Reading a few posts on short travel ‘fun’ full sussers, also the Rocket was supposed to have the elusive pop/fun thing. What is it shock or frame, perhaps both? Is it just a case of whacking up the rebound 🙂

I don’t know- sorry

Pop – what is it?

Fizzy drink for people from oop north

Does it come after a snap and crackle?

i have a rocket, it hasn’t gone pop yet

I’m guessing rebound is a bit low in the settings giving the bike a but more “spring” to make it a bit lively but without the “buck you over the bars” thing

I think it’s the result of a strongly progressive leverage ratio. This means that as you get deeper in the travel you’re pushing the spring further and thus moving the damper piston more quickly, so both the spring rate and compression damping increases. As the suspension rebounds the spring rate decreases towards zero travel and so too does the amount of rebound damping. If you had a non-progressive linkage but tweaked the air spring curve you could match the spring characteristics but you wouldn’t have the rebound damping decreasing as you come back out of the travel.

I think it’s that reduction in rebound damping caused by the linkage that gives the frame the feeling of pop. The peril with a design like this is that there’s a risk of setting the rebound too slow because of the pop and thus ending up stuck deep in the travel when the ground is rough.

pop larkin – Member
I don’t know- sorry

Well if he doesn’t know, there’s no hope!

I think it’s the result of a strongly progressive leverage ratio. This means that as you get deeper in the travel you’re pushing the spring further and thus moving the damper piston more quickly, so both the spring rate and compression damping increases. As the suspension rebounds the spring rate decreases towards zero travel and so too does the amount of rebound damping. If you had a non-progressive linkage but tweaked the air spring curve you could match the spring characteristics but you wouldn’t have the rebound damping decreasing as you come back out of the travel.

I think it’s that reduction in rebound damping caused by the linkage that gives the frame the feeling of pop. The peril with a design like this is that there’s a risk of setting the rebound too slow because of the pop and thus ending up stuck deep in the travel when the ground is rough.

Bull Shit Bingo anyone?
I think I have a full house

There was a bit of discussion on the Knolly thread
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/knolly-bikes-1

After riding loads of bikes, I’m not really any the wiser to what characteristics make up pop.

All I know is that my current bike has loads (Maverick ML7/5).
An Intense 5.5 I rode years ago (the one tested in Singletrack) had loads.
The Specialized bikes I’ve ridden have had very little.
The Bird Aeris I’m buying had enough.

Whatever it is I’d try to avoid it as it’ll eventually eat itself.

AlexSimon – yes read your review, sounds a nice bike. My Pitch sucks along the ground mostly, although its good at the rough stuff.

Still searching then…

is it just not a case of setting the rebound too quick so the bike springs back fast.

My rocket went pop… In spectacular fashion.

Bull Shit Bingo anyone?
I think I have a full house

Just because your brain is made of fluff! 😛

Think about it – an air spring gets softer as it extends so if you have equal rebound damping all the way through the stroke then it won’t spring back hard, it’ll over-dampen its push. If the rebound damping also diminishes then it won’t be over-dampened.

I’ve noticed it was much easier to get the back of my bike with its strongly progressive linkage to both corner with lots of grip and pop off jumps well whilst it’s taken a lot more tweaking to get a similar balance from the Pike up front.

Is this another advantage of coil springs?

Spookily it’s one year ago today that i posted this to a similar thread…

I met a guy in the pub last night and we got chatting bikes and stuff, as you do. I noticed an aged na fading sprocket tattoo on his arm and underneath it had some scripty style writing. It was hard to make out so i asked him what it said.

The bar fell silent, he slowly set down his pint and his expression changed as a shadow of seriousness fell over it. As he twisted his arm to give me a closer look he gruffly whispered ‘bikes aren’t poppy – riders are’.

Discussing pop last night down the ramp with dad’s ramp club and we are in agreement that it is indeed the individual that has ‘pop’ and not the bike/board.

However. Over time boards lose the ability to be bounced so hard and get a different tone when tapped. So not relevant.

And… Obviously a 4x bike is going to be a better shape for jumping on than a Road bike. But a talented individual with enough ‘pop’ can do what they like on them.

Ramble ramble ramble*

Discussing pop last night down the ramp with dad’s ramp club and we are in agreement that it is indeed the individual that has ‘pop’ and not the bike/board.

There’s definitely a wider range of poppability amongst everyone I ride with than the bikes we ride – a few guys can clear doubles at such a slow pace that I’d barely get halfway to the landing. The poppiest grew up riding BMX, which says a lot!

Standing tall when hitting jumps rather than keeping low gives me way more pop than any amount of suspension tweakery can. I do wonder if (in non-competitive riding) it’s the mediocre but pushing themselves riders like myself that benefit most from fancy bikes because great riders can shred on anything whilst bimblers don’t push hard enough to notice the differences?