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Custom, Titanium Full Suspension
Need the Seven Duo Be Anything More?

If there's any bike that can steal the limelight from Paul Turner's revolutionary Maverick ML-7, it's the Seven Duo.

The Duo employs Turner's MonoLink suspension design. Those not familiar with it will need a refresher. It started as two ideas: Turner wanted the shock to be a structural member of the frame (just as a suspension fork is), and he wanted an upward and rearward rear-wheel axle path (later solidified at a 15-degree angle and dubbed "URP") to allow the wheel to move away from and over an impact. In order to keep the suspension movement from affecting the drivetrain, Turner mounted the bottom bracket on a link that also tracks upward and back. The resulting design pulls the rear wheel axle forward and down as it returns to a top-out position, increasing traction while preventing bobbing by counteracting the rearward weight shift a rider experiences while accelerating.

Out of the box (which, for Seven, means custom built to your specifications), the Duo gets plenty of "oohs" and "ahs." Its curved seatstays and chainstays increase heel clearance, and the Chris King headset spec is our preference over any of the integrated systems we've come across. But our rig is not without its hangups—the custom coil-sprung-with-air-assist Fox shock's range of adjustment is pretty narrow, with one knob controlling both rebound and (to a lesser degree) compression, and it hisses like a snake on big hits. Our Hayes discs also made a racket—braking vibrations seem to resonate in some titanium frames more readily than they do in aluminum ones. Our stoppers started to quiet down over time, but would still act up in certain conditions. (Seven informed us that regular pad and rotor cleanings are the key to curbing this nuisance.) Front-derailleur options are limited to E-types, since the seat tube isn't connected to the BB shell.

At our request, Seven designed our 18-inch test frame (measured from the center of the BB spindle to the top of the top tube) with a top-tube length closer to what it would normally spec on a 19-inch frame. Due to the Duo's record-breakingly lax 59 1/2-degree seat-tube angle, however, the horizontal top-tube measurement comes out to a deceivingly short 22 5/8 inches. Don't let this fool you—our cockpit was plenty roomy, though we did find fault in our test rig's effective seat angle, which hovered around a slack 69 1/2 degrees (varying slightly depending on seat height). This positioned most test riders too far behind the BB spindle, even with the seat completely forward on the rails. This measurement foreshadowed what we were to find at the front of the Duo—a strikingly lax 68-degree head angle that got even slacker with sag. With a long 43-inch wheelbase and 17 1/4-inch chainstays, this bike is laid back—the Snoop Dogg of the l00mm-travel bike world.

On the trail, the Duo is one of the best-pedaling suspension bikes we've ridden, remaining plush and active during climbs in or out of the saddle, with the MonoLink design offering unparalleled traction benefits without a "dead-feeling" rear end. The XTR/Hayes/Thompson kit is among the most reliable we've had in years, with the Manitou Black Elite Air's smooth, precise feel complementing a suspension chassis that is in no way flexy.

Despite our Duo's geometry, the front end never felt floppy, but it didn't slither its way through tight singletrack either, leaving us longing for some steeper angles and a better seating position. The Seven's saving grace is that it can be ordered with custom geometry, so you can get your tubes as steep or as slack as you like, and newer frames are designed to have the same head and seat angles with sag and without. To the company's credit, our test bike was only the second Duo Seven had ever built at the time it was shipped to us. Even with its quirks, it's the best titanium full-suspension bike we've ridden, and the only one we've ever regarded as a viable alternative to its aluminum counterpart.