Spring rate vs. compression damping – fork comfort for sustained rocky descents

I have my fork set up what feels just right for trail centre type stuff; that was pretty easy over winter to do consistent loops with different settings. Now winter’s over I’ll rarely visit a trail centre until say November.

What my fork isn’t set up right for, I believe, is rocky natural descending – Lakes or some Yorkshire type stuff, bridleways, walkers path-like bridleways, and old unsanitised tracks. I’ve never been as inclined to focus on improving setup here, as it’s less repeatable, and gets in the way of a nice adventure day out. I did such a ride yesterday which was pretty rough, wasn’t terribly uncomfortable but I noticed I only used 120 of 140mm fork travel. Presumably as I’m not doing any jumps or big drops.

Would be good if I could use that travel to improve comfort, which as I’m running compression full open already, means running a softer spring. In previous experimentation I found further removing even 2-5psi put the front end too low and lacked support in turns. The height should be sortable with a 5mm stem spacer, and I believe the support with compression damping. But I’ve always believed that would come at the expense of sensitivity and thus comfort.

I remembered this bike check from Pinkbike where for comfort on a long race they used a much lower spring rate but with high levels of compression damping to compensate. One of the comments led me to this Vitalmtb podcast with a Fox suspension engineer who was ex-motocross. What he says (from 14:35 to 27:00) is summarised as:

• MTB people depend too much on the spring
• That damping means harshness is a common fallacy in the MTB world
• Pressure and volume spacers make it harder to use full travel even when it would be desirable to do so for better performance when it’s not a big hit
• Suggests dropping 5-10psi, then use compression, and only finally think about more pressure/tokens
• Too much rebound damping is detrimental to traction
• Rebound damping is a sticking plaster solution to the root cause of storing too much energy in the spring to begin with by excessive stroke movement, through not controlling compression
• Limit compression and then you can reduce rebound damping – store less energy rather than controlling its release

I also heard McTrail rider mention he runs 30% fork sag with some compression damping, to make it less fatiguing. Now the abuse my fork gets is less than half what his does but it seems applicable.

Anyone tried more sag and more compression damping on their fork?

Add a token or two, this will help ramp up the spring rate and support the forks for steppy descents IME. Then adjust the rebound speed based on your preferred riding speed.

https://www.pinkbike.com/news/tech-tuesday-volume-spacers-and-spring-curves.html

Best to find a short section of trail and then ride it repeatedly trying out different settings and air pressures and number of tokens. Sometimes just a good service on your fork and really help increase it’s performance.

Whilst you’re experimenting with your suspension, how about trying out a pro enduro riders setup 🤟😉

https://tweedvalleybikes.co.uk/blogs/news/innes-graham-nukeproof-giga-297-bike-check#:~:text=Onto%20the%20suspension%2C%20Innes%20runs,to%20follow%20the%20trail%20contours.

Note, I run 30% sag on my Pikes, and think they’re setup well for tough mtb riding. This does mean that it’s not the most comfy fork for xc riding but I didn’t buy my Hello Dave for xc.

• 80kg weight
• 80 psi,
• One token spacer,
• 6 clicks from fastest rebound
• Compression fully open when descending

Just had some Lyriks tuned with suggested setup by J-Tech. Prior to this, I’ve run other RS forks with around the Trailhead app suggested pressure and very little compression damping. J-Tech recommended dropping 6psi and winding on 2 clicks of HSC and 13 of LSC (plus a click less rebound). The numbers seemed alien, but it rides so well. First couple of rutted, rocky hills I went down felt fantastic.

Funnily enough, I was listening to a car chassis engineer on a podcast last week… and he said in cars at least, the spring rate only needs to be just high enough to support the damper and let the damper do the work.

Add a token or two, this will help ramp up the spring rate and support the forks for steppy descents IME

I used to run 3 tokens for small bump sensitivity and taking landings. The support for cornering was fine but on anything even a little steep, I found (well, someone here suggested it) the fork always sagging towards the ramp up of the spring or hitting it on small/medium bumps, reducing comfort. Much better with 1 token and higher pressure.

