Fork travel and manufacturers recommendations

JamesB

Quick question----the frame , hardtail , I have has a 100mm travel fork recommended; it is well butted / braced at headset area. What effect would running a 120 ish mm fork have (leaving aside wararnty issues!), on handling etc. I`d like to swop over my current 100mm air fork for a spring 120 mm as I prefer action of a spring fork

wordnumb

It actually depends on the frame - specifically the angle of the headtube. However adding 20mm to 100mm won't make a world of difference, it's little more than the difference between running slicks / big nobbly tires..

Terryg

If its a new bike then the warrenty would probably be void, also remember the frame is designed for a 100mm fork. By a Uturn then you have the best of both....

Northwind

No doubt people will tell you it'll ruin the handling, but it ain't neccesarily so. It might, but then there's plenty of frames which can happily run different lengths. Look at Cotic, same geometry on the Soul and BFe so that's everything from 100mm to 160mm. And the Soul rides damn nicely at 100mm, 120mm or 140mm.

My old Carrera Kraken and my GT Idrive both ride better with longer forks than stock in. But on the other hand my Scandal was supposed to be designed for 100mm-130mm, but wasn't very good at 130mm. No simple answers...

hoathy

what frame is it you are running? also consider your choice of forks, travel is important, but the axle to crown distance is also worth knowing, there are some fair old variations.

JamesB

I`m looking at Pace RC40 100-130, 47cm axle to side of crown, to swop for 100mm forks 45cm same measurement; onto Van Nic Zion frame

joshtp

i put 120 mm on my old GT, i slackend th HA right off, i took a while to get used to it, but i acctually really liked it, it handled steep, knarly stuff super well, i know have the forks on a Hardrock frame, ans again i really like the way ot handles, its pretty slack (not as much as the GT was,mind) but its super stable, and gennaraly really good fun.

PedroX64

What are the options on higher spec'd bikes with your frame? The GT Aggressor XC3 has 100mm travel, the XC1 120mm travel and the elite 140mm travel, presumably all on the same triple triangle frame.

I guess other manufacturers spec their bikes similarly depending on price.

joshtp

nah, dif frames, quite frasticlay dif actually, iv had both a 140mm XCR, and a 100mm xc2, the frame differances is quite suprising, the xcr has soo much more beef, both in tube sises, amount of gusseting, and the amount of hydroforming.

Anonymous

adding axle to crown height will slacken your head angle and for some folk, this = worse handling but for me, i prefer a more slack feeling frame.

JamesBrckmn

you could try getting a taller tyre on the rear and a shorter tyre on the front to lessen the effects of longer forks

JamesB

Ran teh bike yesterday with 100-130 swapped off another, and at 120 mm setting felt very nice and smooth , certainly smoother over small bumpy grass knobbl;es / rocks than 100mm but this may all be due to the difference between air sprung forks and spring forks as well---I`v never ever really managed to get air forks of any type to run as well as spring ones!!