the frame, adding carbon to the cover, etc. At this price point this seems like a big deal.
The bike I demoed rattled a bunch. The bike I purchased is silent.
I was looking at the specs on the different builds of the Relay. The one you guys reviewed is about 42lbs. The lower end builds can skyrocket up to 49lbs. I don’t really think that can be considered mid or lightweight. That’s basically a 50 pounder. I was a little disappointed. Saw some specs on the new Santa Cruz Heckler SL which is around 43lbs for a lower/mid build. I think that’s gonna be it for me. Looking forward to seeing a more in depth review of that one by you guys.👍
I agree it is a heavy ish expensive bike. I also don't like the colours they are bad!
Yeah there are full power ebikes that's around 49lbs with removable battery. I like the concept of Relay but it's too heavy as a sl ebike
Sounds like a winner. Wish they offered a non-PNW XO build…
Yeah we would opt for the non-PNW build ourselves.
My 7 year old is absolutely ripping on this bike. He is improving at an incredibly rapid rate and that’s thanks to the bike and the number of laps we can get done in a short period of time. I’m extremely grateful that he has this bike. The XS is full 27.5 and it’s perfect for him.
That is awesome!
I'd be curious about sizing. One comment was that the bike felt long. You all were riding a Large, how tall are you guys and did you feel like going down a size would be an advantage. My style of riding is mostly flow jump lines and not a lot of tech.
Sorry, was out on my Bullit today @48lbs, and @43lbs for this Transition, has nothing more to offer here… A full mid-weight e-bike (40-50lb max) with
How will a Range Extender even be used by the Relay if the charge port is hidden inside the frame? Kind of a let down that Fazua and Forrestal/Bafang have no range extenders when Bosch/Shimano/TQ/Specialized all do.
Damn I just ordered a cascade link for my Rise. Looks like this is the bike I wish my Rise was stock.
This bike sounds awesome! What's the weight as tested? Anything you'd change? Thanks.
What would you guys pick? Timp peak or relay? I know they are different categories of e-bikes.
@TheLoamWolf, appreciate the video. Curious if any of the reviewers in the 5’ 11” neighborhood think they would get a medium over a large?
So you guys had issues with the battery door latch and battery contact tabs?
Don’t sleep on Transition man they are great bikes
Has anyone put some decent mileage on the Fazua DU? I'm dealing with my 5th Bosch DU on a Trek Powerfly (25,000 km)
Looking for a new ride that is more reliable. Cheers!
Great review! Now that you have tried the Ari Nebo Peak, how would you compare that to this bike? I'm torn between those two bikes right now.
Well, slightly different intentions. The Ari is a 140/150 bike whereas this has significantly more travel. The Ari is a more precise nimble play bike for great all around trail riding. For big jumps, drops and hits, or gnarly DH, this takes the edge purely because of travel. Very similar feeling bikes otherwise.
Do we have a winner?
🤐
Man the Relay I demoed rattled so bad, the motor was loud, and the Fazua controller kept getting stuck and shutting off the bike while I was riding. Maybe it just had been beat on really bad by demo riders but that was enough to scare me off
Same here. I demo 1 that was a rattle trap!
My relay is same as the one the guys rode, quiet, except I have added EXT coil that is a bit noisy, it seems some have cable rattles some don't.
I had one of these for 2 hours and I was happy to hand it back. The thing railed the fast rough stuff and could jump for days, but it wasn't as much fun as Trek Fuel EX
It can charge through fast and gnarly, and can jump for days, but that isn't fun? 🤔
@@HarryKuloh weirdly.... yeah
We definitely understand what you mean. Sometimes, less travel provides a different type of feel and fun.
I wouldn’t buy a trek if they were a third the price 🗑️
Cannot see how they will add a battery extender to the current bike without some port to connect to the system. I think the battery extender would have to come with a new version of the bike with a port somewhere in the frame.
Awesome bike
We agree!
I’d really like to see you guys do more real world range testing with these bikes. Especially in the max power, max assist, max everything mode. I ride an eMTB to make boring cross country trails fun. My Decoy set at 56nm with all other settings on max only gets 20-25 miles range on flat CC trails. I always leave wishing I had more battery to spin a few more laps. The SLs would be awesome for how I use an eMTB but I wonder if they have enough range to be worth it.
Thanks James and we’d love to. However our experience is that any range testing we do will only lead to people having higher expectations, calling us liars and being disappointed or saying we are crazy because they can get 10 more miles than we do.
