Even if the golden-orange anodisation and the rough welding beads are pleasing to the eye, the technical look of the Burner makes it immediately clear: this bike wants to be ridden. Turner is particularly proud of the fact that the bike is completely "Made in the USA", from design to frame production. Numerous CNC-milled parts and Turner's typical greaseable friction bearings are included. The Burner also uses a DW-Link rear triangle. In this case, however, with indirect damper linkage and a vertical damper. All in all, this results in a very stiff frame, but at over three kilos it is no lightweight either. You can tell immediately where the Turner Burner was developed and how it is ridden. With its origins in Southern California, it is made for long, moderate fireroad climbs followed by technical trails.
The geometry and rear suspension kinematics are neutral. They fit well for an all-mountain bike. Unfortunately, the fitted shock, which has too soft a compression damping and only weak platform damping, causes the rear end to sag on the climbs, somewhat limiting the otherwise great all-round characteristics of the Turners. Climbing ability suffers and it bobs when pedalling out of the saddle. For our trail conditions, you should order a different basic shock setting or choose the optional upgrade to a Cane Creek inline shock. The all-mountain bike delivered by the European distributor with a rather gravity-heavy spec (DH tyres at the front and a very short stem) was unable to live up to its all-rounder potential in the test.
Test summary of the Turner Burner 275
Very stiff all-mountain "Made in the USA" with sophisticated kinematics, great details and technical looks. The overly soft basic shock setting (ex works) reduces versatility and uphill performance. Otherwise, the Turner Burner would be a great bike.
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