Then adjust the rebound speed based on your preferred riding speed.

I’m not following… I should set the rebound damping for the suspension shaft vertically, based on the speed (km/h) I travel? I’ve seen that mentioned as a common beginner’s misconception.

Best to find a short section of trail and then ride it repeatedly trying out different settings and air pressures and number of tokens. Sometimes just a good service on your fork and really help increase it’s performance.

Yep, done that a lot on trail centre stuff as I mentioned, but less inclined to do it on a passes day out. Serviced recently.

I’m not following… I should set the rebound damping for the suspension shaft vertically, based on the speed (km/h) I travel? I’ve seen that mentioned as a common beginner’s misconception.

If you like to ride a bit slower (picking your way down steppy descents) then a slower rebound is preferable IME. Where’s if you like to ride as fast as you can then try running the rebound faster, to stop the fork from packing down.

It’s one thing that I mess with on my suspension most of all is rebound. Fast trail centre riding I like my rebound to be almost as fast as the fork will go, but for longet natural xc rides I like the rebound to be slower, to make the fork be more comfy without the harsh rebound.

Obviously most will ride somewhere in between, as always it’s a compromise and a preference. I’m just sharing mine.

Isn’t the recommendation, set sag then if you. Bottom out increase compression damping?

if you have separate low and high speed compression use the high speed to control bottom out and the low speed to control diving.

i went through a period of trying to make the forks more comfortable by reducing compression, but discovered that a softer spring and more compression was preferable.

I always used to be a “compression wide open” type. Then I used a shockwiz, and tried some alternative settings, which I’ve stuck with for years and am very happy with.

Most notably I use a reasonable amount of HSC and LSC, air pressure 15psi below recommended (!!) and no tokens. I rarely bottom out at all.

I think damper quality has a lot to do with the ability to go down this route. I.e. can the compression assembly handle high and low speed inputs reliably and consistently? Older RS dampers suffered with spiking at high speed, so what worked for bimbling was downright dangerous when things got wild. Newer, high end dampers seem to have resolved a lot of this issue.

Its interesting to hear how different the thought processes of MX are compared to MTB dogma.

It kinda supports a couple of discussions I’ve had recently as I switch my FS to coil suspension. It’s been mentioned independently by those separately supplying front and rear that its better to be a bit soft and use compression to support.

A bit like cakeandcheese, I’ve always been happier with a softer air fork and less rebound damping, but I’ve never been able to reconcile the diving because ‘compression is harshness’ is fixed in my brain. Time to review.

 I did such a ride yesterday which was pretty rough, wasn’t terribly uncomfortable but I noticed I only used 120 of 140mm fork travel. Presumably as I’m not doing any jumps or big drops.

Personally, I wouldn’t get hung up on how much travel you’re using. If the fork’s working okay otherwise and ‘wasn’t terribly uncomfortable’ or just ‘wrong’ just stick with the set-up you have. The next natural trail you ride might have some steps and drops and you’ll be fine, you might even use the last 20mm if that makes you happy.

If you want to experiment, that’s fair enough, though if you’re running coil forks – which you seem to be – it seems like an unnecessary expense/hassle for what seems to be a relatively small gain unless you have a softer spring already?

In the end, I don’t think the theory’s that important if your suspension works okay in the real world.

If you inclined to dive into the physics of it, Steve at Vorsprung has some interesting videos on such things.

I think sag is one of the most misleading things we’ve been taught. There’s a suspension tuner in NZ, Dougal, who always promotes frequency rather than sag. If it feels like a pogo stick and you’re getting bounced around, go softer, if it feels wallowy, go firmer.

I know a good few decades ago, rally cars switched from the spring doing all the work to the damper doing it, primarily when damper tech and durability caught up.

After all, the spring, air or coil, stores and returns the energy, the damper dissipates it. But that brings me full circle to the Vorsprung tech Tuesday videos again

Once you’ve got your fork nearer your liking, look at the rear…

Yesterday a pal following me down a couple of Golfie descents commented that my rear wheel was “all over the shop”.

I do like to ride the front so kinda ignore what’s going on at the back, but, I took a click off both high speed compression & rebound.  Definitely felt more ‘composed’ for the rest of the ride.

