Sends down. And back up. Fuji photo.
Few things makes me happier than a mountain bike exceeding expectations. Fuji's Auric 1.3 was one of the longest travel rigs at our Big Sky Bike Test and though well-matched to Montana's terrain on paper, we didn't know much about it.
But from the moment we ('we' meaning Big Sky's head wrench Adam Glick) pulled it out of the box, to when the last tester wheeled it back into the shop loaded with dust and sweat, the Auric was a smooth, stone-cold killer.
SPECS
There's just something about it—maybe it's the bouquet of flowers hanging off the saddle. Ryan Dunfee photo.
Frame: Aluminum front and rear triangle with ISCG mounts and sealed cartridge bearing pivots.
Bottom Bracket: Press Fit 30
Travel: 160mm Fuji MLink patented suspension system with “shaped ride-tuned” chainstay
Fork: 160mm Fox 36 FLOAT Factory FIT 3-position w/ Kashima coating.
Shock: 160mm Fox Float Factory EVOL 3-position w/ Kashima coating
Crankset: Oval Concepts M610, 32T, integrated spindle,
Rear Derailleur/Shifter: SRAM X1, 11-speed
Wheelset: 27.5" DT Swiss M1700 Spline Two with Boost hubs.
Tires: Schwalbe Nobby Nic, 27.5" x 2.35" Snake Skin, 67tpi, folding, tubeless ready
Brakes: Shimano Deore XT, hydraulic disc, 180mm rotors
Dropper Post: KS LEV Integra dropper, 125mm travel
Handlebar/Stem: Oval Concepts 600 760mm/60mm
Weight: 29lbs
Price: $4500
Geometry (size L):
All the parts are in the right place. Ryan Dunfee photo.
Effective Top Tube: 24.6” (482.6mm)
Seat Tube Angle: 73°
Head Angle: 67°
Chainstay: 17.2” (438.1mm)
Wheelbase: 180mm
BB Drop: 10mm
Reach: 17.1” (434.9mm)
Setup
The eye-catching mid-chainstay pivot. Ryan Dunfee photo.
The Auric uses Fuji’s MLink suspension platform, a four-bar system with a mid-length linkage in the rear triangle. Basically, your chainstay has a pivot and buttress halfway back, which is not a common design. Fuji claims MLink connects seatstays to chainstays with better triangulation, which delivers a stiff rear swingarm—like longer linkages—but can still take advantage of shorter rear-chainstay geometry. Goldilocks linkage length, as it were.
Fuji bikes have been around for 117 years. You may not see a lot of their marketing, or even know the closest shop which carries them, but they are worth a look.
What we expected going in
Out of the box, the Auric looked good, with money spent in all the right places.
At $4500, there were bikes twice as expensive at the Big Sky test. The Dusty grey/blue with green and white accent colorway comes together very nicely. Internal cable routing is nice and neat. Several testers were eyeing it right out of the box--there's no apparent radical departure from the norm, but something about the Auric just looks appealing.
The money in this bike was spent in all the right places. It’s aluminum, so we know it’s tough. Not the lightest, but by far not the heaviest. 29 lbs is fine for a 160mm enduro brawler. The welds are nice (when’s the last time you heard that in a review?). We felt good throwing a leg over this baby.
On the climbs
Go ahead. Put on a half-shell and pack a lunch. Fuji photo.
Ryan Dunfee felt the Auric was pretty efficient for having as much, and as plush, travel as it does. Even while standing and pedaling, he didn't feel the suspension was sucking up momentum or power; it scooted uphill nicely.
I was also impressed, though my experience was on short bursts of ups more than long climbs. The fork didn’t wander. The three-position lever on the shock is easy to reach and flip on the fly.
It climbs like a good mountain bike, if not an XC rig.
Descending
Tester Jed Donnely plowing through Big Sky's loose and rough stuff on the Auric. Ryan Dunfee photo.
Damn, yo! This thing hauls. If you are looking for a new bike that can hang in the park and race the crap out of an enduro, do yourself a favor and test the Auric. The Fox 36 is the nicest fork I’ve ridden in a while--a velvet battering ram at the gates of chaos. The FIT4 damper is butter, and 36mm stanchions hold like marble columns. It provides absolute confidence and is a perfect choice for this bike.
