Marzocchi 55CR

Run a few forks in the Bandit but have never found the small bump sensitivity and progressive travel that I remembered from my old early 2000s Bombers or the coil Revelation that has been my "return to" fork. Having thought it was about time to get off the Fox/RS bandwagon and have a look at some of the alternatives I was drawn to the X-Fusion Velvet but then Marzocchi came back to my attention with some great deals on the 55CR and the ability to be able to drop it's 170mm travel down to 150mm with the use of the spacer that came in the box.

Deal done, off to Windwave for the spacer fitting (keep the warranty going - great service from them I have to say) then onto the bike, having got the 20mm end caps for the Pro4 and new H/S lower. Got the recommended pressure in, middle the compression (low speed - high speed is a shim stack) and rebound and got out there.

What a lovely fork. It would be difficult to pretend that it was as absolutely buttery as a good coil but it's extremely close - easily the best air fork I've ridden. No stiction, very smooth, progressive travel. Rock solid tracking (35mm stanchions and a 20mm axle on 150mm travel will do that ) all made for a great front end. Not sure I need to play too much with the compression but the rebound will need some tweaking - which shouldn't be too difficult as the adjustments make a proper difference with every click, unlike some forks........

All in all I'm really pleased by my return back to the dark-side (non RS/Fox) for the first time in a long, long time. So much so I'm in discussions about which of their forks to go on my 29er.

And the best bit? They've got "Bomber" written across the top of the brace