Hope this is correct:
Rising rate is the same as progressive rate and means that as the suspension moves through its travel, progressively more force is needed at the wheel to compress the suspension, i.e. the suspension 'ramps up' or gets harder to compress. This also translates to 'resists bottoming out'.
Falling rate is the same as digressive rate and is simply the reverse of the above. The force needed to compress the shock the same amount is less at the end of the travel than it is at the begining, i.e. the bigger the impact the more likely you are to bottom out the suspension.
The leverage ratio indicates which of the above is happening so for example moving from a leverage ratio of 3:1 (three inches of wheel movement to one inch of shock movement) to 2:1 is an example of progressive or rising rate and vice versa.
BIGMAN is indicating that the Five has a digressive or falling rate (the graphs on the Linkage Software you can get over the internet confirm this.) This means you do indeed need more HSC on a linear coil in order to resist bottom out. It might be like this however because it was designed to run an air spring, which is inherently rising rate itself (this is independent of the suspension leverage).
Psychie, aren't you riding a Helius AM? The Linkage software shows that the AM has an initial falling rate for the first 40mm or so, making it very supple in the initial part of the travel, but after that, it become quite sharply rising rate. The rate of change is much more pronounced that that of the Orange Five (although don't forget they are going the opposite way).
To illustrate, the Five's leverage ratio starts off at 2.8:1 and finishes at 2.9:1. The Helius starts at 3.3:1 and finishes at around 2.5:1
If you are on an AM, that would mean you need to dial off far more HSC and on the Five, as BIGMAN says, you need to add it.
And by the way, the CCDB works very well on the AM.
