2014 Pivot Mach 6 Carbon

Pivot Mach 6, Blister Gear Review.
Pivot Mach 6 Carbon

2014 Pivot Mach 6 Carbon

Size Tested: Medium (23.6″ top tube)

Wheels: 27.5″

Travel: 155mm

Rider Info: 5’9”, 150 lbs.

The Build

  • Fox Float X CTD
  • Fox Float 34 CTD

Days Tested: 1

Test Location: Bootleg Canyon, Boulder City, Nevada

[Editor’s Note: This past September we tested a number of bikes on the rocky trails around Boulder City, Nevada, over two days at the Interbike Outdoor Demo. Since then, we’ve rolled out initial reviews of all those bikes—the Yeti SB95GT FuryDevinci AtlasDevinci Troy and the Pivot Mach 6.

We’ll be posting a full review of the bike later this summer, but for now, see why the Mach 6 was one of the most impressive bikes we rode at Interbike.]

The Caveat

Riding bikes at a demo is always kind of tricky. For starters, we didn’t get much time on each bike—at most around an hour, and with many bikes it was just a 25-minute loop. 25 minutes can tell you a lot about how a bike handles, but it certainly doesn’t allow for the customary in-depth, BLISTER analysis.

In addition, these bikes are set up by mechanics at each company’s booth, and while these guys do a great job, there isn’t really time to get each bike dialed for how I’d normally set it up. (If nothing else, I probably would have put wider bars on most of the bikes I rode.)

And then there are the trails. Interbike’s Outdoor Demo takes place at Bootleg Canyon in Boulder City. It’s a little bastion of awesomeness that overlooks the pit of despair that is Las Vegas, and the trails are fantastic: super rocky, with lots of sand, some rocks, some jumps here and there, and did I mention the rocks? Most of my time on these bikes was spent on the more cross-country oriented trails, even though the DH trail system is (in my opinion) the crown jewel of the Bootleg trail network.

The XC trails have a good mix of flowy corners, short punchy climbs, rock gardens, and a bit of chunder.  All in all, they’re decent for testing out the different aspects of a given bike, but to really develop a feel for how a bike works, there’s no substitute for riding it for a long time on a lot of different types of trails.

So with all that in mind, let’s talk about the Mach 6.

Pivot Mach 6 Carbon , Blister Gear Review.
Pivot Mach 6 Carbon

First Impressions

The Mach 6 is Pivot’s new bike aimed at the enduro crowd. It has 27.5″ wheels, 155mm of travel, a relatively low 13.6″ bottom bracket, and a fairly slack 66-degree head tube angle. As with all Pivot bikes, it uses a dw link suspension design. And take note—Pivot has revised the layout of the rear suspension on the Mach 6, so it looks a bit different than something like the older Pivot Firebird.

The model I tested was spec’d with Fox suspension front and rear. The front was a Float 34 CTD with trail adjust, and the rear was a Float X CTD. Without getting into the suspension in too much detail, I’ll just say that I’ve talked about my dislike for the 2013 34 Float CTD fork before. The 2014 is much better, but it still leaves a bit to be desired, especially in the adjustability category.

I have to admit, the Mach 6 was probably the bike that I was most excited to ride at Interbike. I used to own a Firebird, and I was a big fan of the dw link rear end—it pedals well and still does a great job on the descents. That said, the Firebird has a somewhat dated geometry; the head tube is a little steeper, the bottom bracket is a little lower, and the cockpit can feel a bit cramped.

The Mach 6 takes everything I loved about the Firebird and wraps it into a revised carbon fiber chasis with updated geometry. Both the front and rear triangles are carbon, and, as mentioned above, the linkage has been tweaked. Of note, the revised linkage allows the Mach 6 to have extremely short (16.9″ / 430mm) chainstays, which is impressive for this sort of suspension layout.

The reach of the bike, when compared to the Firebird, has also been tweaked. The medium Mach 6 that I rode has a 15.81″ reach, which is almost an inch longer than the medium Firebird. This extra room makes that Mach 6 much more comfortable, and it comes with the added bonus of giving riders a bit more space to shift their weight fore and aft during technical descents.

Pivot Mach 6 Carbon Suspension, Blister Gear Review
Suspension of the Pivot Mach 6

On Trail 

On the trail, it’s immediately apparent that the Mach 6  likes to go fast. At lower speeds, the bike felt a bit sluggish, and the slack front end had a tendency to wander. The front also feels somewhat tall, so right away it’s apparent that the bike wants to go down hills—preferably steep ones.

