Very subjective question, but what would you say the optimum fork length is for a Slackline? I’ve spoken with Dan Stanton himself on this, and he’s said of course that the bike is designed to handle well with a big range of fork lengths. Far from accusing him of being evasive (he’s not, it’s all personal preference after all and he designed it to be a bit of a swiss army knife of a bike) I’d just like to gather owner’s thoughts…

FWIW, I’ve ridden Cotic Soul’s and owned a BFe, all of which I felt rode best with 120-125mm of fork travel. To me, any longer made them felt choppered out and unresponsive. But what is optimal for the slackline?

I built mine up first with some 36 floats lowered to 140mm as I didn’t fancy riding a chopper that handled like shit but I raised them back up to 160mm for a dh race, realised it handled really well and kept them at 160. Still climbs fine which surprised me. I’ve got 160mm devilles fitted now, ti frame and bos forks make for a great ride.

I ran mine with 140mm float 32’s and it felt spot on. I actually found it to ride similarly to my current Soul with 120mm floats.

First ran mine with 120 floats from my Soul, but wasn’t realising it’s full potential. Then ran some Slants at 140mm which was pretty good for all round…but then decided to get some dual pikes 160/130mm.

It’s frickin brilliant now on the ups, flats and downs!

Mine is a ti like Steve’s which is 0.5 degree slacker than a normal slackline.

Obviously, as you say, it’s totally objective but I originally went with a pair of 36 TALAS that did 160/130/100 travel, to match the do-it-all nature of the Slackline. My intention was to use 130 most of the time, shove it on 160 for the steep stuff and 100 for the bmx track.

After playing around with those I got sick of the poor TALAS performance and converted them to a FLOAT spring and spaced the travel to 140. No more faffing about with travel and lot more just enjoying riding the thing.

Cheers guys, this is along the lines of what I thought…

I’ve currently got 2 26″ forks kicking about, a 120mm Reba with a straight steerer and 495mm axle to crown height, and a Manitou Minute with tapered steerer and 130mm of travel and 510mm axle to crown height, but only QR. I’ve also been offered a 120mm tapered Fox Float 32 with 15mm axle from a friend in mint condition, for a good price, but that’s even shorter at 490mm a2c…

Trying to build up on the cheap, but think I may have to sell both and use the money towards a new 140mm travel fork possibly.

Hijack.

How do 6’ish riders find the reach and height of the 18″ Slackline? Is it long enough in the reach and how is the frame height for seatpost extension?

I see the new switchback model has a 18″ version with 0.5″ top tube increase which looks like a great bike but is sadly 650 and I don’t have any of those in my build a cheap hardtail bin!

At 6ft I don’t think you need worry about the reach on the 18… I’m 5ft10 and looking at a 16.5, they’re pretty long in the TT for what they are. I know guys 6ft2 and over on 18’s, and they love them.

Know what you mean about the “build a cheap hardtail” scenario. I’ve got a shed full of 26″ rims, tyres and forks, which is why I’ve even been contemplating this in the first place. I’ve not owned a working 26″ bike over 18 months, so will be odd going back, but when all I need is a new frame… Well!!! 😉

I am just back from BPW with my son(6,3″) riding a large slackline with vanilla rc2 set at 160 ,i think the bike looks like a chopper but he said it was great riding down the black runs a lot faster than me on my fs ,the next day we rode cwmcarn cafall again he had no probs ,top bike 🙂

Any more for any more?

I’m keen not to run too long a fork, I like a relatively low front end and steeper head angle, but by the same token don’t want to clip my pedals on every stroke and have a nervous twitchy feeling bike.

Oh, and if I do have to go for new forks… Anyone running Sektor Dual Position Coils, and what do you think of them?