New fork on the Hardrock

Giraffoto

The original look-at-my-lovely-bike post is here:

I took the plunge a week or so ago, and ordered a shiny new Recon fork: then, having gotten all the pieces in place, I fitted it last night, and what a set of surprises I had in store . . .

Surprise 1: it’s got to be a kilogram lighter than the original Suntour fork. OK, I’ve heard what Supersonic and other luminaries have to say, I believed them enough to buy a fork . . . but I’d not held the Suntour in one hand and the Rockshox in the other. The former is a big ol’ chunk of iron!

Surprise 2: it took forty minutes. I’m so old that I’m used to threaded headsets and loose-ball bearings, so this was pleasantly fast. And why has it taken a hundred years to invent a slot under the bottom race you can get a screwdriver in? That was ten minutes saved right there

Surprise 3: I didn’t need to cut down the steerer. The Hardrock frame has a long head tube, so all it needed was a 10mm spacer on the top, which I plan to leave there rather than mucking around with a hacksaw. It’s nice to have a bit of adjustability left. This also means that the old fork has 250mm of steerer tube so it’ll suit almost anyone who fancies buying it

Finally – not a surprise: the black fork amongst all the red paint scheme looks terrific – it’s the fork the bike should have come with!

jay12

Giraffoto wrote:

The original look-at-my-lovely-bike post is here:
http://www.bikeradar.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=10017&t=12840095

I took the plunge a week or so ago, and ordered a shiny new Recon fork: then, having gotten all the pieces in place, I fitted it last night, and what a set of surprises I had in store . . .

Surprise 1: it’s got to be a kilogram lighter than the original Suntour fork. OK, I’ve heard what Supersonic and other luminaries have to say, I believed them enough to buy a fork . . . but I’d not held the Suntour in one hand and the Rockshox in the other. The former is a big ol’ chunk of iron!

Surprise 2: it took forty minutes. I’m so old that I’m used to threaded headsets and loose-ball bearings, so this was pleasantly fast. And why has it taken a hundred years to invent a slot under the bottom race you can get a screwdriver in? That was ten minutes saved right there

Surprise 3: I didn’t need to cut down the steerer. The Hardrock frame has a long head tube, so all it needed was a 10mm spacer on the top, which I plan to leave there rather than mucking around with a hacksaw. It’s nice to have a bit of adjustability left. This also means that the old fork has 250mm of steerer tube so it’ll suit almost anyone who fancies buying it

Finally – not a surprise: the black fork amongst all the red paint scheme looks terrific – it’s the fork the bike should have come with!

my brother replaced his seized suntour with a rock shox sektor, wow what a difference! i encourage people to spend as much as they can on suspension as it makes such a difference.

on the crown race side of things, so companies have a split crown race meaning you don't need any tools to put it on as it just slides on and comes off a lot easier than the normal type of crown race

Giraffoto

jay12 wrote:

i encourage people to spend as much as they can on suspension

Do you own a shop?
If it made no other difference at all it's going to be very obvious how much lighter the front end is - with a bit of luck I can add a test report to this mechanical bulletin after I've given it a shake-down run tonight

jay12

Giraffoto wrote:

jay12 wrote:

i encourage people to spend as much as they can on suspension

Do you own a shop?
If it made no other difference at all it's going to be very obvious how much lighter the front end is - with a bit of luck I can add a test report to this mechanical bulletin after I've given it a shake-down run tonight

no, i don't, hahah.

it's just in general when people ask what fork to get ot riding or on the forum

Greer_

Just upgraded my suntour to a recon (link in sig below) and the difference is night and day! Weight, adjustability ... oh and it actually soaks up the bumps!

ilovedirt

jay12 wrote:

on the crown race side of things, so companies have a split crown race meaning you don't need any tools to put it on as it just slides on and comes off a lot easier than the normal type of crown race

I don't know why all headsets don't come with split crown races, they make life so much easier!

Giraffoto

ilovedirt wrote:

I don't know why all headsets don't come with split crown races, they make life so much easier!

The first crown race I removed had to be knocked off with a mallet and a piece of wooden dowel - believe me, just the little slot you can get a screwdriver into makes so much difference compared to that that any further improvement seems superfluous!

lillywhite79

Any chance of a photo?

Did you get a Recon Silver or Recon Gold?

Giraffoto

After a lot of thinking about it, I went for the Gold. It's lighter than the Silver and I couldn't help thinking that it would be the one I'd wish I'd bought if I got the Silver. Several reviewers have said that the Hardrock is a terrific frame let down by a range of mediocre (at best) forks: hopefully now it has the fork it deserves!

The version that I have has a remote lock-out that I've put on the left side of the bars - I'll have to get used to this because the original fork only allowed me to lock it out when I was stationary, but I'm sure it'll be fun to play with out in the woods

I'll take a picture in the next few days and see about posting it

1mancity2

The fork will transform your bike, get a pic up....

Giraffoto

A pic will be coming soon, in the meantime just look at the original article (see the top post) and imagine it with a black, chunkier, slightly longer travel fork.

It has transformed the bike - it's substantially faster on the flat, probably due to wasting less energy or flexing less, and it seems to want to climb hills as if it's heard about the view from the top. I was a bit surprised that you can hear the damper working - at least I know something's happening. The ride over rocks, roots, bumps and jumps feels much smoother so it's almost certainly faster. One bit of evidence there is that the brakes are complaining more now - I may have to bring forward my plan to upgrade the pads! Although the travel is 100mm, as distinct from the stock 80mm, I can't feel a difference in handling when the fork's not doing its thing: it only used 70mm of that travel in a slightly alarming night ride along the Ridgeway from Ivinghoe Beacon

The uncut steerer means I now have a 10mm spacer on top of the stem, but I'm not going to muck around shortening it just for that little bit - it doesn't weigh much.

bonezy

The Recon Gold forks are reliable trail forks that do a really good job; and you'll get used to the squelching from the oil whizzing through the damper!