Hi all, sorry to keep posting questions!

Can someone explain to me in layman’s terms why everyone seems to recommend avoiding rock shox tk dampening.

I understand it is cheaper but what are the practical effects of this on a trail i.e. comparing a set of Reba forks to seckor tk ones. The rock shox website seem to suggest both have motion control?

In laymens terms it would be a bit like going on a bouncy castle with a sumo wrestler!

That bad then!

In laymans terms the best way to describe damping characteristics is to try them. Not always possible but if you can spend some time twiddling the knobs and bouncing up and down on it you get an idea. Next time you see a bike with the fork on in a shop see if you can do a car park test.

I just went from a kt gold recon coil 120mm fork to a 120 reba rlt. I’m still playing with the set up on the reba, the knobs on the kt didn’t seem to have much influence on how the recon felt

First impressions are that the reba is a whole lot plusher over small bumps and the rebound is more controlled. It seems smoother and nearly got me I trouble on Tuesday – the plushness upfront suckered me into a rocky section faster than the hardtails rear end wanted to handle, not an issue I’ve had on the same descent on the recon.

I’m no suspension expert though

Basically the more stuff you ask the fork to do, the better it needs to be to do it- once you’ve got a lot of things going on at the same time, crude dampers just can’t keep up and you end up with the fork doing the wrong things at the wrong time. It gets a point you’re better off with no suspension at all

The TK damper’s actually more sophisticated than the stock suspension in my motorbike! But it’s doing a far harder job as soon as you’re doing more than riding down a kerb or over a single rock, mountain bikes really do ask a hell of a lot of the hardware.

Basically, it’s not as expensive so gets some snobbish remarks like the sumo wrestler one.

It’ll have less adjustment, so if you are going to use all the knobs and dials and get it spot on for you, it’s worth spending more. A lot of people don’t really bother doing this though.

Also, the plushness talked about above might just have been the TK needing a service (It might have been something more subtle relating to damping though).

I have to add balance and say one of my mates is quite skinny and has some cheaper Rockshox (not quite sure of the model) which lack rebound damping adjustment. They feel overdamped for my preferences and I’m 4 stone heavier, so I can only imagine that they’re holding him back a bit. This can be sorted out by swapping the damping oil, but not quite as straightforward as twiddling a knob.

Tk damping is a port orifice damper. It has no shims at all, no floating piston, not separate circuits. It has one kidney shaped hole to restrict the flow of oil which affects compression and rebound damping the same and you can’t isolate them.

It’s as basic as they come, and compared to motion control, mission control and charger dampers its basically outclassed in every way.

tk damping really isn’t that bad, i’d say it’s ‘ok’.

i’ve got some xc32’s on my hardtail, they cost ~£100, they do the job reliably.

Would i like some pimp reba’s? – well, yes i would, but i’ve honestly never thought about it when i’m riding the bike.

While i’m riding i DO find myself wanting a dropper seat-post, and some bars with different sweep, and maybe i’ve got the tyre pressure a bit off, and i should really try a stem that’s 10mm longer. But those cheap forks never give me reason to replace them.

(they’re even QR)

Slightly off topic but i serviced the old man’s 2004ish judy xc the other day and was amused to see it’s damping (oil and port, no adjuster) was on a par with my car. Except you can drain the oil and replace it with thinner/thicker far more easily on the fork!