On the way up, the dw link did its thing, which is to say it didn’t do a whole lot. Even with the rear shock in “descend,” the Mach 6 still pedaled pretty well. It’s no XC bike, but it’ll go uphill when needed, and when you need to put some power down, most of that power is going to your rear wheel rather than your rear shock.

But the down is clearly where this bike shines. It’ll plow through chunder while still retaining a feeling of maneuverability, which is pretty noteworthy. Lots of bikes can plow through rock gardens, and lots of other bikes like to play around and whip through corners, but there aren’t that many bikes that really like to do both. The Mach 6 comes in a little bit at the plow-bike end, but it straddles that line pretty well.

Part of the reason I think the Mach 6 retains some of that playfulness is due to its short-ish rear end that’s also stiff. Throwing this bike into corners revealed little if any flex from the frame.

After a few laps on this bike, it was clear that that faster you go, the more the bike will reward you. Conversely, the slower you go, the more the Mach 6 will start to shoot you sideways glances and suggest that maybe you should just go home and watch Dancing With The Stars. This bike wants to go fast all the time, and it doesn’t work right if you don’t oblige.

Pivot Mach 6, Blister Gear Review.
Noah on the Pivot Mach 6, Boulder City, Nevada.

A Quick Note about Wheel Size 

At 155mm travel, the Mach 6 falls into a category where bike companies are pretty evenly split between 26″ and 27.5.”  My “regular” bike (Specialized Enduro) has 26″ wheels, but the only 26″ wheeled bike I rode at Interbike was a DH bike. Everything else had either 27.5″ or 29″ wheels.

Is this a harbinger of the death of the 26″ wheel? Personally, I don’t think so. I still like 26″ wheels just fine, especially for places that have tighter trails, or if I’m looking for a more playful bike. But when I compare the 26″ wheels with the 27.5″ wheels, I honestly haven’t noticed a huge difference. The 26″ wheels corner a little quicker, and the 27.5″ wheels roll over bumps marginally better, but in my experience, the differences are fairly small.

So what I’m getting at is that, between 26″ and 27.5″ bikes, I’m not ready to declare a clear winner. I still like both in certain situations, and I’d be perfectly happy riding either on pretty much any given trail.

Bottom Line (For Now) 

Out of all the bikes I’ve ridden at Interbike, the Mach 6 is the one that gets me the most hot and bothered. It was the most rewarding to ride hard, and it’s an extremely capable bike in pretty much every category.

Depending on the parts spec, the Mach 6 can pretty easily be built to a competitive weight (mid to upper 20’s), but it’ll still hang just fine when the going gets rough. It wasn’t that long ago that a bike in this weight class that would pedal as efficiently as the Mach 6 does could be a viable cross country bike.

If you’re looking for something that’s slightly less skewed toward the descent, take a look at the Santa Cruz Bronson (check back later next week for the review). It pedals a bit better than the Mach 6, and while it doesn’t have that deep-seated yearning for high speed pillaging that the Mach 6 does, it does an awesome job at more reasonable trail speeds, and can still hang just fine if you feel like getting rad. The Devinci Troy is also worth noting—it’s not as efficient on the climbs, but it’s extremely maneuverable and does a great job of playing nicely in tighter spots while still being well mannered at high speeds.

But for anyone looking for a bike that’ll absolutely kill it on descents while still being entirely bearable on the climbs, the Mach 6 should be high on your list.

20 comments on “2014 Pivot Mach 6 Carbon”

    • Hey Ben – I didn’t measure the tire clearance, but I didn’t notice it to be tight at all. I know that tire clearance was an issue on the 27.5 Firebird since that was essentially just the 26″ version with a couple of tweaks to fit the larger wheels. The Mach 6 was designed around the 27.5″ wheels from the start, so it’s definitely intended to fit whatever tire you might want to run on it.

      • Thanks for that Noah. I was hoping you’d say that. I remember some bikes a few years ago with sub 17″ chainstays having tight tire clearance with 26″ wheels – I guess things have come a long way since then!

  1. Hey ben, i have a question for you. Im thinking to get a new ride i do some enduro trails and some times
    Xc not too much, so if u already tried the troy, bronson and mach 6 wich one would you recomennd??