A gorilla in the mist. Ryan Dunfee photo.
The split-pivot mid-length four-bar suspension mated to the Fox's Float EVOL shock works out pretty nice. Boost rear hub spacing and reinforced asymmetrical chainstays add stiffness, so no wandering or wiggling. Just plush banging.
With that much stability and smoothness, you soon start pushing your own limits. I found myself boosting over stuff I’d approached more carefully on other bikes.
27.5' wheels and reasonable bottom bracket height provide a nice, agile cornering feel on berms as well as more ad-hoc direction changes.
You could mob into rock gardens and just giggle as the suspension soaked it up like a limousine.
Dunfee felt the Auric was the plushest-feeling bike in our test, and with so much travel and butter-smooth Fox suspension front and back, “you could mob into rock gardens and just giggle as the suspension soaked it up like a limousine." Still, it felt relatively snappy and playful for the amount of travel it rode with, and was a fun jumper and popped around with energy."
The very capable Float EVOL shock (note the fully utilized o-ring). Ryan Dunfee photo
But the overwhelming feeling, he said, was how you could never get into enough trouble to outmatch the suspension; it felt incredibly bottomless, buttery, and giddily smooth. The head angle could be just one degree slacker to make it feel right at home, though (Gunnar's note; I challenge you to find a review where Dunfee doesn’t want a shorter stem, slacker head angle, wider bars, or whatever rad free-ride quackery is trending).
Standout Components
This bad boy. Ryan Dunfee photo.
All testers felt the Fox 36 fork crushed it at the test. More than a few bikes came with the Float EVOL rear shock, and it was always smooth and reliable. Dunfee thought both together made for “far and away the smoothest-feeling and plushest suspension of the test. “ I got no beef with the shock either. But the fork was top of the podium.
The Bottom line:
Lift it, huck it, send it on the Auric. Fuji photo.
Some testers thought the Nobby Nics don't offer enough grip for the dirty business this bike wants to get into, which is more of a compliment for the bike. I didn’t mind the tires so much, but if I owned this bike, once these wore out, I’d try a Minion DHR or HRII.
The bike does require a custom BB tool to remove the crankset (thought it's not expensive or hard to get), and you have to remove the crankset to route the internal rear derailleur or dropper post cables.
I think a slightly more comprehensive chainstay protection would be wise, given how aggressively the bike is intended to be ridden. Especially as there’s a pivot in the middle of it, you probably want to keep safe.
It makes rock gardens feel like dropping down a series of large, flat slabs, and not a hellacious pile of rubbled chunder.
Again, I freaking LOVE when bikes punch above their price-point. The Fuji Auric absolutely hangs with the higher echelons of descending/enduro bikes for quite a bit less money.
Many testers remarked how Fuji might not be a brand a lot of mountain bikers are thinking about, but the Auric is as much of a mauler on the descent as any bike with similar travel–“it makes rock gardens feel like dropping down a series of large, flat slabs, and not a hellacious pile of rubbled chunder.“
Whatever is going on here, it works just fine. Ryan Dunfee photo.
It pedals well for its travel, and has a good amount of energy, pop, and playfulness despite its downhill bike-level of forgiveness on descents.
This would be a great bike for anyone looking for a bottomless-feeling all mountain/enduro bruiser with a huge margin of error for getting you into trouble.
Truthfully, the spec on the version up from out tester bike (the 1.1) has a Pike fork and Rock Shox Debonair shock and all, but, umm… I like this fork/shock setup better. Not hating on the Pike, it’s a great fork and has been killing the market for the last three years or so. But the Fox 36 with the fit4 damper is a velvet battering ram. It’s great.
Also, the Fuji Auri 1.3 is almost a pound lighter than the 1.1 and about $200 cheaper. That’s not a huge price difference, if you’re more a fan of Rockshox than Fox. I’m happy with this bad boy just how it is. Ride it and you will be, too.
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About The Author
stash member Gunnar Waldman
Editor-at-Large, IMBA instructor and east-coaster. Raced Trans-Savoie in France, SoCal Enduro and Endurance in Temecula and is psyched for all the great new races in the east. Article Ideas: gunnar.waldman@tetongravity.com
Waylon32
July 17th, 2020
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