Canyon Spectral:ON CFR LTD review

The Canyon Spectral:ON range now covers a fairly broad range of price points, aside this showcase blingmobile here.

The entry point is the Canyon Spectral:ON CF7, from £4,799 with 150mm RockShox Lyrik Select Fork and claimed weight of 23.4kg. Hope up a few models and you hit the Spectral:ON CFR, from £8,199 with 150mm Fox 36 Factory fork, and a claimed weight of 22.75kg.

In time, you should be able to select your Spectral:ON comes with a choice of two batteries: the 720Wh or 900Wh. With 720Wh you’ll get a lighter bike at the expense of a bit of range.

A Maxxis Assegai at the front and Minion DHR at the back are paired with carbon fibre DT Swiss HXC1501 ebike specific mixed wheelsize mullet wheels. A Fizik Terra Aidon X5 saddle on a SRAM AXS dropper (150mm on this size medium, 125mm on a small, and 170mm on larger sizes) gives you somewhere to perch.

The only own-brand items here are the integrated Canyon:ON CP12 bar and stem with Canyon Lock-On grips.

Build notes

Away from the virtually infinite fiddling that’s available via the electronics, this bike feels very ‘closed system’. It is what it is, and there’s not an awful lot of room for structural fiddling, fettling, or adjustment.

The clearances around the chainring and chainstay are super tight – you couldn’t have a smaller chainring or your chain would hit the chainstay, and a larger chainring is likely going to foul the body of the bike.

If you’re buying this model, you’re already wedded to the Flight Attendant/AXS system, so this isn’t likely an issue, but it’s perhaps something to note if you’re thinking longer term with other models about what gearing options might be open to you.

It’s a closed system with the cockpit too. The integrated bar and stem with wiring running through it mean that should you wish to swap your bar it’s quite a job, and you’ll need to invest in a mount for the Shimano Steps display. You’ll also need to watch your light mounts if you’re going night riding – the tapered and angled space on the bars won’t play well with some clamps.

Oh, and watch out for the Torx bolts on the headset cap, stem and seatpost clamp – don’t get caught out with a multitool that won’t attend to them.

The Flight Attendant system is easy enough to set up, though make sure your crank sensor is on the left/non drive side – mine was curiously in the right-hand side on arrival and caused me no end of head scratching until this error was spotted.

You’ll also want a nice slim-ended shock pump, as the more bulbous ones (including the one provided with the bike) almost foul the Flight Attendant element of the shock, making it difficult (but not impossible) to get your pump on and off without letting out a load of air.

Between AXS, flight Attendant and the fact it’s an eMTB, there are a lot of batteries. The pedal sensor contains a AAA battery and the AXS Shifter and AXS Dropper actuator contain a CR2032 watch battery. That’s three batteries. Then there are SRAM AXS batteries on the fork, shock, derailleur and dropper. Seven. Plus the bike itself: eight.

The reality is though that once you’ve charged everything up for your initial ride, it’s only the big battery in the downtube that needs frequent attention.

It’s still worth being disciplined about charging the AXS batteries up on rotation, or you’ll find yourself trapped at home with a series of batteries to charge rather than heading out for a ride. Use the app to keep an eye on battery life. Maybe employ a battery butler to take care of it all for you.

The main battery is removable, but it’s quite a faff so you’ll want to charge the bike with the battery still in it.

The Shimano power connector is streets ahead of the Bosch version – it’s a nice clean head without too many pokey bits, and a magnet to help clunk things into place. However, its position on the Canyon Spectral:ON is quite tight. For charging, it’s quite easy to get the connectors in place, however to connect the bike up to the battery again afterwards lacks the reassuring ‘thunk’ I’m looking for. Possibly my connector cable had been cut a bit long, but it seemed to push the head and attached cover away from the bike rather than neatly fitting together. I did a fair amount of trying to reroute the cable around the battery and motor within the confines of the cover, but ultimately nothing made it sit really neatly. The cover is mostly aesthetic, but it’s annoying to have unnecessary faff to deal with.

There’s a little rubber mud flap to keep the worst of the muck out of your linkage. This seemed to work pretty well, but depending on the kind of mud/soils you’re dealing with you may find it makes getting in there to clean properly a bit tricky. I’d keep an eye on this area if it were my bike, and check that things weren’t building up or grinding over time, under cover of the flap.

