On Friday afternoon I took delivery of this beast, a 2016 Specialised Fuse Expert 6Fattie. I'm a tall guy so I went with the XXL and it's plenty enormous.
The XXL runs a 75mm stem as standard but I put a 70mm aftermarket stem on it. I'm actually wishing I'd gone even shorter to something like 60mm or 65mm. The stock bars were far too narrow for me so I've got some 800mm bars on there now. That's definitely too wide but I didn't have time yet to do a decent job of cutting the them down to 780mm, which is my favoured width for trail riding.
With some good pedals, bottle cage/multi-tool, bar and stem upgrade (still running tubes for now) it weighs right on 30 pounds which seems OK to me for such a huuuuge frame and tyres. The Specialised Stout crankset and TranzX dropper are probably really heavy and I'm not at all keen on the dropper. It's definitely a budget piece.
The first ride was interesting. I haven't ridden a hardtail for a very long time so that was initially more noticeable to me than the tyre width. I somehow managed to crash in the first corner. Not really sure what happened. I'm running around 16psi in the tyres. I weigh 260 pounds without riding gear/pack so i guess that is pretty low? I crashed several more times in big rockgardens which I put down to the low tyre pressure and lack of fitness for clearing boulders. I bent the front brake lever right around on itself. I was able to bend it back and finished the ride, but the lever is shot. I have some Shimano Saints on order, luckily. It doesn't need such hardcore brakes but there was a deal where I got them cheaper than XTs. I'm not at all keen on the stock brakes which are Avid DB3. Reviews I've read mention different brakes than came on mine. I'm Australian and even an Australia review unit had SRAM Guide R, so maybe they changed the spec shortly before release? The Manitou Magnum Comp I will need some more time with. It really ramps up for the second half of the stroke. I've read that it can be tricky to get setup perfectly. It didn't stand out as good or bad; but it did the job.
In general I found the bike had tonnes of grip but took a bit to get leaned over. It seemed to want to stand up and power ahead. I'm sure I'll adjust to giving it some more body language. I found it hugely enjoyable to ride and it certainly smoothed out the chatter of the trail.
I'm loving the bike and would definitely recommend it. Especially for anyone my height (even taller) after a big bike.
![Image]()
The XXL runs a 75mm stem as standard but I put a 70mm aftermarket stem on it. I'm actually wishing I'd gone even shorter to something like 60mm or 65mm. The stock bars were far too narrow for me so I've got some 800mm bars on there now. That's definitely too wide but I didn't have time yet to do a decent job of cutting the them down to 780mm, which is my favoured width for trail riding.
With some good pedals, bottle cage/multi-tool, bar and stem upgrade (still running tubes for now) it weighs right on 30 pounds which seems OK to me for such a huuuuge frame and tyres. The Specialised Stout crankset and TranzX dropper are probably really heavy and I'm not at all keen on the dropper. It's definitely a budget piece.
The first ride was interesting. I haven't ridden a hardtail for a very long time so that was initially more noticeable to me than the tyre width. I somehow managed to crash in the first corner. Not really sure what happened. I'm running around 16psi in the tyres. I weigh 260 pounds without riding gear/pack so i guess that is pretty low? I crashed several more times in big rockgardens which I put down to the low tyre pressure and lack of fitness for clearing boulders. I bent the front brake lever right around on itself. I was able to bend it back and finished the ride, but the lever is shot. I have some Shimano Saints on order, luckily. It doesn't need such hardcore brakes but there was a deal where I got them cheaper than XTs. I'm not at all keen on the stock brakes which are Avid DB3. Reviews I've read mention different brakes than came on mine. I'm Australian and even an Australia review unit had SRAM Guide R, so maybe they changed the spec shortly before release? The Manitou Magnum Comp I will need some more time with. It really ramps up for the second half of the stroke. I've read that it can be tricky to get setup perfectly. It didn't stand out as good or bad; but it did the job.
In general I found the bike had tonnes of grip but took a bit to get leaned over. It seemed to want to stand up and power ahead. I'm sure I'll adjust to giving it some more body language. I found it hugely enjoyable to ride and it certainly smoothed out the chatter of the trail.
I'm loving the bike and would definitely recommend it. Especially for anyone my height (even taller) after a big bike.
