Hi,

I’ve got some new Suntour Epicon X1 Lite forks (100-150mm travel) on the way to me, and was wondering whether to strip and rebuild them with new oil as soon as I get them. I’ve heard “Not enough oil in the forks from factory, wore stanchions instantly” a few times about Fox forks (Though I have no idea if it’s a common problem with all makes) and as the forks I’m getting are the 2012 model they’ve probably been sitting in a warehouse for quite some time, which won’t exactly help. And the oil in them will probably be cheap stuff anyway. So any advice would be great, please.

If they do need rebuilding etc. What wattage of oil should I use? I’m about 75kg, ride XC and will have the forks set to 120mm if that helps. I’ll be using motorbike fork oil, I’m not getting ripped off by mtb prices.

Cheers

You would be much better off letting the forks bed in first, so that the oil in there is contaminated from manufacturing byproducts.
And then change it.
By changing the oil yourself on new forks you do risk the hazard of invalidating your warranty mind.

Relax. It will all be fine.

Never bothered on a new fork and never had an issue
I do tend to do a basic seal and oil service twice a year though
As I like fox fork and don’t want to pay for a new csu

No reason to replace it, but sometimes forks go out with less oil in than they should (my Revs had next to none in the lowers). And no real way to check other than dropping the oil

I recently bought some cheap marzocchi marathon r’s, i cracked them open after a week to extend the travel and they had far too much oil in. Left the right amount in a this made them handle a lot better and left me spare oil for a couple of services. They might be cheap and a bit heavy, but they slash all over the rebas they replaced.

Cheers for all the replies, I’ll take ’em apart to check the oil level but keep that oil, and after a few rides I’ll replace it with new stuff. I’m not worried about the warranty, I don’t think I’d have much chance with that anyway as they’re end of line being sold off cheap.

Which Wattage of oil should I use when I get round to needing it? I’m thinking 5W, as I shouldn’t need anything heavy.

Hi Nixon, regardless of being discounted and end of line, you still have warranty cover.