i have a set of 150mm fox 32 forks, the sanction is 170mm long. i measured it after someone asked how long they are as they thought they looked long.

is 20mm a fairly standard amount for the sanction to be longer than the quoted travel or does it vary from brand to brand.

would this also make a difference if i was to change brands to say rock shox.

hope that makes sense, and it wasn’t a stupid question

Tom

My 120 Pikes have maybe a few mm more stanchion showing tab the actual travel.

Having 20mm extra send odd to be.

You need enough left inside the lowers for it still to be structurally stable when extended.
I suppose you’d have to measure them with no air in them? And you don’t want the crown hitting the bridge on the lowers under compression either, so the total length of the sanctions will be a fair bit longer than the travel distance?

If your just measuring from seal to crown with air in them, then the pressure/ amount of sag will interfere with your measurement.

Are you measuring the sanction with the fork in pieces or assembled. If the former than sounds okay as you need enough in the fork for rigidity and also a bit to account for top out. If your measuring the fork assembled then that implies that at full compression you’d have 20mm between fork lower and the crown. That seems like a lot.

It’s irrelevant

Indeed, the only measurements you should care about are the axle to crown distance and travel.

It sounds like you are only measuring the bit of the stanchion projecting out of the lowers on full extension rather than the full length of the stanchion which will also include a length remaining inside the lowers at full extension otherwise the fork would be floppy / boing apart.

In my experience exposed stanchion is usually the same as travel. The manufacturers expect the lowers to go all the way up to the crown. Which has never been possible for me except with Pace forks.

I’d agree with molgrips – full travel is usually just a few mm shy of the crown on all my forks.

plus: ‘stanchion’

Yes, stanchion. FFS.

Reminds me of a really annoying person I shared a flat with about 10 years ago who swore blind that ‘brought’ meant the same as ‘bought’ because ‘they was from the saaaaaarf, innit’. I moved out shortly after.

All of my forks have between 5 and 15 ish mm of stanchion left showing when they bottom out (air out, or spring removed). Depends on the manufacturer. I have 4 to choose from currently.

Only ones i can recall that actually got close enough to be touching were some old Pace i had in the 90’s.

I only know this as the tiny zip tie i was using as a travel indicator put a dent/tear in the wiper seal…….. i use big o-rings for that task now!

Yeah but then compare that achieved travel with no air in with the published travel figure…

I’m pretty sure both my Reba and Pike bottom out at or very near the crown.

Manitous don’t though.

Depends on if they have negative spring or not. Or if they are ****. Or just unreliable……

But usually about on target give or take a couple of mm.