2025 Calibre Bossnut: The Development Story

0:00 Press Coverage
01:05 2022 - 1st Prototype development
03:38 2023 - 2nd Prototypes
04:35 2024 - 3rd Prototypes at Farmer Johns
06:26 3rd Prototypes at Wharncliffe
07:27 3rd Prototypes at Leek
09:37 Final Prototypes in Morzine
09:57 The Bossnut

Get the Bossnut here: https://bit.ly/calibre_Bossnut

The name Bossnut needs no introduction in the mountain bike world.

Since it’s launch in 2015 the Bossnut redefined what an entry level full-suspension bike was capable of. It won countless awards and became the benchmark which other brands entry level full-sus bikes were measured
against. If you wanted to get into mountain biking and didn’t have a huge budget then the Bossnut was the bike to buy.

The Bossnut quickly gained a reputation as the go-to bike for new riders or people getting back into the sport. This sums up Calibre’s ethos of producing bikes that provide affordable performance.

The original bike went through 5 iterations and continued to grow in popularity until 2020 when due to covid our production ceased. It’s been over 4 years since the last model launched, 4 years of redevelopment, testing and refining to create what we believe to be the best entry level performance mountain bike on the market. The bike that your mate who is into MTB will recommend to get you hooked and become one of us!

So what’s new?

The Bossnut has always been a short travel trail bike that is designed to be fun to ride above anything else. The updated geometry makes the bike more capable than ever but it also keeps it’s playful poppy feel.

The biggest change to the bike is that it is now rolling on 29” wheels, through testing mullet and 650b options, the 29er proved the most confident, fun and fast rolling.

The travel has also been increased from 130mm all round to 140mm up front and 135mm on the rear making the bike an even more capable all-rounder that can take the bigger hits as your riding progresses.

We have seen how hard the previous generation bikes got pushed and have developed an all new, chunky custom tubeset and redesigned the forgings to strengthen every part of the frame. We have had our riders absolutely hammering them and nobody has managed to break one of the new frames. We have also taken care of the details, we’ve got space for a
bottle cage inside the frame, improved cable management and added bosses for tool storage under the toptube. We’ve also gone for Boost spacing on the hubs adding stiffness and keeping the frame futureproof.

One thing that the original Bossnut didn’t have was a dropper. It’s now hard to imagine riding a trail bike without one so we have spec’d the bike with a size specific dropper out of the box.

Geometry and sizing:

Bossnut customers span a massive age and size range and it is important to us that it is accessible to everyone. The new bike now comes in 5 sizes. The Small to XL sizes come with 29” wheels and the XS bike for teenagers and smaller riders comes with 27.5” wheels.

We’ve got a slack 64.5 degree head angle for stable descending, a steep 78 degree seat angle giving a composed climbing position, a low BB for a planted feel in the corners and a low standover for manoeuvrability.

A shorter seat tube length across all the sizes gives riders the option of sizing up if they prefer a more stable bike with a longer reach and sizing down if they prefer a shorter more nimble bike. We have 170mm droppers on the L & XL sizes, a 150mm on the M bike and 125mm on the S & XS bikes.

Components:

We've created a bike to get you hooked on riding, keeping the bike at arm affordable price point but with no compromises on the trail.

As always the suspension is taken care of by Rockshox, a 140mm Rockshox Recon RL fork up front and a Rockshox Deluxe Select shock on the rear. They are simple to set up and work together with the linkage to give an active and composed ride feel.

The brakes are Shimano MT401 with 180mm rotors front and rear. These give excellent stopping power and a comfortable and consistent lever feel. The drivetrain is also taken care of by Shimano. The brilliant new Cues 10 speed set up offers a wide range 11-48 cassette is built for longevity and shifting under load. We’ve gone for Maxxis tyres with a grippy Minion DHF up front and a fast rolling Forkaster on the rear. These are seated on 30mm internal tubeless ready rims.

The past four years has been an amazing journey, designing and refining the frame and testing lots of components. The result is what we think gives the right balance of what matters on a mountain bike - all the bits that make a difference and none of the bits that don’t. We have created what we believe is the bike that will give you the best experience of mountain biking at an accessible price point.

The Bossnut is available now from GO Outdoors for £1499 with your GO Outdoors discount card.

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