Priority Vanth
Wheel Sizes: 29’’ front / 27.5’’ rear
Suspension Travel:
- Frame: 165 mm
- Fork: 170 mm
Geometry Highlights:
- Sizes offered: S1, S2, S3
- Headtube angle: 64°
- Reach (size S2): 475 mm
- Chainstay length: 448 mm
Frame Material: Aluminum front triangle / carbon fiber swingarm
Price: Complete bikes: $5,999 to $7,999
Intro
Priority might not be a familiar brand to folks whose attention is focused on the MTB side of the bike world, but they aren’t newcomers to the bike industry. Priority got its start making simple, no-nonsense beach cruiser and commuter bikes over a decade ago, and has expanded its lineup to include higher-end gravel bikes and a hardtail MTB in the years since.
But a high-end, full-suspension Enduro bike is a very new category for Priority, and that’s exactly what they’re launching with the Vanth. In keeping with Priority’s ethos, it uses a Pinion gearbox and a belt drive for low maintenance, and is an impressively good value when it comes to its parts spec, but the Vanth is still a big departure from everything that Priority has offered to date. So, have they managed to make a competitive bike from a performance standpoint, and how have they gone about trying? Here’s what they’ve come up with. And for a whole lot more on the development of the Vanth, check out Ep. 298 of Bikes & Big Ideas.
The Frame
The Vanth frame uses a linkage-driven high-single-pivot layout to produce 165 mm of rear wheel travel, paired with a 170 mm travel fork. It’s a dedicated mixed wheel bike, built around a Pinion gearbox and intended to be run with a Gates belt drive. Its silhouette is certainly striking, but the layout is driven much more by packaging and similarly pragmatic considerations than aesthetics.
One significant challenge in designing a belt drive full-suspension bike is managing belt tension and keeping it consistent throughout the suspension travel. The Vanth’s main pivot and idler pulley locations were chosen, in part, to minimize the amount of movement needed from the belt tensioner. The one-piece carbon fiber swingarm uses an elevated mono-stay layout to avoid needing to split the frame to install the belt (unlike a chain, you can’t separate a belt to feed it through the frame), and going that route also opened up space behind the seat tube to tuck the belt tensioner out of harm’s way.
The main pivot, idler pulley mount, and rocker link fixed pivot are all mounted to an additional frame member that sits forward of the seat tube. That helps place them in a region that would be tough to package otherwise, and allows the seat tube to be straight and uninterrupted for better dropper post insertion. The battery for the Pinion Smart Shift gearbox is housed inside the front triangle, with the charging port routed out of the right side of the frame, along with the dropper post housing; the cable routing is internal across the board, including the rear brake hose and the wire for the electronic trigger shifter.
The Vanth’s main pivot is quite high, and produces a very rearward axle path (just over 34 mm of rearward movement at bottom out, with the axle still moving substantially rearward at that point). The anti-rise is correspondingly fairly high (starting around 135% and falling off to about 110%), though that’s moderated somewhat by the main pivot’s placement forward in the frame. Anti-squat starts around 125% and drops to about 90% in a nearly straight line (the center of gravity height used to calculate those figures isn’t stated). The Vanth’s leverage curve starts at just over 3:1 and drops to about 2.2:1 in a straight-ish line, with the amount of progression tailing off slightly deeper in the travel.
Fit & Geometry
Priority offers the Vanth in just three sizes — an admitted concession to keeping its price down — with slightly larger-than-average jumps between them. Reach starts at 440 mm for the S1 and tops out at 510 mm on the S3, with the S2 clocking in at 475 mm. The headtube grows by 10 mm per size, with the resulting stack heights coming in at 630 / 639 / 648 mm.
The headtube angle is 64°, paired with a 78.5° effective seat tube angle (the actual angle isn’t stated, but it’s visually also very steep) and 448 mm chainstays. The bottom bracket drop is 9 mm relative to the rear axle (for a stated 348 mm bottom bracket height), and all three sizes get a notably short 370 mm seat tube.
The Builds
Priority offers the Vanth in three build tiers — and their pricing is a big part of the story here. All three builds use a Pinion C1.9i Smart Shift gearbox (nine speeds, 568% range, electronic shifting) and a Gates belt drive. Fox handles suspension duties across the lineup, and the brakes for all three builds are from TRP.
