Ok, this is bugging me. Always ridden hardtails and free of neck pain. Recently picked up a short travel full sus frame. Built up with my hardtail parts. Geometry is pretty similar. But really suffering with acute neck pain after 30 mins. I’ve messed around with stem and bar lengths to ensure seat to stem and seat to bar tips is the same as my hardtail, with no joy. I’ve tried another fork with longer steerer to raise the front end a wee bit. No joy.

Seems odd to me, so the key variables are the frame geo (and it’s a tiny bit longer/taller than my hardtail) and the bounce! Rebuilt my hardtail and rode a couple of hours pain free.

I’d like to try the full sus but really struggling. Any suggestions, apart from ditching?

going faster on the FS bike, sat down more so more shock going up and down your spine?

Are you taking sag into account when you’re comparing the geometry?

Geometry is pretty similar.

This.

Pretty similar but not exact, and on a FS the BB will be higher so you’ll be sat higher (have you lifted your bar by the difference?).

Thanks. I’ve lifted the front by ‘about’ the difference. Not getting any backache, but guess i’m sitting more, so hadn’t realised that so may be aggravating my neck. Have tried to take sag into account, it’s only 60mm travel so not huge!

Fwiw, have ridden a goodly number of hardtails over the years, and can only remember once getting neck pain, and that was with a Dean softail with a v bouncy Cane Creek shock that was quite long.