Forum menu
I have a 2 month old Trek Rail with a Rockshox Deluxe RT3 Debonair shock. It’s had an easy life so far, no big drops etc and around 200 miles of riding.
Today I suddenly felt it knocking and saw that the shock was blowing right through its travel easily. Checked the shock pressure at the bottom of the run and it was about 200, 215 should give me 30% sag roughly. I was at over 50% sag.
Had to pump it up to around 310 to get just under 40% sag. (Max shock limit is 315).
Does it sound like the positive chamber could be leaking into the negative or something?
I’ll be looking to warranty it but I’m on holiday in Austria for the next 3 weeks so I’ll need to do it through an LBS here and hope they have a quick turnaround.
Just looking to get a good idea of the problem before I go to try a discussion in German tomorrow!
One thing to check first would be to deflate the shock fully and add 50psi then cycle the shock to balance the positive and negative chambers then do that each time you add another 50psi until you get to your normal amount of pressure.
If I were on holiday and it was potentially going to eat into my riding time massively, I'd be sending it to one of the shock servicing places on the quickest postage option. I've not looked in ages but you can probably send it directly to one of the authorised ones and potentially warranty it anyway?
Warranty job if only 2 months old?
If it’s one of the trek’s own re-aktiv thru shaft RT3 (like on the rail 9) they have a bit of a reputation for shitting themselves and giving up all of a sudden. It’ll deff be a warranty and likely not the last time (on my second, if / when it goes again I’ll swap out the shock)
on holiday with a knackered shock? I'd be flashing the CC and buy something to allow to enjoy my holiday rather than waiting for it to be fixed. Sell one afterwards when back home.
See if a quick clean and lube of the seals on the air can sort it. If not, new shock or hire bike time and worry about it after the holiday.
New shock time I reckon. Unless you find a very good shop you’re looking at massively eating into riding time. As above though, then sell one to offset some of the cost
Cheers for the replies everyone.
Just went to drain the air and pump/cycle/pump and on connecting the shock pump the pressure was down to about 150.
Pumped it up to 215 and got about 30% sag so spot on. The lockout lever doesn’t seem to be doing much however.
It is one of the Trek specific through shaft jobs which I’ve heard as said above aren’t super reliable.
There’s a Trek dealer in the local town I’ll nip down to, see what they say about warranty.
I’ve got another bike here so it’s not a complete disaster.