I have an Orange 5 with a Monarch debonair. I’m blowing through the travel pretty easily with the sag set right, more air firms it up but at the expense of most of the travel. There are already 6 bands in the can.

Can I replace the debonair can with a standard can (will that help)? Quite why the debonair was offered as an “upgrade” I don’t know, reading about the way the suspension works on a 5 it would seem a low volume shock would be the better option. Is a different shock the way forward, if so – which one?

TIA 🙂

Just out of interest, how much do you weigh, and how much PSI are you running?

Just put an Monarch RC3 on my Five, and still playing with setup. At 70kg I’ve put 190psi and 3 bands in. With 30% sag I used all but 5mm of travel on a rocky lakes ride. So I think that’s a good starting point.

With your situation, wouldn’t more air and less bands work?

Is it the right shock tune for the bike or is it an aftermarket shock in standard MM tune?

The shock was factory fitted by Orange bigjim, so presumably is the correct tune (but who knows!)

ben – I’m 78kg kitted up, I was running 170psi to give 25% sag(approx!). Is yours the Debonair or a standard can?

Not sure I’ve actually bottomed it out, but it just gives up the travel too easily with no support.

Mine is the Debonair can. 190psi was about 30% sag for me, with a M/M tune on the shock and 3 bands. I’m probably 73kg kitted up

Hmm. Maybe I’ll drop a couple out and stick 200psi in there, see if that helps. I’ve gone from a multi-pivot Nicolai to the 5 & the nicolai had a really progressive feel to the suspension and maybe I’m trying to emulate that, which will never happen!

I’ve gone from a Stumpjumper Evo to a Five. The single pivot certainly feels quite different (and less poppy I think), but I find it very predictable and fast.

My debonair has sucked. Was losing air overnight, now seems to be losing air mid ride.

I’m going to strip it down and give it a service at the weekend to see if that improves it.

https://nsmb.com/articles/care-for-your-debonair/

Reducing the volume with a smaller can or adding spacer bands won’t help the midstroke support, it only affects bottom out resistance. You either need to run higher psi, more compression damping or get the shock modded with a larger negative spring (or upgrade to one like that or a coil spring).

Chief – good info, thanks

I ruined the ride of my nomad with a debonair by experimenting adding bands. It did exactly the opposite of what logic tells you it should. I ended up taking all them back out and the ride was amazing again. I haven’t messed since.

andysredmini – Member

I ruined the ride of my nomad with a debonair by experimenting adding bands. It did exactly the opposite of what logic tells you it should. I ended up taking all them back out and the ride was amazing again. I haven’t messed since.

Interested to hear your kitted up weight, what you tried and what you’ve settled for

Cheers

I weigh about 13st. I think I tried 4 then 6 then 8 bands. I got to the point that every ride I spent more time messing with rebound settings and air pressure than riding. I was on one ride and got so annoyed that I took all the bands out trailside and pumped it up to whatever santacruz recommended and it was like having a new bike. The bike I enjoyed riding before messing. My problem was that I was trying to set my shock up for both general trail riding and 12ft+ jumps and drops.

Edit: by adding bands it was still bottoming out on the big jumps but felt like a hard tail on small bumps. It got worse with more bands. No amount of pressure experimentation or rebound adjustment helped.

Hmm, interesting for sure. I’m about the same and have tried two and four bands (currently on 4 and 205psi @30% sag) can’t seem to find the sweet spot. It feels good but lacking some mid stroke support and then seems to blow through and hit the internal bump stop on drops and jumps. More air makes it feel harsh and misses out on small bump sensitivity

More trial and error needed obviously

Thanks for the response

Took all but 2 of the bands out (it actually had 7 in there), stuck 200psi (30% sag) in and went for a ride. Totally different – much more initial and mid support with a nice ramp up. Still a bit of tweaking room I think, but heading in the right direction. Cheers for the steer chaps

Sure a skills course won’t fix it?

Bit of an update on this – took all bands out, increased psi to 235 ( not harsh as reported earlier, I think that was due to the bands and rebound setting), 3 clicks from fast on rebound and it felt great today at CYB. Think I need a band in there just to help with ramp up at the end of the stroke for drops and jumps

Normally ride natural stuff in The Peak, The Lakes, Wales amongst other places, so will see how it fares on the that in the coming weeks as opposed to groomed trails.

Might have just saved £700 not buying an X2

Carlos

Maybe Tom 😉