    • Hey Alex,

      Having ridden all three of those bikes (albeit briefly), I think they’re all awesome bikes and you probably wouldn’t go wrong with any of them. That said, they each fall at a slightly different place on the spectrum.

      Out of those three, the Bronson is the most xc-ish. That’s not to say the Bronson can’t handle rough terrain, jumps, etc., but I thought it was the best climber and it wasn’t quite as stable at higher speeds. The Mach 6 is the other end of the spectrum; while it climbs pretty well, it’s clearly in it’s element when it’s going down something steep, fast, and rocky. The Troy falls somewhere in the middle – more playful than the Mach 6, and more stable at speed than the Bronson.

  2. Noah, so you thought the medium was the ideal size for you? I am also 5’9″ (31″ inseam) and weight about 170 give or take ready to ride. I am currently riding the 2013 Firebird 27.5 with a 50mm stem and 787mm Diety Blacklabel bars. I pretty comfortable although my medium Epic 29 XC bike has a much longer reach then the Firebird (14.97″). I am trying to decide if I would want to go with a small or medium Mach 6 frame. Comparing geometries even the small has a bit longer reach then the medium Firebird. You didn’t feel too stretched out on the Mach 6? Any idea what length stem was on the Mach 6?

    Thank you for any help you can provide.
    Ryan

    • Hey Ryan,

      Yeah – I’d suggest the medium unless you have a strong preference for smaller bikes. The Mach 6 is a bit longer than the Firebird, but not unreasonably so; it’s definitely still a medium. The Mach 6 is still not as long as something like my medium Specialized Enduro.

      I don’t recall the exact stem length on the Mach 6 I rode, but I don’t remember it being particularly long or short – if I were to wager a guess, I’d say it was somewhere in the 60mm ballpark.

      Compared to most of the current crop of ~150mm travel bikes, I’d say the sizing of the Mach 6 feels average-ish. When I get back on a Firebird now, it feels really short to me.

      hope that helps!

  3. Hey Noah,

    Great review,I am about to purchase a mach 6, but cannot decide what size to get. I am 5″10,5 75kg. I took the large for a test last weekend and it was pretty good however it did feel a bit clunky. I have just sold my mach 5,7 c medium,it was also a great bike, I had a 50mm stem on it and it was great but the front wheel use to lift on steep technical climbs. I am thinking that as the mach 6 has a longer top tube it will be a bit. Morer comfortable, my concern is that with the slacker seat post angle at full extension I might be further back over the back wheel which will make it really tough to ride steep technical climbs……what are your thoughts??

    • Hey Mark,

      I think your reasoning sounds about right. Keep in mind that both the top tube and the chain stays on the medium Mach 6 are a bit longer than on your medium 5.7. But you could probably go either way on the Mach 6 sizing – the large might help you out a bit in some situations, but at the cost of being a big bike to move around. You might find the front end lifting from time to time on the medium, but it’ll be easier to throw around. If you’re like me, it’d be one of those things where you’re happy with your decision on about 50% of the rides, and regretting it on the other 50%. I’d just look at what you want to prioritize and make the call – want more of a light duty freerider? Go medium. Want an all day trail bike? Maybe lean towards the large. I don’t think you’ll go horribly wrong either way.

  4. Noah,

    I’m a rocky mountain and front range Colorade rider. I have an XC race rig, and I’m about to sell my Mach5.7C (after previosuly owning a Mach 5 Alu). I need to plug-in an all mountain rig that can pedal efficiently all day at high apline and also allow me to have fun in Fruita/Moab. In your opinion, how different a machine is the Mach 6 from the Mach 5.7? What I’m really getting at here is pedaling compliance/efficieny. It’s a tough question, but I appreciate any insight!

    Alan

    • Hey Alan,

      I’ve only spent a very little bit of time on the 5.7, but I rode it back to back with the Mach 6. My initial reaction was that the 5.7 felt like a much smaller bike – shorter in the top tube, steeper head angle, shorter wheelbase, etc. This all made it feel less aggressive (which I admit is a somewhat vague and overused term to describe a bike).

      Suspension wise, they both seemed to pedal quite well. I didn’t have time to really play with the suspension setup on either bike and get the pedaling / compliance balance dialed, but I certainly wouldn’t hesitate to take a Mach 6 on longer jaunts in the alpine – even with quick “seat of the pants” suspension settings, the Mach 6 still pedaled pretty well.

