Advice on Downhill upgrades

JonniOne

Hi guys, I've recently gone into mountain biking and have a Rockhopper 2010 SL with a few upgrades:
raceface next carbon handle bars
DMR V12 pedals

I went to Aston Hills and loved the Downhill riding and looking to go into that part of mountainbiking. As I've just bought the bike, I dont really want to purchase another bike that has full suspension.

Do I have to adjust the settings on the forks from their standard setting?

Thanks in advace,
Jonni

supersonic

Unless you are riding the slopes mildly, you will kill the bike attempting DH.

New bike for hard riding at Aston.

If you want to take it easy there, maybe stiffen the fork and add a higher rise bar and shorter stem for more control on the downs.

Luke-Dob

Fork wise (and this is from reading the spec sheet) the Dart 3 has little adjustment that would make a noticeable difference while riding Downhill.
Main change would maybe changing the Rebound rate so its a little faster to respond to the repeated hits.

The Rockhopper will get you down the hill in one piece, just dont expect to go flying down as those with 200mm of travel both ends!

JonniOne

Thanks for the reply guys, I guess I pretty much bought the wrong bike for this type of riding.
I went on the Red route and I thought the amount of hard bouncing around was just normal until I was reading up a bit more on Downhills and reviews on the Dart 3 (Which hasn't really been reviewed in a good light).

Would it be recommended to just bite the bullet and get a full sus bike?

supersonic

It doesn't have to be full susser - or even a new bike. depending on how you ride.

But if you really want to hit the drops and jumps, something tougher is recommended.

phoenixliston

you're going to want an Adamantium exoskeleton like Wolverine

Clum84

If DH is what you want to do then I'd defiantly recommend just getting a full suss. you could make do with your hardtail but you're just going to limit yourself in the long run and take a load of the fun out of things. If your current bike is pretty new then you could probably sell it without too much of a loss, leaving money to put towards something else.

Make sure that DH is100% what you want to do before committing to a specific bike as a DH bike won't be much use for anything other than a controlled fall down the steepest rockiest mountain you can find! might be worth looking at an all mountain in that case.

fredy

i would stick with the hard tail so you learn the technique better before going FS.

Tom Barton

Keep the rockhopper - if you want to branch into DH - get a full sus bike, but you'll still have a light hardtail for when you fancy a long xc/trail ride.

Also, depending on how your skills are shaping up, you can get the bike down a dh course - just won't be as fast or confidence inspiring as a full sus machine, the chances are its going to take you a little while to build up to the big drops and jumps that will damage the bike so it should be ok for now until you can afford a a big rig to hurl down the hills.

But as lum84 said - if you want one bike to do it all - look for a all mountain bike - it will give yo the best compromise of the varous mountain bike disciplines.