Pole's year of 2018 has been a blast. Pole invented and launched a new production method, set up a factory in Finland, launched two entirely new bikes and now presents a professional Enduro race team...
We sell quite a few to US. You can find people from Facebook group (the link to the is on the main website). Also our customer service have some good data. service@polebicycles.com
I'm not fan of the star ratings either. For example all the steep seat tube angled + plenty of AS bikes climb very well but then usually the enduro bikes are heavier than a XC bike and they need to lower the rating. Stars oversimplify too much. The upper eyelet is turned for two reasons. One is to fit bottle under and the other is to let the shock free of lateral loads.
We sell direct worldwide. The fork offsets are described for slow speed trail riding. The short offset gives more wheel flop. The high speed is already stable on each setup with our geometry.
We measure AS on this setup when designing the bike because it's the one the professionals are using on the race. Also on trail most of the pedaling is done on this gear. We want the AS to be on falling rate so that it wont affect too much on suspension. Also there is less wear on drivetrain. With 30/50 the AS is falling rate from 130% to 55% and on 30% SAG AS is 115% As a thumb rule: smaller on front and bigger on rear means more AS.
All Pole full suspension are short link four bar linkage and the lower link is concentric to bottom bracket. The leverage curve is progressive. Anti-squat has a falling curve to reduce pedal kickback. Around SAG, there is fair amount of anti-squat but the amount of anti-squat declines towards the ending stroke where there is no need dor support.
Looks like after the test that te shock clearance is good this way. We might not make an optional mount at all because we found out mounting shock this way helps the suspension. The shock does not get sideways load as it pivots (if necessary).