Adding oil to the spring leg makes it more progressive which compensates (to some degree) for the lack of compression damping by making it ramp up sooner and not wallow about in the middle so much, but at the expense of some travel and possibly bump absorbing capability.
The damper fix changes the damper to provide a bit more comrpession damping in the right place, and prop the fork up a bit and allow you to keep the spring rate as intended, although I have a feeling there may have been minor tweaks there too in later forks.
So it sa bit of both, but consensus seems to be that it’s better fixed in the damper than the spring leg.
Whether you prefer the feel of the original setup, original damper with spring rate adjustment, or adjusted damper with original spring is entirely personal preference though.
I have a feeling a lot of people are slating these forks because of what they have read rather than actually ‘feeling’ a problem out on the trails, and I think very few have actually had a proper go at tuning their ‘problems’ out.
Really want to have a go on an Avalanche’d up set to see how they perform though 🙂
I had to opposite problem with some old first gen 36’s in that the spring rate ramped up too quickly and wouldn’t use the last 30mm of travel and got a bit too firm too soon on bigger hits, I cut down the air push rod and reposition the piston cap to give a tiny bit more volume in the spring to make it a bit more linear and then added some more compression to compensate in the damper, totally transformed them tbh, still ramps up nicely at the end but get a lot more useful travel and not too wallowy with the extra compression adjustment.
