My first bike related post in a while…

I’m planning to put my full suss bike back together. It’s been stored with the wheels off since last November. It had only done about 130km since it was serviced then stored. Both shocks were serviced, dropper post, brakes bled etc.

Need I do anymore than turn it up side down for a bit to get some oil into the fork seals, check for anything being seized and top up/redo the tyre sealant?

It’ll probably be fine but a quick squirt of silicone (fork juice etc) on the stanchions of forks, shock and dropper before operation may help avoid any problems. Occasionally you find that after being left static the stiction around the seals gets so high you get a little ring mark from where the seal wiper was for so many months. A bit of silicone may help avoid this.

I’ve had my full suspension bike built for four years now, and not serviced the shock, fork or dropper. All work fine

Check for bike worm just in case it’s been eaten away from the inside out.

If you’ve got Shimano brakes they might have self destructed…..

Sound like my full sus! I give the brakes a check, silicon lube the shocks and a general checking over.

I pay more attention when I put it to bed for the year so to speak. Better to prepare to storage well imo.

Pump tyres up. Ride it

The only time I’ve had problems with a bike that’s been stored it had Avid brakes and they were locked on. I think the fluid expands or something, and it has nowhere to go in that model of Avids; released a bit and they were fine.

Half of my bikes haven’t been ridden for that long. I’d just pump tyres up and go.

Pumped up the tyres, checked linkage bolts, lubed chain and fork stanchions, all worked and continued to work except……. the Reverb seat post!!

It became squeaky and noisy on dropping/raising and started to be slow to rise up. So bled it when I got home. One small air bubble did come out at the post end and on reinstalling, it seemed better. Still noisy though. Will check if the seat collar tightness has any effect on that and will double check the psi inside it.

I’ll not be buying another. Such a faff. I’ve yet to have one that doesn’t develop an issue that requires it to be sent back or be serviced.

Argh! The ups and downs of reverb ownership…

Mainly downs, getting stuck down.

or be serviced

By that I meant serviced by a shop/specialist.

It always seems to be reverbs giving trouble with the people I ride bikes with…..would never buy one!

+1 about the Shimano brakes. They’ll no doubt have dumped a load of mineral oil on the rotors and will squeal like a hog for the first 5 miles.

The Reverb is now locked solid in the up position. B*ll*cks! Kind of knew it was going that way. It did 130km since a service then sat for 8 months. Useless junk. I’ve had 4 Reverbs, two of which went back as warranty replacements within weeks of owning them. Out of luck with this one though as it’s out of warranty. Might eBay it as a “non-runner”, although it’s off the bike now so might try a bleed again, just to be sure.

That’s so bad that it’s done that. Given the price of a full reverb service vs a brand x ascend dropper you could pretty much just buy a new ascend every couple of years instead…although one of mine is already past 2 years old and it’s still working at the moment and it’s had zero maintenance. Wondering if it’s worth trying to source new keys to go inside it as it has a little more rotational play than new – but not that noticeable.

Funnily enough, the only thing on my old 26er that didn’t work properly after a year of shed-dwelling was the Thomson dropper.