140mm or 150mm forks whats the real world difference

as per title, 140mm or 150mm forks whats the real world difference?

the reason i ask is, my new 2011 five pro seems to have come with 150mm float RLC’s. I ordered 140mm float RLC’s as an option and paid the extra over the standard float RL’s.

I rode the bike on sunday night for the 1st time and looking over the bike i thought the forks looked a bit big. so too night i got the travel dimensions of the fox website and it states 5.5inch for 140mm and 5.9inch for the 150mm fork. Low and behold my forks are exactly 5.9inch of travel.

Will the extra travel screw the ride up, or is it not noticeable? I purchased the bike for regular trail centre black runs etc and not massive free ride riding in the alps. So i presume as it should have the 140’s that is what the bike rides best with geometry wise.

in short. not noticeable. in my opinion obviously.
orange do say 140-160 travel forks so I really wouldn’t worry.

Easy to space down 10mm, spacers are peanuts from mojo
Not sure I’d bother though for 10mm

Plenty of Five’s come fitted with a Fox 36 fitted, which is 160mm travel, and also about an extra 10mm axle to crown height for its given travel (that is to say a 160mm 36 will be 20mm taller than a 150mm Float, not 10mm).

Really wouldn’t worry about it, I’d be chuffed at getting the longer fork actually!

How have you measured them?
Many forks have ‘extra’ stantion showing, ie when the fork bottoms out the lowers don’t come into contact with the crown assembly

It may well be worth letting all the air out of the fork, compressing them, marking it somehow (not some kind of dent), eg a tie-wrap/zip-tie, pump them back up again making sure they are extended all the way out, and measure the difference?

thanks guys, the reason i ask is i demoed a five all mountain with 160mm forks and thought it climbed horrible on steep climbs (the front end felt like it wanted to wheeley uphill) also test rode a standard five pro with 140mm and it climbed and rode much better. You can sit on the end of the seat to keep the front end down and tracking on steep climbs with the 160’s but they were way to much fork than needed and was a pig of a ride on steep long switch back type climbs compared to the 140’s.

I only rode the bike for a quick blast on sunday night after work around the red run in Llandegla (5mins from my house) so only had 55mins or so on the bike around a very easy trail albeit very wet and muddy on sunday. So have not really had chance to get a feel for the bike.

But the 140mm to the 160mm i test rode felt very different going uphill, what i am concerned a bit with is the 150mm going to be noticeable as well or is the jump negligable between the two. And not like the 140 to 160 jump i felt on the demo bikes.

This is my 1st full sus bike as i have been use to 100mm xc hardtail bikes, but wanted the five for long 20mile+ black route rides as the hardtail for 20+miles of rough/rocky black routes just battered you in (im not talking Llandegla black as the hardtail is fine for this by the way)

thanks for any advice guys.

Keep them i have the 5 AM and think the 150mm would be great on the 5
should’nt notice much difference.
You may want to try a zero rise stem.

If it is a 150mm Fox 32, then it will be closer in height to a 140mm Fox 32 than a 160mm Fox 36.

I believe axle-crown heights are:
Fox 32 QR15 @ 140mm = 515mm
Fox 32 QR15 @ 150mm = 525mm
Fox 36 20mm @ 160mm = 545mm

Don’t listen to them. Night and day.

Maybe.

My Ventana is designed for 130mm forks. Running 140mm forks on it & honestly dont notice the difference in travel.

I felt the difference between 140mm and 150mm Revs on the Hemlock and 130 and 140mm on the Idrive… But I think in both cases that was mainly because the extra 10mm just pushed the bike back into a nice sort of sweet spot, not sure I’d notice 120mm to 130mm in the same way. So, “it depends”.

Orange do say 140mm is the perfect length for handling but then they totally changed the bike just recently and before that, 140mm was the perfect length with the old head angle too. And also the minimum even though they sold a version of the bike with 130mm. So don’t worry too much about that, just go with what feels right.

james – Member
If it is a 150mm Fox 32, then it will be closer in height to a 140mm Fox 32 than a 160mm Fox 36.

I believe axle-crown heights are:
Fox 32 QR15 @ 140mm = 515mm
Fox 32 QR15 @ 150mm = 525mm
Fox 36 20mm @ 160mm = 545mm

I’m pretty sure its 510 and 520mm for the 140 & 150mm floats.

I’ve had 150mm forks on my Five for 2 years. I’ve not been killed yet so they must be OK.

You’ve had a free upgrade; you should be happy.

apparently thats what Rowan Sorrel run on his Five. If it works for him…?

Run a fraction more sag!!

Real world difference is about 8mm of travel.

Real world difference is about 8mm of travel.

thanks for that gem of wisdom, i had already worked that one out. What i meant was any real world difference in handling and climbing as i noticed a big difference from the 32 140’s compared to the 36 160’s on the bikes i test rode.

How about you ride the bike and decide whether you think it handles OK? Or don’t you trust your own opinion?

If a) It handles fine: stop worrying.

or b) It handles like a pig: you can get a spacer for your fork. I seriously doubt that 10mm will make any significant difference though.

As stated above, the reason the 160mm fork felt worse is probably because it is 30mm extra a/c, which more of a significant difference, whilst the 150mm fork is only an extra 10mm a/c.

Also, mtfu. 😉

Real world difference will be about half a degree on the head angle when the bike is static and slightly less when sagged.

If 140mm/515mm axle to crown height was already 20mm more than it should be, then maybe the extra 10mm/half a degree would tip the bike over what you could get away with. As it is, I’d be amazed if any discernable difference actually had a detrimental effect on the handling.

Besides as people have already pointed out, you can (relatively) easily space them down in 10mm increments.

Sorry Junkie if you took my response the wrong way. Just answering your question.

Theoretically, that extra 8mm will make your head angle about 0.3 of a degree slacker than it would have been with the 140mm forks on there.

In the real world, you probably wouldn’t notice any difference if you swapped the 150s out for 140s.

“I’m pretty sure its 510 and 520mm for the 140 & 150mm floats”
AFAIK its 511mm for Fox 32 140mm QR/9mm open dropout
(150mm only available in QR15 bolt-thru)

Just ride it and if it feels a bit lofty, run a bit more sag.

I’ll swap you my RLC 140’s if it bothers you that much