Improving Front Suspension Forks...

parkinpants

I was wondering about whether it's worthwhile looking into improving my front suspension forks. It's an old Rockshox Tora, about 7 years old. They still work but they're not too springy any more. My mate just bought some bottom of the range suspension forks and it made me realise the difference. I've never taken forks apart before though so not sure how easy or possible it is to service them but I'm willing to give it a go. I don't want to spend too much £ on this because it's an old bike and I'll be looking to buy a new beast in a year or so, but I've seen spares and repair kits on ebay for cheap. So i'm trying to figure out whether to:

a) let a professional repair them;
b) get some spares and do it myself (with your help);
c) buy a replacement second hand one and bin them

What do you reckon?

The Rookie

Splitting, checking them over, relubing and reassembly is an easy DIY job, expense is minimal, at that age it's not worth spending a lot so you just need the right lubes, get the correct manual from the RS website and have a look.

TheTherese

parkinpants wrote:

I was wondering about whether it's worthwhile looking into improving my front suspension forks. It's an old Rockshox Tora, about 7 years old. They still work but they're not too springy any more. My mate just bought some bottom of the range suspension forks and it made me realise the difference. I've never taken forks apart before though so not sure how easy or possible it is to service them but I'm willing to give it a go. I don't want to spend too much £ on this because it's an old bike and I'll be looking to buy a new beast in a year or so, but I've seen spares and repair kits on ebay for cheap. So i'm trying to figure out whether to:

a) let a professional repair them;
b) get some spares and do it myself (with your help);
c) buy a replacement second hand one and bin them

What do you reckon?

I don´t have much experience from this. I have done only one service on a Boxxer and I have also done a service on a old fork - a recon - that was pretty much in the same state as yours Tora and the diffrence is amazing. I bought the seals from TF Tunes and the lube from CRC. My take on this is that your old fork will be as new. I guess you already have made a decision since this is an old post. Can´t resist to ask what you did and if you are happy about it!

.blitz

Good forks Toras

https://www.sram.com/service/rockshox/105

Easy to do and the first service makes a big difference

diy

For about a 5ers worth of fork oil you'll get them like new. It always amazes me how quickly the oil breaks down in forks. You can use engine synthetic oil for the bottom rather than buy two lots of different weight fork oil and get it from a motorbike shop its about half the price of a bike shop.