bought my son a 20″ mtb recently off ebay. overall the bike is in great condition and everything works as it should except the forks…which were seized solid. on closer inspection it seems the lower part of the coils have snapped and therefore there is nothing holding the fork lowers to the rest of the fork.

the obvious thing would be to stick the bike back on ebay and get another but doing that would get me grief off mrs gonzy, mini gonzy really likes the bike….and my male pride wont let me sell it

anyone got any recommendations for a replacement fork?
the one on the bike at the moment is a v brake only unit but has a 1 & 1/8th steerer. all the ones i can find come with 1 inch steerers

The spring has snapped – normally that wouldn’t affect how the lowers are held on or not – they should do that by themselves even if you remove the spring.

Do you actually need to fix it? IME suspension forks in kids bikes (certainly 20″ ones) don’t really do much anyway so it wont actually make much difference other than a small geometry change which is unlikely to be an issue.

the springs are attached to the stanchions and then there are a pair of plastic plug are attached to the bottom of the springs. once in the fork the 5mm allen bolts then secure the plastic plugs to the lowers so that it all stays together, but last night i was able to pull the forks lowers off by hand even though the plugs were still bolted to the lowers. there was a bit of spring attached to each of the plugs and i could see where the springs had corroded and snapped off.
i reckon he can still get away with riding it as it is as his body weight will keep things together…but ideally i’d like a fork that works even if it only gives him 30mm of travel
i’ve seen a pair of suntour xct-jr 20 forks which i can get new for less than £40, which i’m tempted by as they are disc ready too
but i wanted to know if there were any other alternatives out there

my other option is to get some soft springs and modify them to fit the existing forks

Suntour forks don’t get a good rep (heavy, not really going up and down), but I don’t have any personal experience.

Spinner forks seem to be better received, but you’ll pay more than double (eg http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/New-SPINNER-GRIND-20-Fork-50-mm-1-1-8-Remote-Lockout-Red-/131286887435?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item1e914eec0b)

An alternative is a rigid fork – you should be able to get a reasonable 20″ BMX fork, and a nice fat tyre. I’ve just put a 20 x 2.1 small block 8 on the littlest’s bike and it’s made a massive difference to his riding.

Gonzy i.ve got some Suntour xct spring forks to fit discs brakes, you can have for £20 posted,came off my lads Carrera Blast..i’ll dig em out if ya want ??.

Gonzy i.ve got some Suntour xct spring forks to fit discs brakes, you can have for £20 posted,came off my lads Carrera Blast..i’ll dig em out if ya want ??.

can you get some pictures of them to me please? email in profile thanks

Hi Gonzy,yes will do..

Spinner Air 20″ fork is about £65 from rep in poland – contact info here https://mtbmumblings.wordpress.com/2014/06/07/kids-suspension-forks/

£65? Really? The only price I’ve managed to dig up for that fork was $170 (USD)

I found mention of a 20″ version of their 300 fork, but that was from a recent trade show, so doubt it’s available yet.

I’ve emailed Lukasz @ BluePill… in English obviously. I’ll report back 😉

bookmarked, very interested in the outcome of your email.

James

Gonzy,you got mail.

Gonzy,you got mail.

thanks. replied.

For those interested…

Hi Jon,

I do not have this model on stock. However I’m expecting new delivery in the end of may.
Price including shipping chargé to UK is around 80 EUR (depends on the exchange rate of USD while doing custom clearance).

If you will still be interested please contact me again the end of may.

Best regards,
Lukasz Nowak

SPINNER EUROPE
Ul. Gdanska 112, 90-508 Lodz, Poland
Email: lukasz.nowak@bluepill.pl
Mobile: +48 605 607 358

So that looks promising 🙂

you can get 1 1/8 tp 1 ” adapters for your head tube

BMX thing IIRC and about £10

IMHO rigid forks are fine at that age as they weight penalty is more of an issue than rigid

the only issue with that Junkyard is that mini gonzy’s current fork has a threadless steerer…the only bmx forks i’ve seen so far that use the same steerer dont have lugs for any brakes. those that do use a threaded steerer which would mean a headset and stem change in addition to the use of headset adapters

I’ve been down this road. Bought an old 20″ alu hotrock to customise for the lad. The suntour fork weighs about 2.5kg and won’t work with someone that light anyway.

I bought some BMX forks but the ACL is way too short, prob 100mm. Cruiser forks might work but standard BMX forks wont replace a 20″ suspension fork, the geometry will be all wrong.

Is that price for the 20″ spinner fork?

I think worrying about the geometry on a bike for a 5 year old is a little OTT what matter MOST is if it weighs too much

The a-c was about 20 mm difference when I did this and the Wheel base was a little longer but I never measured it

Both kids preferred it as they dropped over 1.5 kg of weight* and the suspension did nto reallywork anyway

* One set of suspension forks were just under 3 kg iirc and one was 2.5 kg
Kona and a Ridgeback so not BSO

Yes – I asked about 20″ Spinner Air forks, they’re the EU distributor I think.

I’m perfectly happy with mine on a rigid fork (Islabike Beinn), be he isn’t! He’s watching me and his bigger brother hooning about on suspension and wants some of that action. He also wants clipless pedals, but I think I’ve managed to explain to him that he’ll need to grow into his brothers shoes first!

Carbon cycles/exotic do a 20″ carbon rigid fork. Disc only I think but it looks good. Think recumbent bikes have 20″ forks.

I think worrying about the geometry on a bike for a 5 year old is a little OTT what matter MOST is if it weighs too much

Hence why I tried a rigid fork, I assure you 100mm difference in ACL DOES make a difference, even to a 5 yr old… 🙂 Those suntour forks are actually pretty long, his pedals would have been hitting everything.

I’ve even passed an old Orange P7 fork to a tame welder to move the bosses but it’s job number 1million on his list…

weight isnt an issue as mini-gonzy’s previous bmx feels heavier. the bike he’s now got is pretty light (saracen hoax) in comparrison.
i’ve already removed the heavy steel seatpost and saddle and replaced them with a lighter wtb saddle and an old chopped down raceface prodigy post which i had lurking in the toolbox (i couldnt believe my luck when i saw that the frame took a 27.2mm post). i’ve got some lightweight alloy bars and stem that will be going on at the weekend too.
i know i have some old soft marzocchi springs in the toolbox so i’m going to have a go at modifying them to fit in the crappy top gun forks that are on there while i make arrangements with Reedspeed.
i’m trying not to spend too much on this project either as he is nearly 8 and is at that stage where his 18″ bmx is too small but a 24″ still seems a bit too big so i only see him having this for 12 months before he’s ready for a 24″ mtb.
this bike was supposed to be a transitional bike for him to learn how to use the gears correctly but he’s been on it once and has already figured that out.

Hence why I tried a rigid fork, I assure you 100mm difference in ACL DOES make a difference, even to a 5 yr old.

Point taken

Yes it did work out as £65 when I bought them. I have had a 20″ and 24″. They are lighter than most kids forks but I can’t remember the weight off the top of my head.

I haven’t used the 20″ ones yet – was planning to use them on a 16″ bike but it would rake out the bike too much as the tt is too short on the frame I have.

The 24″ ones are broken – I think they were ridden down the Glentress red with the lockout on.