I was wondering if anyone had tried a coil shock on their Orange Five or similar. Or indeed what anyones experience of coil shocks compared to modern air units is like for XC? Because i'm pretty downwards-oriented I think it may be better for my hypothetical XC bike. Any views?

theres a couple of people running cane creek double barrels on 5 apparently…..

Coil shocks give a more constant smooth stroke with little or no ramp up.
They are going to take more abuse than an air but to be honest if you have something like an rp23 on a five then why would you want a coil on there?

A nice coil shock with a Ti spring – why not?

I've never had my own full sus before, so I don't really know what its like in the long term. I much prefer coil forks to air despite the weight penalty and was wonderng if a coil shock would be ok for an XC bike. A CCDB looks a bit complicated for me frankly (I like my bikes simple and problem free because I prefer them on the trail than in the workshop). A ti-sprung Van R was what I was thinking of really.

I have a Vanilla RC for my Heckler when it's in heavy duty mode. Great stuff.

I ran a DHX5 Coil on my heckler for a couple of months and found it superb, especially on the downs. I used to run it with a slightly lighter spring for that softer feel, felt more planted. swapped it out for a Float R and if anything the float feels more bottomless due to the ramp spring curve but does not give as much small bumb response. If you can live with the weight penalty (700g) then go for the coil. There's not as much weight saving as stated with Ti springs either, it's about 150g depending on shock size