I think the ‘rules’ that we’ve been taught as mountain bikers. 1. Sag setting and 2. “use full travel at least once a ride” has a couple of knock-on effects, Folks shy away from compression damping as it has a controlling effect on rule two and the rider sees that as not using full travel, and riders use more and more spring (or more and more tokens to support the fork) to compensate and consequently have less and less sag.

Without effective compression damping, the fork moves too much and too fast, and taking off the compression damping will also make the fork feel more supple and softer. Throw into that the fact that many/most suspension manufacturers use the compression circuits for lockout and people understand that as more compression = fork not moving. In most situations the fork is fine (without much compression damping), but if it gets repeated big hits, it’ll suddenly feel uncontrolled.

Personally* I’ll set the fork up as soft (spring) and as fast (rebound) as I can and control both using compression, which has the added effect of controlling the fork on repeated larger hits and controlling dive (more generally) so the geometry stays more neutral.

*There is no perfect fork set up.

Just a few thoughts:

1. It’s really hard to measure fork sag accurately, so I tend to just start with the recommended air pressure and adjust by ride feel.
2. Riding the damping more than the spring can feel great on some products (e.g. EXT Storia shock, some coil forks), but as mentioned – a lot of MTB dampers have been a bit lacking in previous years.
3. I ride quite a lot of rocky trails, and smoother ones – and I don’t really tweak the settings, apart from dialling off some LSC riding the fast rocky Pont Scethin descents last weekend (I don’t have a HSC knob on that fork).

I’ve found faster rebound and higher compression damping to be beneficial with air forks. Keeps them in the ‘softer’ zone nearer the sag point where the air is less compressed. As the fork uses travel the air compresses and the fork ramps up / feels harder, particularly if its rammed with tokens.

If your compression damping is full open, and you’re running rebound damping, the fork will be ‘jacking down’ during sustained bumps (e.g. a rough descent) and making it feel much harsher than it really is.

The points that you highlighted from the Fox suspension guy (unsurprisingly) make perfect sense to me. I didn’t realise that there was an ‘mtb sub-set’ that had other ideas (some self-promulgating facebook group stuff??).

…And don’t get hung up on using the full suspension travel every ride – IMHO, the only time you should be hitting full travel is in the biggest, ‘oh-sheet-I’ve-overcooked-it’ type event that doesn’t happen that often, but would be made worse by your suspension bottoming out.

YMMV.

Personally, I wouldn’t get hung up on how much travel you’re using. If the fork’s working okay otherwise and ‘wasn’t terribly uncomfortable’ or just ‘wrong’ just stick with the set-up you have. The next natural trail you ride might have some steps and drops and you’ll be fine, you might even use the last 20mm if that makes you happy.

If you want to experiment, that’s fair enough, though if you’re running coil forks – which you seem to be

…And don’t get hung up on using the full suspension travel every ride

Yep just want to experiment. Why settle for good when better may be possible. Fork is air.

If you inclined to dive into the physics of it, Steve at Vorsprung has some interesting videos on such things.

Watched them all a good while back. This is a relevant one but I don’t think he covers this aspect.

I’ve found faster rebound and higher compression damping to be beneficial with air forks. Keeps them in the ‘softer’ zone nearer the sag point where the air is less compressed. As the fork uses travel the air compresses and the fork ramps up / feels harder, particularly if its rammed with tokens.

Same principle as the problem I found with too many tokens. In your scenario it sounds like the first hit would be less comfortable, but on sustained hits it’s consistent rather than getting worse.

If your compression damping is full open, and you’re running rebound damping, the fork will be ‘jacking down’ during sustained bumps (e.g. a rough descent) and making it feel much harsher than it really is.

Yes. I’ve set the rebound using the “press it down, release it, it should barely jump off the ground” method, then refine a bit bouncing around the car park. I should experiment more really.

The points that you highlighted from the Fox suspension guy (unsurprisingly) make perfect sense to me. I didn’t realise that there was an ‘mtb sub-set’ that had other ideas (some self-promulgating facebook group stuff??).

