Greetings STW, I'm after a 120 mm 29er fork for general hardtail trail duties, maybe a spot of amateur racing if I can lay off the biccies (82-87 kgs, depending on season, plumage etc). I want a Rockshox for reasons of price, servicing and matchymatchiness. I don't need loads of adjustment, correct pressure and rebound is good enough for me, and I tend to remove remote lockout devices anyway.
I had a Dual Air Reba on a 2012 bike, which was ok but I didn't like the fore and aft flex under heavy braking. My main current bike has a X-Fusion 34 mm stanchions, so I know a Pike or 2018 Revelation (35 mm stanchions) would solve the flex issue but at the costs of €€€s for the former and mass for the latter, about 400 g over a 2018 Reba RL (1595g). I'm not going full-on weight weenie, a SID would never suit me, but I've only ever had heavy bikes and am aiming for 24-25 lbs for the new build,
So, are recent Rebas stiffer than my 2012 one was? Or, are 2017 or earlier Revs significantly stiffer than Rebas, for just a 100-200g penalty?
If your old reba was QR and straight steerer, then yes there will be a noticeable improvement with a 15mm thru axle and tapered steerer version. If you had some, or all of that before then I doubt you would notice much change. It's a light fork for a 29er.
The 2012 Reba was taper with 15 mm thru-axle, should have said, sorry.
RS have a fork for every day of the year and ime unless you are going from something truly awful to something rather good you will be seriously underwhelmed by the incremental differences between models.
Having said that ime a tapered steerer and thru axle makes more difference than the stanchion diameter
Yes, the RS range is certainly overwhelming, but I can narrow it down to a few models fairly easily. Then it's just a small negotiation of robustness versus mass. I do think stanchion diameter has a pretty big impact but was trying to avoid the mass increase if the 32mm offering has improved or if the Revs offer something more (I've read some about stanchion:lower overlap) in the same format.
Cheers,
Gaidong