It promises more aero, less weight, and so on. Some of the details, like the brake mounts, look great. But maybe it's hype right now, I should wait for independent reviews before buying one...
It looks to be better thought-out than most 3T bikes and it doesn't restrict you to a 1x drivetrain. However, there doesn't appear to be any compliance features built into the design, so I wouldn't consider one until there are some actual reviews that address this question. Granted, tires make a huge difference and if you're willing to run 45mm+ rubber, compliance in the frame doesn't matter as much, so depending on how you build it and the type of riding you intend to do, it may work great for you.
I had an exploro (was stolen recently) and absolutely loved it as both a gravel and road bike. To this day my favorite bike. This looks good and even better. I need to look what they did to the geometry (OP said stack height on the rm is higher?) hope not. One really nice change they made was the rear derailed hanger attached to the frame not the axle... huge, that was an awful design. Also they improved the seat post binder wedge (also an awful design on the exploro ... the only bike that you can destroy a frame by both over tightening and over loosening the seatpost!) it looks like they improved the seatpost as well with the ritchey mast (great that clamp was not the best) but i think it’s still the proprietary “aero” shape which. I think everyone should just go round... the aero seat post thing is stupid imho... that air is so dirty by the time it hits the post that it doesn’t do anything. Dying to check one of these out... on a willier Jenna now and not a huge fan of it (mostly fit)
Perhaps 3T have been a little ... ambitious with their engineering lately. Maybe they have to fight harder to be noticed when surrounded by bigger businesses with more resources. Personally, I'm a big fan of 1x, and I think the Exploro and Racemax look very clever, but on the other hand the last 3T seatpost I bought had an "innovative" design which was so annoying that I had to return it & get a refund. It can be good to push boundaries, but if everybody hates a feature like the derailleur hanger and 3T have to back down...
In the world of aero, everybody else seems to be working on tighter integration of handlebars (integrated stems, aero spacers, quirky cable routing, Canyon's Grail biplane, tri bikes with integrated drinks systems). I'm surprised that 3T didn't try anything ambitious with the Exploro handlebars. Maybe it was one risk too many? Or will there be an Exploro with exotic integrated steering in 2022 or 2024?
Am on something else now... but had generation 1 for several years and a lot of miles on some pretty harsh courses, some of the harshest in fact, two Kanzas but much gnarlier technical stuff. It was indeed stiff rather than compliant -- about as stiff as you can imagine on washboard corners frankly -- but this just wasn’t an issue at Kanza and really was just annoying for a few minutes here and there on the other stuff. Its raw speed easily made up for a couple seconds here and there taking it easy around corners... If you want to race the bike rather than cruise it, this is one of the best possible picks..... if you have big climbs where the low weight would be an advantage or long open windy sections where the aero would be a help there is no question this would be my pick over nearly anything else out there and especially the heavier bikes with compliance features. I don’t have to name them. The only real downsides to the first generation were annoyances, not deal breakers... the seat post clamp, the seat clamp itself and the hangar setup. And those are gone... The seat clamp mechanism was actually the silliest of these things, was a pain to adjust like 3T toothed ones always are... and it’s great it’s gone. The other two items were no big deal, just details that were kind of mentally troubling if you wanted a bike with perfect engineering... but in real life had no effect, if that makes sense. Anyway, 3T have now refined out all of that and apparently made it more aero. I’d say its at the very top of the heap with Allied, Open, Aspero and S-works Diverge (ok, I’m probably missing a couple, but please, no 21-pounders allowed on the list) , and among these if you want 2x, well, that leaves you with just this, Aspero, Diverge and maybe a couple less-known items. I’d say in terms of the sheer speed differences between these bikes, this and the aspero are fastest because of weight and aero. And the colors are now pretty awesome.
thumper...good points on it being a pure race bike...always found and still find it weird when i see people touring and bikepacking with it. Even though it has the "braze-ons" and capability of touring its so racy that i would not have done much touring with it (though i did when i had mine...was ok as a tourer, and a much better road bike). I raced almost everything with that thing, crits, gavel (IMHO, the best Kanza bike), road, dirt crits, great bike and as you said, worth the annoyances.
Since this year was a "mud year" at Unbound I can say this bike caused some extra suffering. The rear tire clearance meant that I had to stop probably 10 times to use my paint stick to removed impacted mud from that area (in addition to walking more than others in the real mud sections). But after the last mud bog I got into the clip-ons and was flying to the finish probably passed 30+ 200 riders (+ 100 100 riders??). I have to chalk that up to aero... because I'm pretty sure fitness had little to do with it. I hope to run it again in a dry year as I think this thing would have been perfect!
I'm not a fan of any of the press fit bottom bracket variants. I've had too many problems with creaks. With so many so called standards (PF30, BB30, OSBB, etc etc) it's expensive to have all the tools and it is likely parts will become a challenge... well that is unless one upgrades every 5 or 10 years and sells off the old bike. Food for thought...
