raises hand
i have had a few bikes with suspension over the years but apart from setting the air pressure i just leave it as it came from thew shop.
now though i have 2 new very nice suspension forks for my 2 mountain bikes (one a fox 32 step kashima for my 27.5 ht and now just got a lovely rockshox sid ultimate 3 setting version for my chisel fs both bought at reduced price). i really feel that i should at least mess around with the dials slightly to see if it improves things for where i ride (not technical terrain i have to say just the marlbrough downs and salisbury plain. also the k & a canal towpath).
tbh though both forks seem perfectly fine as they came (admittedly i have only tested the rockshox on a 10 mile mostly road ride home as didn't want to get it muddy on its first ride).
i have to admit that i don't know how to set up the forks either if i did try to change things as i'm a slow unfit 51 year old so no racing etc.
no doubt am strange for not trying to adjust things lol.
I have tried to adjust various forks on various bikes over the years, and can't say anything seemed much different, let alone better.
I might as well have left it at the shop settings
I go the other way. Suspension components are expensive, and they come with lots of adjustment. I've used factory setups, Shockwiz type apps/hardware to improve it, but now I just hand it over to the experts, be honest about what I ride, and leave the setting well alone once they've worked their magic.
I would not be able to notice a couple of minor tweaks, but I can definitely tell when a fork/shock has been set up properly. Although often that's after a service, so maybe the answer is look after them rather than tweak them!
Knobs and dials are there to be twiddled.
By doing so I've learned that suspension travel is far less important than damping.
I spent years and £££ modifying Rockshox forks because they never felt 'right'. No amount of airspring tuning or damper swapping made the fork feel the way I thought it should feel.
I bailed and bought a Mezzer Pro. I had to swap some shims around in the damper because it was too harsh on high speed stuff. It's amazing to me how much difference each click of the damper makes. Using a charger, I could twiddle the knobs all day long and it felt different but I could really figure out why. It never felt right.
With the Mezzer, it's obvious what changes with each click.
I'm a tinkerer. I'll probably never be satisfied with anything. Suspension is there to help keep me on the bike instead of being thrown off. If I can adjust something to make it work better, I will.
The only way you'll know if the adjustments are help or hindrance is to make the adjustment and see for yourself.
I look at it along the lines of, it can always be better so I'll tinker with the dials until it's as good as it can be. If I'm still not convinced it is as good as it can be, I'll change stuff until it's close enough that I'm happy with it.
Yes and my suspension service guy cries every time
To be honest not really on xc forks. The dampers are fairly simple so you can't do much adjusting without taking them apart. Though you mention three settings, my lockout lever gets triggered almost as much as the gears on some routes!
I'm firmly in the set and forget camp.
Rockshox have a calculator where you put in your weight and it suggests pressure and rebound settings. I used the results as a starting point/ baseline.
https://trailhead.rockshox.com/en?silentAuthAttempted=true
Specialized have something similar, but looks like the chisel is not yet supported.
https://www.specialized.com/gb/en/app/suspension-calculator
Or you could fiddle around with them , forget to log what you did and make them worse , not that I'm speaking personally 🙄
Always adjust them. I’ve never been asked enough information by the shop for them to have a clue where to set them. The don’t even ask weight.
'Set and forget' is fine but there's no such thing as 'shop settings'. They just pump them up and wheel them out the door.
Probably makes no difference on a hardtail used on canal paths.
On a decent full suspension bike used off road it's a huge waste of money to have all that suspension and not make it work for you. You'll have a much better time if everything is set correctly.
Years ago a group of us chipped in for a shockwiz. Either disappointingly or happily, my settings were only a click away from right according to it.
Fiddle with it, take notes, go to the extremes of the range to find out what each setting does.
At the very least the pressure and rebound need setting
This resonates - for 6 years on my old bike I was set and forget, left them at factory recommendations and always thought it wasn't as good as the reviews made out (Lyrik Ultimate). I never actually put any focussed effort into understanding why, or tweaking and testing
I recently got a new bike with fox 36 performance elite, and finally took myself off to do a proper 'bracketing' session. I went to a track I knew well (approx 1.20 run) which broadly matched the riding I like. I rode it 14 times in a row, and it took 2 hours. I followed the bracketing process recommended by Jordi from fox and Ben cathro in his how to bike series. Wrote down my settings, did a run, wrote what it felt like then changed 1 setting, 2 clicks at a time.
It was absolutely time worth spending. I could genuinely feel when my rebound was too fast, and too slow. All I did was say whether a run was better or worse than the last. If better, I'd go another 2 clicks further. If worse, I'd stop and that setting became one end of the bracket.
I've now got the rebound on my fork feeling superb, whereas in the factory recommendations it was good. Turns out I needed to go a few clicks faster than fox's rec.
