Ben Tests Out The BikeYoke Divine Dropper Post
BikeYoke is possibly not a name that springs to mind when considering upgrades for your mountain bike. However, the German brand has built a solid reputation over the years for making extremely well engineered components, including the popular Revive dropper post, and the super lightweight Divine SL we reviewed recently.
Joining those two models, the Divine post I’ve been riding for the past six months is the latest addition to the BikeYoke dropper family. It’s also the cheapest dropper in the lineup, but it certainly doesn’t skimp out on features, and that helps to make it stand out in a heavily saturated market.
A Bleedin’ Clever Design
From the outside the Divine looks very similar to most other all-black dropper posts out there, but it’s what’s on the inside that counts. A feature borrowed (and simplified) from its big brother the Revive is what sets it apart.
Inside the Divine features an ‘Auto Reset Function’, which automatically bleeds the hydraulic circuit of air with every full drop of the post. This helps to prevent the dreaded squish that can develop when air finds its way into the hydraulic circuit of the post. Rockshox Reverb users may be familiar with the feeling of their post sagging when they hop on their bike. The fix for this is usually a trip to the bike shop who may or may not have the tools or expertise to service and rebuild the post. This could mean sending the post to a third party for service, meaning more cost and more downtime.
Adjustable Travel
Another nifty feature of the Divine is the ability to shorten its total length by reducing the available travel. By clipping one of the four included travel reducers onto the piston shaft, you can reduce travel in 5mm increments up to 20mm. You will need to partially disassemble the post to get to that piston shaft, and the travel reduction procedure certainly isn’t as quick and easy as it on some of the latest e*thirteen and PNW dropper posts, but it’s still pretty straightforward.
This is an incredibly useful feature if your saddle height is lower than what can be achieved with a given dropper post and the length of your frame’s seat tube. Some frames also have a bend in the seat tube, or a suspension pivot that runs through the middle of it, which can limit how far the post will insert into the tube. Normally this would force you to buy a separate shorter travel post, but not so with the Divine. And if you did upgrade to a new frame with a shorter seat tube in the future, you can simply unclip and remove those spacers to return the post to its maximum travel. Neat!
By clipping one of the four included travel reducers onto the piston shaft, you can reduce travel in 5mm increments up to 20mm.
What Options We Got?
The Divine is available in 30.9mm and 31.6mm diameters and three travel lengths: 125mm, 160mm and 185mm. Total stack height is impressively low – the overall post lengths are 365mm (125mm drop), 435mm (160mm drop) and 485mm (185mm drop).
On test we have a 31.6mm post with 160mm of travel. In this configuration the Divine post weighs 517 grams. That’s thoroughly competitive when you compare it to a 150mm travel RockShox Reverb AXS (673g) and Fox Transfer (589g). There is also a titanium bolt upgrade kit available for the saddle clamp bolts that will shave off 20 grams off the overall weight.
The Divine is sold in Australia via MTB Direct without a remote for $565 AUD. The BikeYoke Triggy remote is sold separately for an additional $85 AUD. Alternatively, you can also order directly from the BikeYoke website.
The Triggy Remote
The standard Triggy is designed to pair with SRAM Matchmaker mounts, but there are clamps and adapters to allow fitment to Shimano I-Spec B, Shimano I-Spec II, Shimano I-Spec EV (yes, Shimano now has three different mount standards) as well as a good old-fashioned split bar clamp.
The Triggy is super neat and light at only 24 grams without clamp. The lever paddle has some nice Drillium™ going on and the overall feel is one of sturdiness and quality. It features a barrel adjuster for cable tension adjustment and can work with other brands droppers that may clamp the cable at the dropper end rather than the remote end.
Also available is the Triggy X remote ($99 AUD), which has an adjustable length lever paddle.
Installing The Divine
The 160mm Divine was a perfect fit in my Large size Trek Top Fuel 9.8. This post has an overall length of 466.2mm and I had no issues achieving my desired saddle height of 770mm.
The post was fairly straightforward to install, though my biggest gripe with the Divine is that the cable head is installed from the lever end and secured with a two-piece locking barrel at the post end, which is then attached to the base of the post. I struggle to see the benefit to this system over the much simpler alternative of routing the cable head from the post and clamping at the lever. It’s trickier to determine correct cable housing length and requires the use of a fiddly locking barrel that requires 2mm and 3mm hex keys to secure the cable. It also means the inner cable has to be cut to a very specific length above the housing so that correct tension is achieved when the cable is attached to the dropper actuator. Granted, BikeYoke do laser etch a nice guide on the base of the post to use as a guide for cutting the cable, but the grumpy mechanic in me just thinks there’d be fewer headaches if the cable was simply routed the other way.