It made sense to me too, but it was different. Where I learnt my original misconceptions, probably some of the big bike sites, their videos, threads on here.

From what you describe, you need more resistance to using the deeper part of the stroke. This can be achieved with either more progression in the air spring (tokens) or adding more damping.

Easiest way to would be to add some damping, one click at a time. Ride a descent.

If you feel your hands start to hurt after a while or the fork feels harsh then you probably actually want more progression. In that case, whack a token in and repeat. Might want to try a psi or 2 lower pressure with an extra token.

Air springs can be counter intuitive sometimes. If it feels harsh, usually people lower the pressure until they arrive at a pressure so low that there’s no support in the fork. It still feels harsh because you’re running into the ramp up at the end of the stroke so actually, more air would be the answer.

I think you’ve got it about right if you’re just above the point where you lose support. That’s where the damper should be helping you out. Remember, that damper doesn’t affect the spring rate, only the amount of time it takes to compress the spring.

Obviously, that depends on the damper. Some are better than others.

I’ve recently dropped the pressure in my Mezzer by quite a bit. Down to 40psi from 45. I’ve always been a damper wide open guy but having dropped the main air pressure and upped the IRT (same as adding tokens) I’m able to run the LsC almost closed for support and the fork is riding so much better. It almost feels too soft but when you actually push it down something fast and chunky, it’s still supportive enough to keep the front end up but super smooth.

Coming from Rockshox it’s a revelation (pun unintended) to be able to rely on the damper rather air pressure.

From what you describe, you need more resistance to using the deeper part of the stroke. This can be achieved with either more progression in the air spring (tokens) or adding more damping.

How do you conclude that? I said I’m not using the deeper part of the stroke.

Onzadog
Free Member

I think sag is one of the most misleading things we’ve been taught.

TBH it’s not so much misleading as misunderstood. People obsess about it, I think because it’s measurable and everything else is so subjective and harder to perceive. It has its place for sure but you see people basically sabotaging their setup in order to get a magical sag number that they’re convinced is right. It’s a really good starting point when you’re setting up new suspension but tbf most people never really get past the starting point and don’t really understand why they’re doing it.

bikesandboots

Full Member

How do you conclude that? I said I’m not using the deeper part of the stroke.

Ha! I think my brain was moving faster than I had the ability to type.

I think what Im saying is that if you go with more sag/ less air pressure then you’ll need to add tokens or damping to keep the fork from blowing through the travel.

If you’re not using the full travel when you want to, then I’d say it’s the progression in the air spring that’s stopping you from getting that. Adding tokens in that case is a bad idea as it’ll stop you getting full travel. You said you already removed a load and dropped the pressure. This is my preferred feel too.

What fork is it? What travel?

Did you try taking out that last token? I found my Revelation and Pike were too progressive for me with any tokens in (set at 150, I weigh ~73kg).

Would be good if I could use that travel to improve comfort

No. Think of that last bit as emergency reserve, you will only ever use it landing from jumps on rocks etc.

I used to obsess about getting full travel, then I gave up and set the fork to feel good, and the results were far better. IMO what’s important is how your fork supports you, you can then tune the damping as fast as you can whilst still feeling controlled. For me this is pretty fast since I love to move around a lot on the bike for the fun of it at times, so my body movement compensates for and absorbs a lot of rebound action from the spring.

Getting your fork to use an extra 10mm of travel will make it wallowy and soft, and you will still have too much sag. And it’ll dive like Tom Daley as soon as you hit the brakes, your bars will disappear from under your body mass and you’ll get pitched forward.

I think it can depend on the fork length as well.

I regularly get full travel from my 130mm Pike – and it isn’t compromising on support.

It’s much rarer to get full travel from my 160mm fork and I’m not sure I ever have from my 180mm Zeb.

To the OP, what fork is it?

The reason I ask is that different brands can be very different to set up despite having the same dials to twiddle.

My personal experience is that with any of the recent Fox grip dampers the slow speed rebound totally dominates the fork, and has by far the most influence on the other controls including compression, particularly on the Grip2 VVC damper.

