The Identiti Mettle GX enduro bike is a sturdy unit, and it benefits from SRAM’s latest RockShox Deluxe shock and wide-range GX Eagle drivetrain.

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Identiti Mettle GX review

Several years in the making, the Identiti Mettle was designed with the input of Michael Bonney, ex- marketing man at Orange bikes.

It’s also low and slack for a 160mm travel rig, so it’s not just the sizing that’s on the money. The frame is nicely finished too, with small details that make a big difference, like the seatstay bridge wrapping around the seat tube to prevent mud building up on the back end. We also liked the small recess on the underside of the driveside seatstay that improves chain clearance and produces a blissfully quiet ride, even on the rowdiest trails.

Sure, the cable routing on the Mettle isn’t the neatest, as it’s not all concealed inside the down tube, but it’s unobtrusive and at no point detracts from the ride.

Against Identiti’s advice, 35 per cent sag proved the best set-up for us

Suspension

We like the fact that Identiti doesn’t have some bullshit name or a daft acronym for its suspension design. Instead, it just says what it is in plain English: a four-bar design with 160mm travel. All of the pivots use the same bearing size, to make everyone’s lives easier, and it’s been designed around the new metric shock standard. The RockShox Deluxe comes stock on the GX build, but you can also upgrade to the Super Deluxe for an extra £100.

Keeping it RockShox at both ends is a 160mm travel Yari RC suspension fork. It’s not quite as good at ironing out big creases in the trail as the Lyrik on the DMR, but it feels every bit as stout.

Eagle’s huge range makes light work of tough climbs

Components

The GX level Mettle hasn’t just got any old SRAM GX on it; it’s got the 12-speed Eagle version, with a massive gear range thanks to the 10-50t cassette. Combined with a relatively steep seat angle that helps keep your weight forward, and the front end down, on climbs, the Eagle lets you soar to new heights considering the bike weighs 14.63kg.

Other aspects of the specification aren’t so breathtaking. The 760mm handlebar is just about wide enough, but the 50mm stem is too long for a bike with such a generous reach measurement. The two higher-priced bikes in the three-strong Mettle range both get 40mm stems, so it seems silly that the entry-level bike misses out.

Dropping and stopping are well taken care of

Our biggest issue with the finishing kit on the Mettle, however, is the saddle. The material covering the Gusset R-Series Black Jack saddle is just too grippy, so we were continually snagging our shorts on it.

Performance

Swapping the stock 50mm stem for a 30mm made a massive difference to the ride quality of the Mettle. Not only did it shift our weight rearward on descents, it really allowed the bike to settle into the rear suspension, improving tracking and handling. And while we’d normally run a wider bar than a 760mm, to open up the cockpit, the extra length in the Mettle frame meant that we never felt penned in.

We experimented with different sag settings too, settling around 35 per cent, the softer set-up improving traction, while still keeping some travel in reserve for bigger hits and drops. We ran the rebound damping on the Deluxe shock fully open, so if you’re lighter than 80kg, we’d highly recommend dropping the extra cash to get the Super Deluxe, as it has a wider range of rebound adjustment.