I'd thoroughly recommend doing this, I wish I'd done it 6 years ago. I hasten to add though, it was 2 hours of focused riding and I only managed to sort my high & low speed rebound on the fork. I still need to do compression, and my rear shock!
TLDL: do the bracketing process. At worst, it will confirm your kit is set well. At best, you will learn how the clicks feels and discover a bracket of settings that work for you.
Taking tokens out of Fox forks makes a noticeable difference which I only found out after 2 years. They don't exactly tell you or help you to know it or understand this with a new bike in my opinion
now just got a lovely rockshox sid ultimate 3 setting version for my chisel fs both bought at reduced price).
Ooh where did you get the SIDs from please?
And in answer to the question, yes and no. When I was racing, I got all the forks on my MTBs custom serviced by TF Tuned and it massively improved them. I tended to do fairly little other than basic pressure adjustments and a bit on rebound depending on the course.
It's kind of like bike fit. Most people can get a feel of what's sort of right / comfortable and work from there but having a proper bike fit will sort all that out in hours rather than days / weeks of occasional fettling and "I wonder what this does".
As mentioned above, if you've got an expensive full sus, you may as well get the most out of it!
FWIW i've seen massive improvements just by giving forks a full service, let alone playing with settings. Once adjusted to my satisfaction I tend to leave alone, but then I'm mostly a wheels-on-ground rider.
As I build bikes from scratch, I tend to buy suspension from people who will set them up, or at least provide suggestions on set up based on my weight and projected use. So fit and forget really, maybe a click or two either way to account for personal preference.
Did look at full custom tuning for my next fork. Cost put even me off…
Did look at full custom tuning for my next fork. Cost put even me off…
It was the early days of TF Tuned when I was having my forks serviced, we're talking 20 years ago now. I've not looked at any similar custom tuning option for a long time!
I had a basic service done on my gravel bike forks (RS Rudy) a couple of months ago, that was £70 which I thought was reasonable. I think the shop charges double that for the full 200hr service.
I recently bought my first custom tuned, brand new fork from J-Tech. It's comfortably the best fork I've ever ridden and the recommended settings are bang on.
Probably a bit overkill for the OP.
Everyone should know how to do a lower service at least. It's so easy and massively improves performance and prolongs the life of your expensive toy.
I used to fiddle with all the settings but these days tend to set them to the manufacturers recommendation which is usually good enough to stop me making them worse.
“TLDR: do the bracketing process. At worst, it will confirm your kit is set well. At best, you will learn how the clicks feels and discover a bracket of settings that work for you.”
This!
I’ve got three damping adjustments on my hardtail’s fork and four on my full-sus’s (the shock only has one but I seem to have been v lucky with the stock shim stack). So much potential for them to feel rubbish if set wrong.
I take most/all of the tokens out because I don’t get big air and both forks have lots of travel so don’t need to ramp up tons.
Even just fine tuning the air pressure / sag to suit you can make a world of difference.
one of my pals bought one of them expensive set up/monitor things that alot of the live setup guys use. ive always been a set up roughly and forget type of rider. I had a session with him on my bike to help him learn how to use it (he bought as he likes racing lot) and for chilled normal riding my settings were already about there, however when it was time for race pace runs it basically showed to wack a few more psi in and up the rebound speed by alot...hard and fast much more than id run normally. The difference in speed was noticeable, runs that id done for years knocking alot of time off them.
Put it back to normal after as it was way too hard and harsh for everyday normal riding, but if im doing runs and wanting to push on i just adjust the rebound to near enough fully fast.
my controversial take. (After working in bike shops for years)
If you don’t take the time to understand and setup the suspension for your riding style/conditions etc then you may as well ride a rigid bike
I really want to get best out of my suspension and will spend any required time to explore all the options. It is also a way to enjoy of my overly familiar backyard trails.
That said, group rides are not the time for fiddling with suspension, quick adjustment of 1-2 clicks of something may get done while waiting for someone but nothing more.
however when it was time for race pace runs it basically showed to wack a few more psi in and up the rebound speed by alot...hard and fast much more than id run normally.
When shockwiz first came out, that's exactly what I found. Trail centre suspension settings were about 10-15% harder and faster rebound. My stock settings for stodgy, lumpy irregular trail rider were softer.
I'd never rely on 'shop settings' and mostly deviate from manufacturer’s settings too!
I use a few rides to get the set up good enough, then leave well alone. I really like the old CaneCreek way of using Allen keys not knobs and levers to adjust the damping.
We're both light, Madame Edukator at the bottom end of Rockshox settings so recommended settings for pressure result in no sag and not much travel. So oil change for thinner oil, compression damper wound fully off, a little rebound and pressure to give plenty of travel.
Marzocchi Bomber coil - just thin oil and set rebound. Pity they don't make them like that anymore.