There is a well known harshness to this damper on high speed hard & repeated hits, such as the rocky descents I think you’re describing.

When I raced the mega last year, prior to the race I had been very happy with the fork on my usual UK trails, by day 3 of mega week I was struggling to hold on it was so harsh.

I took it to a tuner on site at the race village & it was him who initially described the damper harshness problem. He set my fork up rather counter-intuitively (because the problems I had were at speed) in that he backed off the slow speed rebound almost entirely and upped the high speed compression.

His explanation was along the lines of: the slow rebound dominates the whole damping, so backed off allows the oil to flow better at all times; then increasing the high speed compression to stop the fork blowing through travel too easily (he stressed that the effect of HSC on this damper is actually negligible) and left the slow speed open.

The fork was better but still not what I would call great (at least I could hold on).

I took the bike back to him that evening and he further explained that although the rebound is completely open on the dial, it still provides a lot of damping at that position; as do all the damping controls – open does not mean no damping, just the least damped of the parameters the manufacturer gives you.

I sold those forks & bought a set of Marzocchi z1 coil, which I felt were better & I will admit I much preferred the Grip sweep damper on these, but was still unsatisfied.

Ive ended up buying a Fast sc5 damper unit, and though I’m yet to really put it through its paces I see no sign of the harshness, they sit much higher in their travel & seem to give up travel at high speed readily.

We may have different aim as I don’t really care about small bump trail chatter, i just want the high speed hard hit performance, I.e. I want it to work properly when I really need it.

Sorry for the rambling but if you’re searching for a specific feel you may be chasing shadows with setup.

What fork is it? What travel?

To the OP, what fork is it?

The other day’s ride – Formula Selva R 140mm. Yes, I bought a can of worms, and I like it.

The one I had too many tokens in – Pike Ultimate RCT3 140mm B4/2020.

Did you try taking out that last token?

Not in the Pike because I’d have to compensate with more pressure which was uncomfortable. Not in the Selva either but only because I’ve not got round to it yet. It has a single Neopos spacer from the factory.

No. Think of that last bit as emergency reserve, you will only ever use it landing from jumps on rocks etc.

I used to obsess about getting full travel, then I gave up and set the fork to feel good, and the results were far better

Yes, I already get the idea with that. The main question here is about how to get the best possible comfort – the not using all my travel is just a relevant recent experience, rather than an actual problem. The performance I have now is the best I’ve ever experienced, but better still may well be possible. I doubt that setting the fork up iteratively on very different terrain has produced the best possible setup for this terrain.

Getting your fork to use an extra 10mm of travel will make it wallowy and soft, and you will still have too much sag. And it’ll dive like Tom Daley as soon as you hit the brakes, your bars will disappear from under your body mass and you’ll get pitched forward.

Hence the question about damping. It can be done, see the Pinkbike bike check I posted, they were running 25% less pressure than usual.

I think it can depend on the fork length as well.

I regularly get full travel from my 130mm Pike – and it isn’t compromising on support.

It’s much rarer to get full travel from my 160mm fork and I’m not sure I ever have from my 180mm Zeb.

Interesting point. You want the same support from any length fork. While a longer fork can absorb the same hits with a lower spring rate, that does mean you’ve less support.

His explanation was along the lines of: the slow rebound dominates the whole damping, so backed off allows the oil to flow better at all times; then increasing the high speed compression to stop the fork blowing through travel too easily (he stressed that the effect of HSC on this damper is actually negligible) and left the slow speed open.

That’s pretty much what the Pinkbike article describes.

Sorry for the rambling but if you’re searching for a specific feel you may be chasing shadows with setup.

Not at all, really interesting. I have the CTS to play with the Selva, and mine has the light rebound damper tune.

mildred
Full Member

His explanation was along the lines of: the slow rebound dominates the whole damping, so backed off allows the oil to flow better at all times; then increasing the high speed compression to stop the fork blowing through travel too easily (he stressed that the effect of HSC on this damper is actually negligible) and left the slow speed open.

