Fox 36 Float Factory GRIP2 Review

Conclusion first: the Fox 36 Float Factory GRIP2 is the best air-sprung trail fork out there. By quite a margin too.

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By ben_haworth

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Fox 36 Float Factory GRIP2 Review

Erm … that seems like a very short review based on 18 months of riding.

I’ve just recently swapped my XFusion Trace 36 for one of these.

I’m not sure yet whether it’s worth it, but probably need to get it dialled in.

 

The damping range thing is fairly ridiculous tbh, these come as OEM on some bikes as well, imagine taking your new expensive bike home and you’re too light for the fork to work properly. You can get them tuned of course but you shouldn’t have to.

It really can’t be the best fork out there, the damping seems to be somewhat different per each fork, it might not be possible to have it work on big and small hits on same setup and some haved needed bushings readjusted.

Sold mine and got different fork with different issues – I only miss the 36 on bike park days which I do 1-2 per year.

Erm … that seems like a very short review based on 18 months of riding.

Might be useful to add a bit about chassis stiffness, ride feel on different surfaces/types of trail and effectiveness of adjusters.

Editor should have pointed this out really.

The damping range thing is fairly ridiculous tbh

Agreed, if a slightly below average weight rider has the damping fully open, that doesn’t bode well for lighter riders.

I used to have compression full open on a lot of my forks, but rebound as well is a bit worrying.

I feel like I should provide some constructive criticism for this review, because recently I’ve felt a lot of STW reviews have been pretty poor quality – they never used to be like this, hopefully they can improve.

– This review reads like the final conclusion section of what should be a much bigger review, it feels like its missing the beginning and middle and just skips straight to the end (I know it says conclusion first, but it doesnt even have the beginning and middle at any point) . For example it doesnt describe much about the fork itself, for example
– what travel lengths is it available in?
– what wheel sizes is it available in?
– what offsets?
– What model year , travel, offset, wheel size etc was this particular fork that was tested?
-what bike did you test it on?
– How heavy is it?
– what size if the brake mount of thefork?
– what is the max brake disc size it can take?
– How often does it officially need a service?
– what are the damping adjustments that are available to the end user? do they have a good range of adjustment?
– What are the air spring adjustments that are available to the user?
– Does it have bolts for a mud guard?
– Can you easily adjust the travel, if so how?
– WHat sort of riding does the tester like, how was the fork tested?
etc etc

I feel the quality of reviews on STW has dropped quite a bit recently, so please take this criticism the way its intended, constructively.

It does read a bit like someone from Fox has rung up and said, something along the lines of ‘Oi! You’ve had our fork for 18 months now, could you maybe write something about it now please or no more test kit for you guys’.

And what is it with the toddler speak stuff. ‘Best’ is a perfectly good word, ‘bestest’ is something lisping three-year olds say about ice cream.

I got as far as the use of “bestest” and gave up reading.

This review reads like the final conclusion section of what should be a much bigger review

I actually kept scrolling up and down to see if there was some more.

I’d like to know what other forks the reviewer is basing his “best air sprung” fork upon? As “sag point, mid-stroke and end-stroke” are all adjustable on other forks.

Totally agree with @julians points above.

This smacks of “quick, we need to fill up some space and keep Silverfish/Fox happy or we won’t get any more stuff to test…”

Id be interested to know more about recommended service intervals, how much are the service costs, how easy is it to service yourself, do Fox have a YouTube channel that’s an equivalent of the generally good SRAMTech channel?

I wouldn’t necessarily want to see all the tech stuff in a review, though I appreciate it might save me going to the Fox site.

I’d just like a bit more about what it feels like, perhaps making the stuff about mid-stroke support etc. a little more context specific – rather than just in the abstract.

Like Julian, I hope this helps as constructive criticism.

Unlike Julian… all those dry but important measurements are out there already, I don’t need them here… I want opinions on the ride, not copy and pasted stats. More about the ride would be welcome though… although I already moved to this fork (well, a cheaper version of it) based on Benji’s advice in the past.

In fairness, in its original context- ie the magazine- this is just one out of the 7 pages of reviews, where it gets a full page, as much as an entire bike. On the website it feels small and a bit odd, on the page it feels to me concise and to the point, and way more comfortable in company.

I liked the style of review

All the details about the fork are on the product page of fox. I don’t need to read a regurgitated press release. I’m interested in how they ride.

I like stw reviews.

I’m very happy to see the grinder back in the magazine 🙂