Have you had a chance to ride it yet? I'd love a review as I'm thinking of the exact same build

I've only had it out on XC rides so far thanks to lockdown so not given it the beans yet. Quality wise I really can't knock it considering the price, welds all look good and the alignment / fitment of components is all good. It feels like the money saved comes from the massive wait time (9 months despite being originally quoted 4) and the lack of attention to detail (He didnt leave clearance for a water bottle despite my attempts to make it clear that I needed one so he just didnt put mounts on without letting me know before delivery). All in all though if you're on a budget / want to prioritise spending on other areas I'd still definitely recommend one! If you've got any specific questions let me know

How does the coil perform with the rising leverage ratio of the rear swingarm?

Not had a chance to get out on it yet thanks to a mixture of work and the ol' rona. I'm hoping that between the progressive coil and the wide adjustment range the CC shock provides I can largely get it to feel how I'd like

I have a similar setup- a frame with a nearly identical rear suspension layout, and I've tried both the coil and air DBinline on it. My coil is also a progressive coil, but I couldn't get it to feel right. It wasn't bottoming out, but it felt like the rear would get hung up on larger square edged hits, or rather like halfway into its travel there was a compression "wall" I had to push through to feel plush. Like you, the snow mixed with the rona has kept me from putting very many rides on it. I would like to try a firmer spring with less preload, but the air inline with max spacers felt great right out of the box, so I haven't tried to tune the coil further.

I'm guilty of being a serial tinkerer so I'm willing to put in more time than would probably be considered sensible in order to get it feeling 'right'. We'll have to see how it goes once I've got some miles on it - out of interest how many turns of preload and what % sag were you running yours with?

Its harder to measure sag with a coil, but it was roughly 35%. I don't remember the number of turns, but it was probably "too many".

This is why I want to try a firmer coil.

That is awesome!!

I love those Marinos!

Nice clean build.

A well thought through build. Props.

Bike of the Day January 3, 2021!

Cheers!