Yep, depressingly common. “crosstalk” is the bane of more basic dampers, it’s why the old mission control was so damn good, the adjusters were as close to completely independent as anything I’ve ever used so you didn’t really have to deal with this sort of “having to outsmart the damper” nonsense. And also it makes for really easy adjustment, when you add a click of X and it actually changes X noticably and barely affects Y and Z at all.

@Northwind – Yes absolutely correct.

To go off on a little tangent, I’ve had plenty of suspension products over the years starting with a Mag21, Bomber RC2, RC3ti & V2, Bos Deville, RS Motion control & Mission Control, all except the latest charger dampers, the odd manitou, and most Fox dampers.

I can say with all certainty that damping has certainly not improved to the same degree as other aspects of suspension design and reliability, but what’s frustrating is how we’re told that each year’s version is an improvement on the last. Utter bunkum; the best performing forks I’ve ever had are my Bos Deville (non FCV version), Marzocchi 55 RC3tiV2 & Totems with Mission Control (in that order) all forks from a few years ago.

it’s definitely isn’t rose tinted specs either; up until using a charger damper I had virtually never experienced arm pump on hard fast descents. It seems that from then on all modern dampers seemed to focus more on slow speed characteristics, groomed trail performance etc. that’s just NOT what I want or need. Maybe it’s me because of a background in BMX, but I don’t need to be isolated from trail chatter, pebbles and roots; I don’t need the suspension for trail comfort, I have arms & legs and can adjust my tyre volume or pressures for that; what I want is a firm platform for stability around the sag point, something to push against (high low speed damping) but also a fork that’s extremely quick to respond to hard high speed hits – in other words I want my suspension as an insurance policy or high speed get out of jail – I need suspension when I REALLY need it, the rest of the time I don’t want to even notice it’s there.

I realise that what I want from suspension may be just my personal preference, and not shared by everyone; maybe I’m a bit odd because I find that most dampers on newer forks only give you very limited adjustment, within whatever parameter the manufacturer has set (the recent Fox Grip2 VVC especially – in my experience even with the adjuster completely open it retains a significant damping/choked feeling) which is why I said earlier that @bikesnboots may be chasing shadows with his setup.

One final thought, one of the best feeling forks i owned was my 55 rc3ti v2 – an amazing fork but also a fork that had a very distinct compression damping “crosstalk”, which Marzocchi discussed in their online tuning guides rather than ignoring or denying it exists.

This blog is still an interesting read:

http://marzocchiworkshop.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2016-08-25T08:32:00%2B01:00&max-results=7&start=14&by-date=false&m=1

I wonder if it’s the US influence – there seem to be a lot more woodsy trails there which seem to be fairly smooth, and in ‘big’ mountain locations people seem to end up at bike parks where the trails are groomed.  I have not seen a Peak/Welsh style rocky trail in the USA.

@mildred, that sounds familiar to me and is why I changed the oil from 5wt to 2.5wt in my Z2s.  Since LSC is not adjustable in that fork, it was the only way to get the damn thing moving over small bumps.  Of course I’m not after limo comfort but the chatter was so bad that on armoured trail centre trails it was pretty limiting, and even on some of my local fire roads it was distinctly uncomfortable. It was however great on big features on technical trails taken slower, as you’d expect.  But since I’ve been able to dial some HSC back in, it is overall miles better now.

 one of the best feeling forks i owned was my 55 rc3ti v2

I’m sure we’ve discussed those RC3 ti forks on here before, but my new Z1 coil has finally got me back close to that effortless rock-and-root-melting feeling.

You mentioned above that you weren’t happy with the damper on your Z1, why was that?

FWIW I think the RS Zeb with charger 3 damper is pretty decent, it’s just still got that bit of stiction that can feel unbalancing on a bed of wet roots or whatever.

OP – did you try the soft CTS in your Selva already? I found my Mod rear shock too harsh and swapping to the soft CTS was a great fix

You mentioned above that you weren’t happy with the damper on your Z1, why was that?

Don’t get me wrong, it was a world of difference when compared to the so called better grip2 vvc damper, and I loved the instant support with the grip sweep. However, even with a firm spring and all of the damping completely wound off it was harsh on high speed Rocky descents. Again, I emphasise that it was nowhere near as harsh as the grip2 but I also suspected the coil was helping a lot, as oppose to the air spring.