The Performance Elite build gets (surprise) a Fox 38 and Float X2 Performance Elite suspension package and TRP Trail Evo brakes, and retails for $5,999. In gearbox terms, that’s remarkably affordable — less than a Zerode Katipo or Nicolai G1 GPI frame (including a Pinion gearbox and the belt drive components), for example. The Kavenz VHPG has been one of the more affordable gearbox Enduro bikes on the market, but it still retails for just over €3,800 (about $4,425 at the time of publication) for a frame and gearbox — without a shock.
The rest of the Performance Elite build isn’t fancy, but it’s mostly solid. You get WTB KOM Tough rims laced to Priority hubs, a Race Face Aeffect finishing kit, and a OneUp V3 dropper post. The TRP Trail Evo brakes aren’t especially powerful, and I’d like to see much burlier casings than the Exo ones that come in the stock Maxxis tires (a DHF MaxxGrip front / DHR II MaxxTerra combo), but it’s still an excellent value.
Stepping up to the Factory build bumps the price up to $6,799 and adds Kashima coating to the Fox suspension, upgrades the brakes to TRP Evo Pros, and gets you a few modest upgrades to the cockpit parts. Finally, the Podium build subs in a Fox Podium Factory fork, Race Face ARC 30 Carbon rims, and a OneUp V2 carbon bar for $7,999. The Podium build also gets beefier tire casings (Exo+ up front and DoubleDown in back), which is a definite step in the right direction in my book.
The Pinion C1.9i gearbox used in the Vanth has a 568% range — substantially more than modern 1x derailleur-based drivetrains (~500-520% for 12-speed MTB versions), which produces rather large steps between gears, given the wide overall range and modest gear count. The steps are nearly even, averaging 24.3% per gear, with much less variation than you get with a cassette-based drivetrain. Priority specs the Vanth with a 32-tooth chainring and cassette, which produces gearing roughly equivalent to a 10-57 tooth cassette, paired with a 31-tooth chainring.
The full build details are as follows:
- Drivetrain: Pinion C1.9i Smart Shift gearbox w/ Gates belt drive
- Brakes: TRP Trail Evo w/ 203 mm rotors
- Fork: Fox 38 Performance Elite (170 mm)
- Shock: Fox Float X2 Performance Elite
- Wheels: WTB KOM Tough rims w/ Priority hubs
- Dropper post: OneUp V3 (S1: 180 mm; S2: 210 mm; S3: 240 mm)
- Drivetrain: Pinion C1.9i Smart Shift gearbox w/ Gates belt drive
- Brakes: TRP Evo Pro w/ 203 mm rotors
- Fork: Fox 38 Factory (170 mm)
- Shock: Fox Float X2 Factory
- Wheels: WTB KOM Tough rims w/ Priority hubs
- Dropper post: OneUp V3 (S1: 180 mm; S2: 210 mm; S3: 240 mm)
- Drivetrain: Pinion C1.9i Smart Shift gearbox w/ Gates belt drive
- Brakes: TRP Evo Pro w/ 203 mm rotors
- Fork: Fox Podium Factory (170 mm)
- Shock: Fox Float X2 Factory
- Wheels: Race Face ARC 30 Carbon rims w/ Priority front / Halo Mantradrive 750 rear hubs
- Dropper post: OneUp V3 (S1: 180 mm; S2: 210 mm; S3: 240 mm)
Some Questions / Things We’re Curious About
(1) Does the Vanth deliver on the promised benefits of the gearbox + belt drive combo?
(2) What about the (potential) downsides, like drivetrain drag? How noticeable is that on trail?
(3) How does the Vanth ride in general? Its geometry and suspension kinematics look reasonable on paper, but it’s also Priority’s first full-suspension bike. Have they gotten it right from the jump?
Bottom Line (For Now)
Gearboxes have been touted as the future of MTB drivetrains by a certain set of folks for decades now, but they’ve yet to take off in a big way — due, in no small part, to how expensive the bikes built around them have generally been. The Priority Vanth is, by a long shot, the most affordable full-suspension Pinion gearbox MTB we’re aware of, but it doesn’t look like a particularly compromised budget offering, either. That’s a compelling proposition, and we’ve been spending time on the Vanth to see if it delivers. Check out our take so far below, and stay tuned for a Full Review once we’ve logged a lot more time on the Vanth.
Flash Review: Our Initial On-Trail Impressions
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Flash Review: Priority Vanth
The Priority Vanth is both striking and very affordable for a high-pivot gearbox Enduro bike, but how does it ride? Here’s what we’ve learned after a month-plus on board.
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