Setting up forks
Sikora
Posts: 519
I've put this in the beginners forum as i'm sure its a topic a few novices come across too.
Basically i've been cycling for a few years but i've never got my head around setting up a pair of forks. My old Reba's had allsorts of adjustment which was like a minefield to me. Although my current forks - Fox F120 RL's, have less adjustment, i still don't know what i'm doing
I currently have my F120's setup with slightly less air pressure than recommended to try to get the full travel, although i'm still only getting about 90mm.
On the rebound side, i have it set halfway as suggested as a starting point in the manual. When i adjust it either way i notice no difference.
Can anyone give me any tips? Other than the lack of full travel, the forks seem fine, but then i don't know if they can be better/worse with a bit of adjustment. What should i be looking for in a good/poor setup fork?
Basically i've been cycling for a few years but i've never got my head around setting up a pair of forks. My old Reba's had allsorts of adjustment which was like a minefield to me. Although my current forks - Fox F120 RL's, have less adjustment, i still don't know what i'm doing
I currently have my F120's setup with slightly less air pressure than recommended to try to get the full travel, although i'm still only getting about 90mm.
On the rebound side, i have it set halfway as suggested as a starting point in the manual. When i adjust it either way i notice no difference.
Can anyone give me any tips? Other than the lack of full travel, the forks seem fine, but then i don't know if they can be better/worse with a bit of adjustment. What should i be looking for in a good/poor setup fork?
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Comments
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First off, forget getting full travel. If your getting full travel you're also gettin close to bottoming out which isn't good.
Air forks also "ramp up" as you compress them - that is to say, the more you compress them the harder the spring rate becomes (especially in the last part of the travel), so in actual fact it's unlikely that you'll ever get full travel even with them set up correctly.
First up, set your sag correctly. Depending upon personal preference and your particular riding style this needs to be between 20% and 30% travel.
Now the rebound damping. If the fork feels like it's pin-balling off everything, chances are you've got too little damping. Fox forks can be run successfully with a LOT of rebound damping - check out this video at Mojo's website. The forks shown are being run at 75psi with the rebound set two clicks out from fully slow.0
