I’m thick! What is the meaning of linear?

We must also consider the fact that it is only a bicycle!

V8 – nope, they aren’t, I think thats the point of them. Google it, theres a fair few pages otu there with simulations of all the major types.

Amos – might only be a bicycle, but with direct connection to some of the most sensitive instruments available (arms/hands) the difference in suspension tuning can be vast. Its not just springs and some oil like Asda bikes seem to assume 😀

Air springs are not linear. A good fork manufacturer will leave a bit of volume open in the air chamber when the fork hits the bottom out bumper, so that you can actually get full travel (ie Pace).. My MZ 66s have 180mm of throw ie the piston can move that far in the cartridge when the insides are all out, but in the fork you can never reach the last 20mm of travel. So they just lie blatantly by calling them 180mm.

Another more important factor with air forks is that there’s a fair bit of initial friction to overome due to the seals. So you get a firm start, then a slack bit then it ramps back up again. Some manufs have a linear coil spring as a negative spring to help overcome this, and it works rather well.

Coil forks on the other hand have no resistance to inital movement at all since the first infinitesimal part of spring compression takes no force at all. That’s why they are incredibly plush. You could watch my old coil 66s moving fractions of a mm as they tracked the tiniest bumps on a tarmac road.

Note that some degree of ramp-up towards the end of the travel can be a good thing, especially for forks that are designed to land from drops or take a bit of serious beating otherwise. The coil 66s, rather than have the spring rate ramp up, have an extra stiff compression damper in the last 30mm of travel to help stop you bottoming them out on big hits or landings.

PS It’s only a bicycle, but so what? I want mine to work as nicely as it can 🙂