Were any baby robins killed?

Was looking at the NS Eccentric cheap on CRC. They are a bit more LLS than I’d want for the riding I’d use it for, with the 140mm recommended fork. Then I noticed on their website that they offer the ally version with a 120mm fork, which puts the geo squarely in the XC/Trail/down/upcountry type thing. 66+ HA, 75 ish Seat tube. Pretty much what the Sirius/Scandal etc. The website has the reach wrong, they have it shorter with less travel, not longer. Was thinking of doing the same with the steel frame I might even go 490-500 rigid.

Anyone done anything similar? Any downsides?

Pedal strikes!

I had an old u turn rockshok fork the could be adjusted from 80-130mm.

The idea being to have a shorter fork when climbing. At 80mm I was forever clipping pedals. I ended up leaving it at 110 most of the time and only winding it out to full t ravel for the nastiest decents.

From 140 to 120 would probably be absolutely fine on a more modern bike as long as your trails aren’t totaly littered with chunky rocks.

What about running a fork like a pike where 120 to 140 is £40 and half an hour in the shed?

Hardtail Party likes to do it on youtube.

I think the effects of a longer fork diving on a hardtail are over-stated, particularly if you set your fork up right.

You might want to put shorter cranks on and increase your stack/reduce ETT and or/reach.

I am about to try this with my Murmur. I’ll report back….

I did this with my Zero AM – 150mm shortened to 130mm plus an angleset, to get a lower BB, slightly longer reach and steeper seat angle. It worked fine but in retrospect I think I needed higher bars.

I’m now running the same angleset but the forks at 150mm. The static angles are slacker and the BB higher.

However, and this is a BIG however – with the 150mm fork I’m running closer to 30% sag but with the 130mm I was at more like 20%. That puts the sagged axle to crown height of both within a few mm. So there’s more to it than fork travel, how you set up the fork matters a lot – and I found it very hard to get a 27.5 Pike feeling great at 130mm, I don’t think the ratios of negative to positive air chambers vs travel are as good as with more travel.

I should add that at 130mm the Pike was stock (quite firm at the start, softer in the middle and then ramping up, which is why I ran less sag to stop it being squishy when pumping).

I added a Luftkappe at some point but I know I increased the travel before that happened and felt that soft region head more towards the start of the travel so the midstroke got relatively firmer. Obviously the big negative spring on the Luftkappe helped that more!

Was looking at the NS Eccentric cheap on CRC. They are a bit more LLS than I’d want for the riding I’d use it for, with the 140mm recommended fork. Then I noticed on their website that they offer the ally version with a 120mm fork,

It’s only the ‘Eccentric Lite’ that comes with a 120 fork (IIRC) and it’s slightly different geo. The Alu and the Cromo Eccentrics both come with 140.

NB: I have the Cromo and love it.

Currently underforked on my FS, they recommend a 160mm and i run a 150mm only, no baby robins have been harmed, The difference in Geo was similar to using either a rockshox or a fox fork as one had a slightly longer ATC than the other.

Im still waiting to burst in flames the next time i attempt a medium sized drop.

I’m on an Ibis Ripmo, newer one, mean’t for 160mm single crown up front which gives some amount of degree’s of slack trail riding epic’ness. Didn’t want a fox, no DVO available last year, couldn’t stand the bright red of the lyric’s so put a RS pike 150 on it.

Absolutely ruined the handling, dropping it from 160 to 150mm has turned it into a road bike basically, only able to ride it on the forest roads to avoid the front end washing out. Wouldn’t recommend anything less than 20mm over mftr suggestion and an angle set on all bikes all of the time.

Pedal strikes!

Yeah, I did wonder about that. If my math is right, the BB would end up right about where it is on a stock BigWig, which gives me an idea of how bad they’d be – except for the fork dive issue.

What about running a fork like a pike where 120 to 140 is £40 and half an hour in the shed?

Thought about that too. I think one of the Manitou forks goes 130 to 120 relatively easily. I think I missed the cheap ones at CRC!

The only issue is sizing – with the recommended fork I’d go medium for reach. With the shorter fork the medium would be waaaaay too long, so I’d go small, which would be a bit short on the long forks.

However, and this is a BIG however – with the 150mm fork I’m running closer to 30% sag but with the 130mm I was at more like 20%.

Hmmmm. I hadn’t thought about sag etc. Not even sure if the numbers they quote are sagged or not. That would change things significantly.

It’s only the ‘Eccentric Lite’ that comes with a 120 fork (IIRC) and it’s slightly different geo. The Alu and the Cromo Eccentrics both come with 140.

@pyro – is the frame actually different? I’d assumed the different geo was a result of the shorter fork on the same frame. Certainly the numbers they get match what my dodgy math skills got by shortening the fork on the from by 20mm.
Except for reach, which they got backwards and bb drop ditto.

NB: I have the Cromo and love it.

You are going to make me spend money!
What size are you on vs height etc? They don’t give any guide and their sizes seem to run big, even factoring in LLS – the medium has a nearly 18″ seattube, where most mediums run about 17″. They are about 1/2-3/4″ longer reach in the medium too.

I’m on a medium, I’m 5’10” and it’s cracking. Swapped stems around to lift myself up a bit, but absolutely love the bike. Not the lightest, but I think it’s a cracking bike to ride.