FAST Damper Tune half arsed unedited review

So as per my previous threads, after the debacle with my Pikes and Fisher/Giant I sent them off to TF tuned for a service and the FAST damper conversion. I promised a ride report after 1 week in wales, to let you guys know whether it was worth it.

I’ll refrain from saying that it’s amazing and that you should go out and buy it – I will just try to stick to a somewhat objective experience.

My first day of riding was at Antur Stiniog, I spent most of my time on the Red run trying to keep things the same so that I could dial the fork in. I weigh 174lb’s, TF Tuninings recommended settings were 70 PSI, Rebound 4 from fully closed, LSC 10 from fully open, HSC 10 from fully open and the fork came with 2 tokens installed. In regards to the tokens, TF Tuned stated that the damper upgrade would solve diving issues and that I wouldn’t have to run two tokens instead of the 1 that I was running previously – but that they were happy to install one for me to try out – so they did.

Car park – TF tunings settings gave me about 15 percent sag, fork felt much smoother and very damped.

First run – Fork felt great on the top of the red run, very supportive and had a very racey feel. However, further down it battered the shit out of me. I’d run this setup in a Boxxer if I was only doing a qualy and a race run in a day. High speed rebound felt a bit fast, like I was being kicked about when deeper in the stroke.

Second run – Dropped about 10 PSI, fork sat at 20 percent sag. Better, still kicking a bit deep in the stoke. Didn’t notice much difference in support.

Third run – Took a token out, upped the PSI a little to keep me at 20 percent. This was much better, the fork stopped kicking me in rock gardens. TF Tuned were of course right, this didn’t need an extra token. There is barely a perceptible difference in terms of support during low speed events, such as braking – there is loads of low speed compression support.

Forth run – backed off the HSC to fully open. Fork kind of felt like it was collapsing a little in it’s travel during the fist few hits in rock gardens.

5th/6th/7th run – backed off HSC a few clicks at a time, settled on five from fully open. Reduced a small but perceptible amount of chatter but still kept enough support for my preferences, any more open and it felt like it was collapsing in rock gardens.

8th run – backed off LSC two clicks. Still felt really well supported – might revert back to 10.

9th run – added one click of low speed rebound compression to three from fully closed. Fork didn’t pack down – yet felt more composed on lower speed technical terrain, drops and jumps.

Results at the end of the day – great feeling fork but I’d never ridden at Antur Stiniog so couldn’t really compare it to anything else.

However, I did take it to Coed-Y-Brenin, a place that I have ridden for the past two decades fairly regularly. During the day a few things really stuck out:

1) I had more mid stroke support, this was really noticeable in some of the switchbacks at the bottom of some of the steeper descents. I felt like I had something to push against and could more confidently load up the front wheel, the front wheel also felt easier to lift into the air off trail features. In terms of resistance to bottom out, the fork only uses the last inch of its travel for really big hits – eg cased landings.

2) There is less feedback through the bars from high speed events, despite the stronger compression tune. My hands felt a lot less sore after a days riding at Coed-Y-Brenin than they usually do.

To sum it up, I think that if you’re getting your fork serviced then it’s worth the 110 quid extra for the upgrade. But keep in mind that you will have to be fairly patient and methodical with fork setup to really get the most from having the extra tuning options and that previous spring side settings (eg tokens) may not work for you any longer.

Your review reminds me of Rimmer’s Risk diary

Glad the upgrade was worth it mind, would like it for my Boxxers

😛

I wrote it in several minutes, if someone was paying me – I’d care about flow and grammar. As it stands, certain writers at Dirt get paid to write just as badly 😀

The fork is definitely better though, it’s hard to describe but the bike just feels better balanced and if it wasn’t so imperceptible as to potentially being a placebo, I swear that I’ve also got a better feeling for how much grip I have on the front when turning.

It’s not going to magically make you faster though, it just feels like the icing on the cake for what was already a good fork (when it wasn’t being warrantied).

what happened to this?

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/coil-conversion-for-the-pike

Glad it’s finally sorted, I know it’s been a mission to get this far.

Dirt wish they could write that coherently.

Actually, they dont – pretty clear they don’t give a shit

Thanks George and PMJ. 😀 Kimbers, the coil conversion is still on the cards – mostly out of curiosity – I mean it’s now better than my coil Lyrik was – would a coil mod be even more awesomes? 😀 It’s just that the damper blew, I warrantied it, it came back five weeks later without the updated seal head and consequently blew again. So I spent my budget on sorting the damper first.

Cheers, good to know there’s more options out there.

£300 😯

300? Where’d you get that from wrecker? 300 is about the cost of their own drop in open bath damper, not the Charger modification.

Mine came to 210 including the service! The service is around 95, which includes new seals.

Anyway, in comparison to the front I can now feel the rear shock spiking. I never noticed that before….so I think that’s testament to the fact that it does do what it says on the tin. So for someone who doesn’t service their own forks, I think it depends on whether you think 115+ quid extra is worth it for the extra adjustments or to improve aspects of the fork you’re not happy with. If you don’t think there is anything wrong with your fork, the high speed rebound setting etc, then I think it’s a toss up whether you should spend the money – as it’s a subtle upgrade in performance, it won’t be a totally new fork that will blow your mind.