  5. Hi, I read your review of the Pivot Mach 6 and thought it insightful. I have some questions however. I currently have a 2009 Specialized Elite that I bought as a leftover in 2010. It has served me well but as of late the chain stay keeps breaking in the same place. I’ve replaced it the first time and repaired it the second and it just broke again so I think it’s time for a new bike. I am 5’10 and about 240# with a 32″ inseam. I want a heavy duty bike that can handle my weight. I Just finished demoing a medium Pivot Mach 429 and I really liked it but I need more suspension travel. I used every bit of it on the 429. The “expert” at the bike shop told me I needed medium but it felt like I was riding one of those little clown bikes. lol. I am currently demoing a large Santa Cruz Bronson. I like it also but it doesn’t seem as refined as the Pivot. What is your opinion on that? What size bike should a person of my size be riding? I hear a lot of terms like cross country, endure, freeride, trail bike thrown around in the mtb community but I’m not really sure of the differences. Which type is the most heavy duty that could handle the pounding a person of my size would give it? Thanks for taking the time to read my email Kenny

  6. Hi Kenny,

    To start with your last question, the different labels that people and bike companies put on different bikes relate to the intended use of the bike, but in a more practical sense, they relate to how stout the frame and parts are generally going to be. So a cross country bike is usually built with going uphill fast as the primary goal, which means it’ll generally be pretty light (and thus fragile). A freeride bike, on the other hand, is usually built to withstand jumps and rougher terrain, so it’ll usually have more travel and heavier duty parts than an XC bike. An enduro bike often will have similar travel to some of the freeride bikes, but is theoretically designed with racing in mind, so it might have some lighter weight parts. Keep in mind that these are all just labels that people, and more specifically, marketing departments like to use to sell bikes, so there’s a healthy amount of B.S. sprinkled in there.

    Rather than get caught up in those labels, I’d suggest deciding 1) roughly how much travel you want (more = better for going down, less = better for going up), 2) how much you really care about weight (generally, when price stays equal, more weight = more durable), and 3) how much you want to spend (less weight = more money).

    As to your size question, at 5’10” you’d probably be fine on either a medium or a large; go with whatever you’re comfortable on. Keep in mind that not every medium is going to be the same size; a medium Mach 6 isn’t necessarily going to be the same size as a medium Bronson. Also keep in mind that something that feels comfortable on a parking lot test ride might feel less comfortable after sitting on it for a few hours.

    Comparing the Mach 6 to the Bronson, I’d say the Mach 6 is a bit burlier, and handles rough terrain and steep descents a bit better. I wouldn’t necessarily say its less refined, it’s just designed with a slightly different set of goals in mind.

    Since you’re a big guy and seem to be punishing your equipment, you might want to look at something that’s built a little heavier than the Bronson or the Mach 6. Sure, those are both awesome bikes that can take some abuse, but they’re also both fairly light bikes and they’ll probably start to show signs of wear quicker than something that’s heavier and burlier. If you’re looking for something that’ll last you a while, I’d look at something that’s a bit more stout – that means more weight to haul uphill, but it’ll hold up better in the long run. I’d probably look at (in no particular order) a GT Force, Knolly Warden, Kona Process 134 or 153, Turner Burner, or a Transition Covert.

    Hope that helps

  7. Just a question looking at buy a pivot m6 I’m 6″4 and took a large for a ride around the block and it felt not to bad.. Just wondering if I should get an extra large for my height?

    Thanks heaps

  8. I bought a Mach 6 back in 2014. It’s been a great bike for riding coastal BC tech. It’s a great one-bike-to-rule-them-all solution. Burly enough to tackle anything beyond a full-on DH track and efficient enough to hang with trail bikes on less demanding terrain.

    The geo means:

    – decent sized eff TT for seated pedaling
    – reasonable WB for maneuvering in the woods
    – high enough BB for pedaling through tech without thinking about your feet all the time

    The rear suspension has been silent and trouble free for 3 seasons [~7 months a year] without any service.

    All in all a sweet bike I plan to keep for a long while yet.

  9. Noah:

    Nice Mach-6 review. I own a 26″ Mach 5.7 and it is a great bike, but the Mach-6 must be still better. What do you think about the “new” 2017 12x148mm boosted Mach-6..? Pivot has made a lot of changes to improve that bike and I am really tempted to get one. At 5’11” should I take the “L” frame…?
    Thanks
    Raf

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