My biggest gripe with the Divine is that the cable head is installed from the lever end and secured with a two-piece locking barrel at the post end, which is then attached to the base of the post.
The remote bar clamp is made of flexible plastic with a heat-treated stainless-steel band around the outside, so the clamp can easily be stretched open and then clamped around the bar without having to remove grips and brake levers. Interestingly, the clamp can also be used to mount a SRAM trigger shifter. This could come in handy in the event of a broken shifter mount on the trail, or allowing you to mount a SRAM trigger with a split mount rather than the standard slide on clamp mount that SRAM provides.
Adjustable Return Speed
The return speed of the Divine can be adjusted by altering the air pressure with a shock pump. Underneath the saddle rail clamp assembly is an air valve covered with a 10mm alloy cap. BikeYoke recommends running 250-350 psi, with lower pressures giving a slower return speed and a lighter feel at the lever, and higher pressures providing a faster return speed and a firmer feel at the lever.
Interestingly, BikeYoke mention that the Divine has a safety overload feature that allows the post to compress like a spring when it encounters a very hard impact. This feature protects the post internals from damage, similar to the blowoff function of modern forks and shocks when they’re hit with a big enough bump whilst locked out.
The saddle clamp assembly is secured by two T25mm torx bolts with a suggested max torque of 7nm. Personally, I’m not a huge fan of torx bolts on saddle rails clamps. They can be a bit awkward when adjusting saddle tilt – 4/5mm hex bolt that allows the use of a ball-end hex key for the initial stages of adjustment is much easier. This isn’t a big deal of course, more of a personal preference.
Silky-Smooth Performance
On the trail there is one word to describe the post’s performance – smooth! BikeYoke says the Divine isn’t quite as silky as the more expensive Revive, but it’s a small difference – you’d need both side-by-side to make that judgment. Dropping the post requires only the most delicate of touches from your derrière, the action is light and quick with no need to heavily squat or overly weight the saddle to initiate movement.
This was a marked difference when compared to the Bontrager Line Elite dropper that came stock on my Top Fuel 9.8. Whilst the Line Elite post is pretty smooth, its action is sluggish and requires more force to get the post moving. The Divine is also not sensitive to where weight is applied to the saddle to get the post moving. In my experience with the Bontrager and other cheaper posts fitted to bikes with slacker seat angles, the post will not drop unless the rider’s weight is shifted forward to push down on the saddle nose.
This speaks to the build quality of the Divine, as it doesn’t exhibit the same flex and binding under the rider’s weight. For reference, the actual seat angle on my 2020 Top Fuel is 68.5°. Despite this the Divine was smooth and responsive throughout the test. The return speed of the Divine is fast and has a reassuring clunk when it reaches full extension, not the loudest clunk but certainly loud enough to hear and be confident the post is where it needs to be.
Just like the more expensive Revive, the Divine gives you a supremely low stack height – so you can fit in more travel into the same amount of space.
Long-Term Durability
I’ve not experienced any issues at all with the Divine post I’ve been testing for the last six months. It has faultlessly dropped and raised on command and its smooth, light action has remained consistent. Side to side saddle play is minimal and on par with other high-end droppers like the Reverb and Transfer.
BikeYoke recommends a lower tube service every 100 hours of riding. It’s a straightforward process to remove the lower tube assembly and clean and re-grease the internals, and BikeYoke provides some handy videos on servicing on its website and YouTube channel. There’s also a suite of spare parts and rebuild kits available from BikeYoke, including replacement cable actuator mechanisms, saddle clamps, seals and glide pins. You can even buy the alloy outer tube separately, which is interchangeable between the 30.9mm and 31.6mm posts – handy if you want to swap frames and don’t want to buy a whole new dropper post.
Flow’s Verdict
If you’re looking for a high performance dropper post, the Divine should be on your list. It’s smooth as silk in its action and has given us zero issues throughout the test period. It isn’t quite as effortless to use as the Revive, but you’d really need both side-by-side to compare, and on the trail the difference is negligible.
As well as being over $100 cheaper, the Divine automatically bleeds its hydraulic circuit, whereas you have to perform that function manually on the Revive. Add in the ability to adjust the total travel, and the decision between the two is a no brainer in our opinion.
Compared to the competition, the Divine is cheaper and lighter than both the Fox Transfer and RockShox Reverb, and it’s also easier to service at home too. If BikeYoke could flip the cable orientation to make installation that much easier, then we reckon it’d have close to the perfect dropper post on the market.
Mo’ Flow Please!
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