Fox 34 is £300.
http://www.tftuned.com/service/81-fast-tuning-forks
They can FRO!

That’s a full open bath damper, customised for your weight and riding style etc. I still think that a custom damper with less adjustments is the way to go, and if I was going to spend 700-800 quid on a new fork. I’d buy a used Fox 34 or Yari and drop that in it. If you’re lighter or heavier than average, or more aggressive then the high speed rebound is never right.

If you have one of the brand new E16 Fox 34s, then it’s pretty pointless and a ridiculously expensive way of getting a decent fork.

TF Tuned FAST Suspension Upgrades and tuning are in addition to a standard service. This means your fork will get all the usual TFT love – new wipers seals, foams, o-rings, oils, bushing resizing if necessary and anything else it might need.

Means that the price actually isn’t as bad as you think if you’d prefer to buy a cheap chassis off fleabay or from Germany and get it setup right from the start.

That’s because the standard Pike conversion kit uses a lot of bits from the Charger damper.

The CO3 is a completely new, drop in cartridge, it’s an open bath system, much more like an Avalanche kit than the cheaper Pike conversion kit.

Any experience on the CO3 damper Hob Nob?

Still, there’s not much left of my original Charger damper – mostly the damper body that’s left. I got a massive bag of parts back with what seemed to be most of the important bits of the damper in it!

We’re not talking about upgrading a shit fork though are we? We are (seriously, it seems) talking about spending an extra £300 on an already high performance fork costing £750. Nobody will ever be able to convince me that the marginal (and it will be) improvement in performance is worth anywhere near that. £200 including a service is probably worthy of consideration but £300, no chance.

Early Fox 34’s were god awful weren’t they? Dampers eventually end up needing lots of parts replacing in them, which costs money and will bring the cost of overhauling it closer to the cost of dropping in a new damper.

If you have an early one, it’s still cheaper than buying a new fork, and it will probably work better than a new fork with a damping range designed to accommodate the manufacturers idea of an average rider.

Having said that, Mattocs are awesome value for money. So I’d be tempted by one of those if I had an ageing Fox 34 that needed a service.

It’s just an option isn’t it? I’d be happier to have a battered old chassis that’s not the coolest or newest thing on the bloc, but a damper that’s setup better for my weight.

An old 34 won’t be worth £300! You’d see as much performance improvement by selling it and buying a brand new pike, and it wouldn’t cost you £300.

New Pikes are 600+ quid aren’t they? I reckon it would be more expensive. As long as the stanchions are fine, the service that is included covers seals and bushings etc which would have it working like new.

Most people would be better served by a basic low speed compression adjustment, a narrow range of rebound adjustment and the shims set up for them by someone that knew what they were doing.

Has anyone tried one of these head to head with the avalanche stuff?

I’ve got a fast Co3 damper stuck in a set of 2010 Boxxers I got for £100 in the classifieds.

It rides great! So much better than the original motion control, but cheaper than the r2c2 damper upgrades would have been.

If i had known I might have waited for the charger damper upgrade instead, but i bought it about 2 months before they were announced.

Tom_W1987 – Member

Having said that, Mattocs are awesome value for money. So I’d be tempted by one of those if I had an ageing Fox 34 that needed a service.

Does the Mattoc actually work now? I had a go on one and it was lovely, reminded me of my old coil Lyrik but everyone I know who’s owned them has had serious bother (including one guy who now has 2 Mattocs- he complained about a ruined race so they sent him a spare, now he almost always has a working fork…)

wrecker – Member

We’re not talking about upgrading a shit fork though are we? We are (seriously, it seems) talking about spending an extra £300 on an already high performance fork costing £750.

If your Pike is working right, reliably, and how you want it to then yes. But they’ve proved a little highly strung, if you’re replacing an unreliable or broken damper it’s obviously different. And you might just not like the way it operates- performance isn’t a simple better/worse, there’s lots of room for taste (I’m not crazy about the charger damper personally, I preferred the old mission control…)

Just sell the pike and buy a lyrik, that’s an upgrade that well worth the cost to change.

My old man has a Lyrik RCT3 – the damping on the FAST Pike is better. It’s offered as an upgrade on the Lyrik as well.

The Pike to Lyrik upgrade is fairly pointless. Buy the Lyrik if you haven’t got a Pike – it’s main pluses are that it suffers a bit less from bushing bind, twists a little less and is a bit smoother off the top. Although the PUSH wiper seals and the SKF seal on the updated seal head have done a lot to close that gap. If I put a coil in my Pike, the only thing a stock Lyrik will do better is minimize bushing bind and twist.

I’d have only been able to get 200-250 quid for my Pikes as the lowers are pretty scratched up and it has an odd 46mm offset (specced by Giant). Would have been 400 quid minimum to upgrade to Lyriks for marginal improvement. Also, I like the 46mm offset a LOT on steep terrain. So if I ever do move to a Lyrik, it’s going to be some basterdized frankenfork with Lyrik lowers and my 46mm offset Pike CSU.

Heheh – rather looking forward to building a 46mm offset, coil and FAST damper equiped Pyrike. *laughs maniacally*