I bought a new frame and a set of Fox 38s just over a year ago. Used the Fox settings from the website and hated the forks so much I sent them for servicing in case there was an issue. Suspension specialist gave me some setup recommendations after finding no issues. Total transformation. Well worth speaking to someone who knows what they are doing.
My default seems to be...
For forks- Set sag at 25-30%, Back compression almost all the way off, faff about with rebound so its fast(ish) but not violent.
For shocks- as above but then add a bit more rebound damping so as not to get bucked on jumps.
We're both light, Madame Edukator at the bottom end of Rockshox settings so recommended settings for pressure result in no sag and not much travel. So oil change for thinner oil, compression damper wound fully off, a little rebound and pressure to give plenty of travel.Had a couple of kids riding with me a few years ago. Neither of them even got on the bottom of the pressure chart for their forks. Spent a lot of time fiddling, custom shim stacks, lighter oil (MUCH lighter) just to get the fork to run through the travel properly. Then another i don't know how long to get them working well. Both of them now sniffing round the edges of contracts in elite, and both knowledgeable about how to set their bikes up properly. Having seen me and their respective parents/mechs tearing stuff apart to get it to work properly for them!
I've also done custom shim stacks and non-stock oil weights for myself to get the forks just right. Don't tend to bother now as i'm heavier and slower, and forks are so much better than they were last time i was light and fast.
Used the Fox settings from the website and hated the forks so much I sent them for servicing in case there was an issue
I find both RS and Fox recommended settings useless.
I'm a medium fettler, could probably get them better if I tried harder. Bought a shockwiz ages ago and haven't got round to using it 🤣
“TLDR: do the bracketing process. At worst, it will confirm your kit is set well. At best, you will learn how the clicks feels and discover a bracket of settings that work for you.”
This!
Yep very much this. Also, when you're getting a new FS bike, leave one end at manufacturer recommended settings and get the other end dialed in. I tend do shock first and then fork as fork settings tend to be nearer my preference. Once you've done both, do one or 2 more runs to make sure you're happy on your normal trails.
My local isn't massively rough nor steep so I tend to adjust settings when I go to Alps, Wales or Scotland.
I usually play with it until it feels nice.
Same for my bike's suspension.
I bought my bike used and I don't think I've adjusted the rebound at all since I got it. Just put some air in it for correct sag. My Z2 just has that and the grip compression dial to change, and I keep that about 1/3 of the way closed.
The less for me to faff around with the better to be honest, otherwise I'll start to obsess over it. When I last had a FS I was messing with settings every ride and never got it feeling quite right, just a headache I don't need!
Kinda. I'm not none for fiddling with the suspension settings (don't have the knowledge/patience) but after I sent my forks and shock off to TF for a refresh, told them my weight and riding style the difference was night and day. Over due another service tbh but it still seems to ride well!
Slightly different query actually, when I described the bracketing process earlier in the thread I found that I needed rebounded approx 4 clicks faster than fox's rec settings. But, I did my runs in early Jan with the ambient temp around 5-7 degrees. Does anyone have any thoughts on whether at least part of the reason for the bracket being faster was due to it being cold, and therefore the suspension oils being thicker? I have heard that can be the case, but I just don't know at what temps this becomes a problem.
If so, is it likely I'll have to add some rebound damping in the summer to remove the compensation?
Does anyone routinely do this? Any thoughts?
I've set the pressure to what the sticker on the fork says. Put all the knobs in the middle of their range.
I can only feel a difference if I set the knobs to their extremes. Fidlling around in the mid range seems to make no noticeable change.
I'm on a hardtail. I don't know what the pressure in the forks is supposed to be, or indeed is, cos I never check it. They do go squish when I hit stuff though, so that's okay.
I probably should pay more attention.
Hell no, I fiddle around with my settings often. I paid for them, so damn sure I'm going to use the adjusters etc.
The only fork I've not tweaked significantly is on a secondhand bike. Previous owner was similar weight to me (but completely different ballpark of ability...) and whatever he had done to the fork, it feels incredible. Might be tweaked internally but I won't know until I have it fully serviced. Keen to learn as I can't get my identical fork on my other bike feeling as good, no matter what I try.
Slightly different query actually, when I described the bracketing process earlier in the thread I found that I needed rebounded approx 4 clicks faster than fox's rec settings. But, I did my runs in early Jan with the ambient temp around 5-7 degrees. Does anyone have any thoughts on whether at least part of the reason for the bracket being faster was due to it being cold, and therefore the suspension oils being thicker? I have heard that can be the case, but I just don't know at what temps this becomes a problem.
If so, is it likely I'll have to add some rebound damping in the summer to remove the compensation?
Does anyone routinely do this? Any thoughts?
Yes, it is routine here where summer and winter temperatures vary quite a bit.
I avoid riding in colder than -5C but forks can become quite slow already in +5C. Oil in damper and especially oil in lower legs has big effect on this - some oils are more prone to viscosity changes in cold.