On the trail

Riding the Canyon Spectral:ON CFR LTD, you are going to want good shorts. If the saddle doesn’t suit you, you’ll want to swap it. You should probably buy some chamois cream too. Because unless you’re descending, you’re never going to need to stand up.

The ride position is balanced and the traction is great – you just sit and spin your way up and over everything. Maybe pull your chin a bit closer to the bars on the odd obstacle. But otherwise, you just keep pedalling, and it keeps going.

With its full carbon fibre frame and full fat battery options, the Canyon is aimed at both pedalling and plummeting – getting in as many trails as possible. The Flight Attendant set up means you can just get on with riding, with barely a thought for anything other than which gear you are in and the occasional shift of assist mode.

Despite its carbon fibre frame (and in this instance, the smaller of the possible battery options), it is still a fairly weighty bike compared to one without a battery. For this reason, in common with every other eMTB I have ridden, I wouldn’t ride it ‘at my limits’ where I would ride standard bike, regardless of the fact that it is probably capable of such.

On the steepest lines and loosest of turns, I find that the weight of the bike exposes the flaws in my riding technique and leaves me feeling like I am being dragged and pulled rather than feeling like I am in control.

On lean-in turns I felt I lacked confidence. I had thought it might be the tyres, but as they’re the same as the Canyon Torque that I loved so much (albeit the Torque was a full 29er), I think it’s the extra weight of the bike making me feel like I’ll wash out rather than stay in control. It would have been nice to be able to see if tweaking the cockpit made any difference on this front too – it works out as a 50mm stem.

Another reason I’d have like to swap the bar and stem is that I found that riding this bike gave me quite a lot of arm fatigue. I swapped the grips out for something a little softer than the stock option, and this seemed to help a little, however the integrated carbon bar arrangement stopped me exploring this further. I do think that perhaps are you very a slightly shorter stem and more compliant bar would improve the overall feel of this bike.

It might look cool but I’m not sold on this integrated bar set up, it feels to me like it adds unnecessary barrier to swapping out or adjusting your position. As something which can affect a bike quite considerably, I’d rather have something less proprietary here.

Fun time

However away from the steepest of steeps and limits of my abilities, this bike is plenty of fun. It is very well balanced and there is never any sensation of the front wheel lifting on climbs, and traction is excellent.

It is an impressively agile bike – especially so for an eMTB – and feels respectfully playful for something of its weight.

On less precipitous descents I found myself really flying along, especially on straight-line flat-out trails with more occasional obstacles, I could really let rip. It’s one of the jumpier eMTBs I’ve ridden, and I felt more confident riding drops and getting air on it than I have on other eMTBs.

Lecky

This bike has a lot of electronics going on, and I’ve been wrestling with how I feel about it. Yes, the SRAM AXS shifting is effortless. Yes, the Flight Attendant means you never ride down a descent with your shock locked out. But do they add that much to my ride? For me, they’re nice to have, but not really needed. Like heated seats and parking sensors, I’d be glad to have them on a car if it happened to come with them, but I can’t see myself forking out the extra to have them added.

I think this Canyon Spectral:ON CFR LTD is the bike for the person who buys the heated seats, the metallic paint, and the panoramic sunroof – you have the extras because you can. And, if you’re already looking at the CFR, there’s only an extra £100 in it to get the electronics of the CFR LTD, so why wouldn’t you?

Overall

I’ve already said I wouldn’t choose to ride this bike at the limits of my ability – nor would I choose to ride any big-batteried (weighty) eMTB in such places.

But I would happily take this bike to ride laps of trails I know, or feel pretty confident I’ve got the skills for. I wouldn’t feel like I needed a wheels on the ground trail all the way, and in that respect it’s a real step up from other eMTBs I’ve ridden.

It’s got enough oomph and battery to it that in a bike park setting I think my body (and especially my arms) would be worn out long before the charge ran low.

Out on the pedally trail, it makes longer rides a breeze, but isn’t such a beast that you lose the playful side of riding. If you want more assist than a low-fat eMTB, but want some agile handling and a bike that feels like it has some pop, then the Canyon Spectral:ON CFR is well worth a look.