MRP

Bartlett 29 170 Boost Fork

When we hear the name Bartlett, we immediately think of Bartlett Wash, a giant slickrock playground in Moab filled with natural drops, sweeping wall rides, and endless line choices that are only limited by your imagination and the capability of your equipment. It's a name well-suited to MRP's new dual-crown fork, which is designed for enduro, freeride, and bike park applications. Normally you'd only find 170mm of travel on burly single-crown forks, but recently there's been a resurgence in the popularity of running a lightweight dual-crown fork on your enduro or park sled for greater chassis stiffness and better steering precision, characteristics that improve the fork's composure when you're charging hard on aggressive terrain. Packed with every bit of revolutionary technology that MRP has developed in recent years, the Bartlett 29 170 Boost Fork is ready to slay big lines without a big weight increase.

Like their award-winning Ribbon fork, the Bartlett uses MRP's FulFill air spring with independently adjustable positive and negative air chambers. If you want a super supple feel off the top, you can run a little more negative air pressure for smooth bump-gobbling trail manners. For a more supportive feel off the top, run a little more positive pressure to keep the fork riding higher in its travel on those high-speed bike park flow trails with jumps and bigger hits. For balanced performance, you can always run the chambers at equal pressures.

In addition to the independently adjustable air chambers, MRP incorporates their on-the-fly Ramp Control system that lets you tune the progressivity of the fork with a 16-position knob. Turning up the Ramp Control adds speed-sensitive end-stroke and bottom-out force control to better mitigate violent, high-speed impacts without the need to disassemble the fork and add volume spacers. That being said, the Bartlett does have the ability to run Huck Pucks—threaded spacers that you can add to the Ramp Control cartridge for macro-tuning of the air spring volume. Once you've found your perfect settings, you can keep the fork feeling consistent with the PSST valves. Changes in elevation and temperature cause pressure build-up in the fork lowers that can radically alter the feel of the stroke. Rather than having to insert zip ties into the fork lowers to bleed that excess air, the PSST valves do it at the press of a button, ensuring your fork's performance doesn't suffer at nose-bleed inducing elevations.

MRP uses a twin-tube damper for this fork rather than an open-bath or mono-tube design. They claim this offers advantages in performance, ride control, and durability compared to the aforementioned designs. Furthermore, the damper uses a low-pressure internal floating piston instead of a bladder, reducing stiction and providing more reliability and consistency over long-term use. You get 8 clicks of low-speed compression adjustment and a speed-sensitive rebound adjustment that responds well to all types of terrain. Additionally, the travel is internally adjustable in 5mm increments, and the fork's chassis comes with MRP's signature Outcast arch design that puts the weight reliefs in a forward-facing position to mitigate mud build-up in the arch, something we've all experienced with conventional arch designs.