For example, you said you get 20-25 miles out of yours, however if we took it on our test loop we could have killed the battery in 11-13miles… plus rider weight, tire compound/patterns and even soil conditions (soft/Sandy, hard pack or soft soil) will all affect mileage and it’s just hard to really explain that in every review and video. Hope that makes sense?
We will continue to brainstorm and work on ways to do this, or feel free to share an idea if you’ve got one too!
@@TheLoamWolf I think the motor nm and battery watt hours is a good indicator for range these days. Although apparently SC is fibbing a little bit on the new Heckler SL numbers. If we get concrete power numbers from manufacturers everyone should have a pretty good gauge of what kind of range they can expect.
@@TheLoamWolf Makes sense and I appreciate the effort you guys put into this. I wasn’t trying to be critical at all and I do really like this Transition. That was my point though, I think the way I ride my eMTB on my local trails is probably the best case scenario for range and it will only go down from there on other trails.
Unfortunately looks like there won’t be a range extender for the Relay as there’s no external charge port. That said, this bike rips. We got a couple for of the PNW versions in for demo, and one of my guys hasn’t touched his own bike since. 😂
There is a hole in the frame to connect the range extender if and when it eventually appears. Will require some kind of connecting cable I assume there is a spare plug in the bike that looks like that is what it connects to.
Just bought handguards from your site. bit pricey, but they look good on all your bike reviews.
Thank you so much! We hope you like them! We wish they could be cheaper, and even looked at all other offerings. Sadly we’re all fish and until we can place orders for hundreds of units, we just don’t have a ton of room to go lower. But, thanks to your support we’re one set closer! We appreciate you!!
@@TheLoamWolf I appreciate your informative videos.
With no charge port how will a range extender connect?
Looks like awesome bike, I would love ….. but I won’t run out to buy it yet. I had a fazua bike and it was plagued with problems, I’ll wait a few years until Porsche get a grip on the company.
As an aside one thing reviewers never test… the walk mode is absolutely rubbish. How can you give something a 9 if you haven’t tested every feature this expensive machine is advertised as having. I know It’s not relevant to a lot of people, but for folk who live in v steep terrain a good walk mode is a game-changer to access those awesome trails too hard to get to on an analogue bike.
Future video idea. Mullet vs full 29er comparisons on this bike.
We just did that comparison, see my comment above.
Be nice to see the Focus sl in the mix
How heavy is the Frame?
By process of elimination I would say the frame, including battery mounting, cabling, headset and few other miscellaneous bits and pieces is about 4200grams, I haven't fully stripped everything back and weighed it though.
Thank you so much for the Information!!!@@ajandlucy
Whats going on with your website?
We’re not seeing any issues at this moment??
Must've been a glitch. Its fine now. I tried to go on the website and it said 404 not found. Strange
Interesting! We appreciate you letting us know and also, visiting the site!! Thank you
Did you try without the battery?
Yes we did. It rides like a good 38lb enduro bike. Minimal drag/efficiency loss.
I ride mine on the regular with out the battery, on one of my local moderately techy climbs I’m about 30min on the Relay no battery & 27min on my 2016 Smuggler. I’m a pretty average climber so I’m never going to set any KOMs on either. Smuggler is going to get sold and Relay will be my main MTB; it’s that good.
These SL underpowered bikes with small batteries (that need range extenders, And therefore adding even more weight) are not that different in weight to some of the full powered that are available. The Merida e160 10K for example 22.4 (with a 36mm fork). I'm just not convinced that it's worth it. Looking forward to the day where we can get good quality powered e-bikes with batteries at 15 kg-16kg. Don't get me wrong I love all ebikes, but I think the value for money and use is the lighter full powered versions. 🤠
Some of would not disagree with you there. I'm sure we are not too far away from bigger batteries in lighter weight packages. Just have to hold out a bit longer. There are still instances where SL's would be a good option for some, just depends on where one rides, and what their typical ride looks like. Certainly not an option if you want to be on the trail for 3+ hours.
Do yourself a favor and try the PNW.
When you get to the top of your climb take the battery out and put it in your backpack, then you have a lighter feeling bike for the downhill, ha ha
Way too expensive for the 42 lb top model. The alloy size large is 50lbs and the same price as some full size ebikes with more battery and power. Meh. I really dont consider this a superlight if it only applies to to very top model. Slap a battery extender on and you have a fullsize in weight. All but the top price SLs are approaching or arguably within fullsize territory. Full circle has been made.
Great points
100% agree. I’m not saying it’s not a fun bike, but when I saw the weight of the lower builds I was shocked!
Dusty
Very!!! Glad we had those Schwalbe Tacky Chans to dig into that loose ground!
@@TheLoamWolf Hammerhead!!!!