Just changing the travel on some new Reba's, easy to do, but there's no oil in the air side, plenty of grease, so should I add some oil while it's all apart? I have the volumes for top and bottom, the only thing I'm not sure about is where you add the oil in the top section, do you add it once it's all assembled or does it go inbetween, or under, the upper seal, the manuals and guides on the net doesn't make it clear??

Thanks

There shouldn't really be oil in the top air section on them? Sometimes a dash to fit ontop of the air piston to work as lube, but that's about it.
15ml in the bottom of each leg, just squirt some in when you have the lowers half on.
If you do want to put some in the top, just add it when they're back together before you put the top cap on.

I changed the travel on my forks at the weekend using PeterPoddy's guide.

He suggests covering everything in oil, especially the air seals, with 5ml of oil either side of the first seal. The forks have survived their first ride like – with a mere 2000ft of descending last night 8)

https://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B1AoGIWBz4H1M2E5ZTc0MTItNjM4NS00YjBiLWEwZDgtMjEyYTQ5NWZlMjc5&hl=en

Ah, ok, I must be reading the manual wrong … actually yeah, just going through the manual again and there's another column for the 'air' side that just states grease and the small amount of oil in the lowers 😳 … thanks!

There shouldn't really be oil in the top air section on them

Yes there should! To keep the seals lubed! 🙂

I always add 5-10cc of oil above and below the main air piston in the spring side. Clean the grease out, use 15wt oil (Preferable) or whatever you have to hand. Car engine oil will do fine. 🙂

I do as well, but according to the ATG & Fishers when I did my training on them, there shouldn't be, just greased on assembly, although having just looked at the SRAM site, they do advise 3-5ml. Must update my info. I usually use wet lube, but anything that's O ring safe is fine, so use fork oil if you've already got that out.

although having just looked at the SRAM site, they do advise 3-5ml

That's where I got my info from. I can't believe Fisher's don't lube them TBH! That's just crazy. The difference in sensitivity on a freshlsy serviced set of air RS forks is quite noticeable. Keeping the seals lubed is essential, surely? And grease will just be pushed out of the way fairly quickly whereas oil will always run back to the seals……

Mmm, that's got me thinking now, maybe I will add some oil in the top section, what you say about the grease being pushed out the way makes sense, it's not going to run back down it'll stay where it's pushed too.

Rockshox have changed their recommendation to grease on the newer reba's air pistons, at least based on their manuals.

I still use 15wt for the same reasons peter.

Look at my guide Crispin linke to above. Put 5cc into the air chamber, inset the main piton, and put 5cc in below it, before reinstalling the bottom plug. Honestly, it works perfectly. 🙂

I actually bought some ver cheap air Recons a while back that were as dry as Ghandis sandals inside when I opened them up, and felt terrible to use (Hence the cheapness) This might explain why, if they're only greasing them on assembly. I serviced them, and then made £55 profit on them. They were buttery smooth and in prefect nick for the new user. 🙂

SO – got a link mate? 🙂

The sram website appears to be buggering about at the mo, but its in the summary table for oil volumes in the 2010 technical manual that I've downloaded from the tech support pages.

EDIT: its back now – Page 7 of this doc. http://www.sram.com/_media/pdf/rockshox/dealers/TM_MY10.pdf

Actually, I've made a mistake – I don't use 15wt fork oil (although I used too), I use a fully synthetic motor oil. I use that for the semi bath too.

FWIW, the Reba SL's I bought late last year on the classifieds were pretty dry too. Although they'd been through two previous owners they were virtually new condition and they clearly hadn't been lubed properly during assembly. The wiper rings were almost completly dry, and hadn't even been wetted. They worked rather better after I'd been at them. 🙂

I actually bought some ver cheap air Recons a while back that were as dry as Ghandis sandals inside when I opened them up, and felt terrible to use (Hence the cheapness)

Bit of a long shot, I've got a pair of cheapy recons(327's) on my Sanderson, pulled them apart and serviced them, but I'm now getting what is referred to as "hydrolock" where the damping oil is leaking passed the inner o ring seal around the damping shaft and into the bottom of the fork.

Does anyone know what size this o ring is and where to get them from?

It may not be seal failure. If you've just serviced them, you may have over-filled them in error.

Sonor, I started a thread on this, ohh, must be a year ago or more now. I'll have a look for it….

Have a read here – http://www.singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/pikes-leaking-damping-oil

This is the important bit though –

The inner seal (on the base plug at the bottom of the damping leg, that the shaft slides through) is VERY close to 3.53mm cross section by 12.29mm internal diameter. That's a tiny bit bigger than the original, with a slightly fatter x-section. Once fitted it feels a bit tighter than the one I removed.

For the outer seal I ordered 3 sizes to try them out –

2.62 x 22.23
2.50 x 23.50
2.50 x 23.00

I can't remember which one is in there offhand, but they all seemed pretty much identical once fitted.

I got my O rings from simplybearings.co.uk, you just order them by size

Does that help? 🙂

Thanks Peter, you are a gentlemen, sir.

No problem. I hate it that this sort of sevice info is so hard to get hold of. Servicing is really a bloody easy thing to do, but 'those in the know' like to keep it a secret and tell us we need to spend silly amounts of money on tiny little parts that they've pulled of a shelf somewhere, and quadrupled the price before they sell onto us. Fork and shock spares are a case in point. O rings, bushes, oil seals and oil can all be had for a fraction of what Fox or RS will sell them for, you've just gotta dig about a bit deeper for the info, or find it out for yourself…. 🙂

Just thinking about upping the travel on my 2009 REBA RACE if possible, they came from Merlin with 2 spacers in the bag with them. Anyone know if they can be upped from the 100mm they currently are? They are the standard QR Race.

Quite possibly but you wont know until you open them up. IIRC my Reba's, which were not OEM, came with three spacers. One in the actual fork itself and two spares in the box.

What travel are they at now? You'll need to strip them down & take spacers out to add travel. Easy job, step by step instructions on Sram's website

If they are like my Reba's you will need to open them up and remove the plastic spacer attached to the shaft on the air side of the fork. My forks are from 2005, so when i removed the spacer the travel only increased by 15mm to 115mm, I think it's 120mm max on newer reba's these days.

Ill have a look inside and see where i get to, good guide above so ill follow.

cheers

Peter, funny you should mention the whole seals thing, I was only just advising a customer that he didn't need a full MoCo/damper seal kit to fix the leak out the top of the MoCo adjusters. £5 instead of an RRP of £16.99 is a fair saving.
I think the main costs of the damper service kit is bolt, bottom out stops, glide/piston ring plus the crush washers.
The trade price doesn't give a huge margin either (at my price).
I always try to be as open as possible with advice, there's a really minimal mark up on any seals I've sourced or had made specifically to solve issues with any units that the manufacturers seal kits do not cover.