For reference I rode my grip 2 vvc factory 36 with 107psi & one token. I tried two token & a variety of air pressures, and no token and a variety of air pressures. At the mega I was getting all but about 5mm of travel, it was supportive on slow over the seat tech bits, but at speed… it was horrific.

I have a similar issue to the OP with My Mezzer, but have sort of lacked the time to play with pressures and settings, it’s set to 160mm and seems to track quite well in the initial half of its travel, but I think I’ve maybe got the ‘IRT’ spring pressure set too high (it’s basically got two stacked air springs that run at different pressures) even when pushing quite hard the other week at BPW I just wasn’t getting the last 10-15mm of travel but I wasn’t really dealing with lots of stutter or vibrations. I might as well be riding a 140mm fork.
I’ll admit I’ve been a bit reticent to ramp up compression (it’s got High and low speed) and instead have maybe run more ‘Main’ spring pressure to stand the fork up more.

There’s lots of info about for the Mezzer, and a spreadsheet compiled with settings shared by various users. But making useful sense of it is the hardest thing, just because someone of a similar weight with the same travel uses a specific setup there’s no guarantee that will work for you…

I do at least know I don’t like lots of rebound, I like the fork to extend back quickly.

Basically I need to find the time to play with spring pressure(s) and compression damping on repeated runs of a familiar trail or two and then just confirm I’ve not ruined it for climbing and longer distance riding and that it’s still supportive enough for seated pedalling… The trouble is knowing how twiddling one dial or changing one pressure will affect all the other settings…

TBF I thought my 55s didn’t have a good damper setting in them, if they had enough damping to actually control the spring they were chokey. I thought they were broken but apparently that was what they were supposed to be like. People raved about how reactive and supple they were and that was definitely true but reactive <and> controlled, that’s the trick. They were incredible when you hit the first root or hole but not so much when there were 20 in a heap with a corner in the middle

I swapped them for lyrik micos with a uturn coil in which honestly are still prpbably the best fork I’ve ever had, weight aside. I mean, my 36s are really good, but they’ve had a ton of money thrown at them, the lyriks were that good on day 2 (because on day 1, the 2-step airspring exploded while they were still in the box). I still have a dh bike with the same era’s boxxers in and that pretty much summed that ancient lyrik up, it was a pocket dh fork you could put on a trailbike, it only lost the seperate high and low speed rebound. I’ve not ridden anything from Rockshox since that I like much at all, tbf.

Have you compressed the fork and marked where full travel actually is on the stanchion? The crown never gets close to the seal on the mezzer. There’s always a ~10mm gap so it can often look like you’re not using full travel.

With a shock pump connected to the main air valve, you should be able to push the fork fully through the travel.

There’s also the hydraulic bottom out control that won’t let you use the last bit of travel unless you really clout something hard.

Start off with the compression and rebound dials wound right out. A good starting point for the air pressure is to out your weight in kg into the IRT (as PSI) and then set the main pressure to  0.6 of that value.

So if you weight 60kg, 60 psi in the top and then 36 in the main. 90kgs go for 90 IRT and 54 in the main etc.

Get a digital pump. 1 or 2 psi can make all the difference and trying to get repeatable results using a gauge where the needle is 5psi thick makes life difficult.

Once you’ve got the initial sensitivity of the fork how you want it, then start to add damping one click at a time until you get the support you want.

The best set up for me initially felt way to soft in the carpark test and like I’d be bottoming out all over the place but once you get out and ride a trail somewhere, you realise that the damper does amazing things.

Commenting so I can find this discussion again in future.

I suspect I’m guilty of relying on the spring rate to do the work rather than the damper, so perhaps I need to experiment. Thing being I owned a Shockwiz briefly (a few months before it was refunded under warranty…) and arrived at my current settings of very little compression damping on advice from it.

@Northwind my 55 was great – the spring rate was all cack and I had to use the air preload, but that actually worked ok for me, though more like an air assisted bottom out control.

