Hi I am planning on building a 456 carbon in the near future. This will be the first bike I have built so wanted some advice. The fork I am thinking of going with is Fox 32 Float 140 RL. Is there any others I should consider. Also what wheels would you recommend. Thanks in advance.

Revolutions or Fox 34’s as they are stiffer.

Depends what you want it to do really, very versatile frame so there’s no one right build. Personally I wouldn’t put 32s on it, they’re needlessly flexy- upgrade to a Revelation at the minimum, the weight penalty is bugger all but the performance is far better for a hard use frame. But you could easily justify going bigger than Revs.

Wheels, likewise… Mine was fairly lightweight/allrounder so I used Traversees, lovely, but you could build a stronger C456 with the harder use wheel of your choice, crossmax sx or flows-on-hopes or whatever.

Oh, and when you’re building it, be wary of helicopter tape- On One say that it’s incompatible with these frames and recommend not using it. Though, the finish is pretty soft so if you don’t use it, it’ll soon look hammered. Bit of a dilemma.

Thanks for the quick reply, i want it as an all rounder really, bit of trail centre stuff and some local trails. Brake wise i was looking at XT M785’s, like i said this is my first build. I was going to just buy the 456 x9 bike but having read the elixr 3 brakes are crap has put me off.

I use 140 TALAS QR on mine and I rarely use the travel adjust but sometime sit is a bit steep.
i would not want 100 mm forks on it tbh but 120 would be ok

As for flex never felt it and my comparison forks are maxle pikes

Wheels as he says what do you want lightwieght or strength

I have some stans 355 or DT swiss 5.1 s depending on what i ride

I’ve got air sprung revs at 130mm on mine – I have a layback seat post and 50mm stem so found anymore than 130mm made the front wander a bit too much for my liking on climbs.

I’ve got helicopter tape on the downtube and around the bottom bracket area as a chain slipped off and caused a fair bit of cosmetic damage – I didn’t want it happening again so put some tape around the drive side bottom bracket shell.

Inner tube wrapped around the drive side chainstay takes care of that too.

I think it’s a great bike and less ugly n the flesh than many photographs suggest.

I have 140 QR Fox 32 RL on mine with a 2 degree slackset and it’s pretty much the only bike I ride now (out of 3 to chose from). Never had a problem with the slack angle steering.
Mine is raw black with no heli tape, but I did wrap the drive side stay to protect the carbon. My frame was £299 new and at that price I just decided not to care about frame aesthetics right from the start. There’s now a fair amount of cable rub around the headtube and marks around the BB, but overall it still looks ok IMO (think I’ve had it 3 yearsish). If yours is a painted frame then you have more to worry about, because the c456 paint chips fairly easily. A used painted frame might become obviously shabby looking, I don;t know and that’s if aesthetics bother you. For a few months I had a standard headset with the 140 QR Fox 32 RL and that was fine as well. I just fancied trying On One Summer Season Geometry because I could.
QR, bolt thru, slackset, blah blah, don;t get too hung up on the shite unless you can afford to.

Run fox on mine and it rides real nice…….taken last weekend in Afan

Mine is covered in Helitape and has been for the last 18 months. I’ve not noticed any marks or damage to the paint finish.

Oh yeah, angleset works really well in the C456- it’s not a brilliant climber anyway (perfectly decent at it but no rocket ship) so it doesn’t exactly blunt it, but it makes it far better on the way back down. I put one in to try and never considered taking it back out.

I have mine with 140mm Revs, with 740mm bars and 60mm stem.

I have heli tape down the downtube, on the top tube and some bits on the top of the seat stays which were just left over bits.

I also have a inner tube wrapped right up to the BB to stop the chain damaging the lacquer in there if chainsuck occurs.

There are chips and spots in the lacquer all over the bike, and a bit of cable rub at the headtube, but it’s all just cosmetic. You’ll never keep it spotless!

No issues with a (very) second hand set of 140mm RL’s (hand me downs) on my c456:

People go on about how flexi they are, and well maybe they are, but you’re not building a world cup downhill bike so i think you’ll be ok!
(personally, they feel fine to me, you can change the feel of the steering more by just putting an extra 5psi in the front tyre than by changing the fork…….)

Only think i did do is make up a little carbon rock/chainstay guard:

As my “winter” bike i don’t really look after it that well tbh, and yes, it looks a little bit battered now after last years long wet winter, but so what? As previously mentioned, the frames are cheap enough to be virtually disposable imo 😉

They are i think a bit of a “slow burner” in terms of how they ride. Long, quite slack and feeling a little bit “dull” perhaps initally. But you soon learn to love the stability and start to exploit the calm balance of the bike. No issues going uphill with the 140’s on either for me.

yes they do feel long when you first get them