Here’s my Nicolai Helius ST in Les Deux Alpes 2014 with 55’s, Push tuned Van RC & Hammerschmidt – steam roller of a bike..!

I’m another one who had some marz 55 rc3ti forks and didn’t think they were all that.

They were very supple, but always felt like a pogo stick to me regardless of damping settings

OP – did you try the soft CTS in your Selva already? I found my Mod rear shock too harsh and swapping to the soft CTS was a great fix

Came with gold, loved it (the damping) compared to my previous fork. Was keen to try one of the progressive valves (less LSC, more HSC) so got the blue, was way too harsh with all that high speed so it only stayed in for one ride. Now on violet (a softer gold) but haven’t spent time experimenting to make the most of it. The blue might go back in to try the soft spring more damping idea. If I buy one more valve I might as well have bought the whole box set for just a couple more pounds!

Have you compressed the fork and marked where full travel actually is on the stanchion? The crown never gets close to the seal on the mezzer. There’s always a ~10mm gap so it can often look like you’re not using full travel.

Selva has this even more so – 20mm, I believe regardless of travel setting.

Once you’ve got the initial sensitivity of the fork how you want it, then start to add damping one click at a time until you get the support you want.

I’ll give this approach a go, cheers.

Thing being I owned a Shockwiz briefly (a few months before it was refunded under warranty…) and arrived at my current settings of very little compression damping on advice from it.

I thought it was pretty useless, sold it. Followed to arrive at my low pressured Pike with 3 tokens in, practically hitting the rampup on every hit especially if steepish downhill. The idea that you can choose some words like “comfort poppy” and then have it monitor the pressure in your fork/shock, and guide you towards a preferred setup without any other information or feedback from the rider, now looks like nonsense to me.

@bens, cheers yeah I set it up initially inline with the standard normal setup guidance but then did go a little higher on the IRT as it seemed softer than I thought it should.Q
I wasn’t aware that they don’t fully compress to the crown TBH, but I think I’m more like 20mm short normally anyhow, I think I will try running them a little softer but with HSC wound on and everything else backed off a bit as my instinct is plush with some compression to control the deeper stroke makes sense.

Interestingly when you look at other people’s shared numbers lots seem to go a bit lower than manitou suggest for the IRT, but then some go maybe a smidge higher relatively on the main chamber, which is surprising.

Damping dials seem to be all over the place…

I do wonder if I’d have been better off with fewer settings to play with…

I do wonder if I’d have been better off with fewer settings to play with…

I did think about this before getting the Selva and specifically the R version.

Essentially now, anything I don’t like about how the fork behaves is all my own fault.

Anyway, I enjoy suspension geekery, and the fork was an investment in still being able to use my hands when I’m 70.

cookeaa

Full Member

I think I will try running them a little softer but with HSC wound on and everything else backed off a bit as my instinct is plush with some compression to control the deeper stroke makes sense.

I’d still leave the HSC all the way to start with. The IRT is there to control the end of the stroke. It’s creating progression in the air spring. The difference between it and the main changes where in the stroke is starts to have an effect. Best setup I’ve found so far is (relative to the 0.6 ratio above) slightly lower main and slightly higher IRT. I was at 45/73, I’m now at 40/80 with LsC wound right in and it’s fantastic. I’ve removed one of the 17mm shims from the HSC and would like it softer still ideally.

bikesandboots Full Member

Anyway, I enjoy suspension geekery, and the fork was an investment in still being able to use my hands when I’m 70.

This is how I know if something isn’t right. Sore hands at the bottom of a descent, particularly on rocky stuff. It’s usually the damping for me. Air pressure problems are usually fairly obvious whereas damping issues tend to not really reveal themselves immediately but instead manifest into sore hands or shoulders after a ride.

bikesandboots Full Member

Essentially now, anything I don’t like about how the fork behaves is all my own fault.

I have the exact same thoughts. At the same time though, knowing I’ve got the adjustability to make it better makes it fun. Even if I do lack the knowledge 😂

If you have a fork with no adjustment and it feels crap, you’d feel deflated and disappointed. At least with lots of dials and clickers to twiddle there’s a chance it might be amazing one day.