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Not really sure what you’re talking about. It’s a relative position problem. The whole rear end moves including the ground plane. Or the ground plane doesn’t move and everything else does. There’s no adjusting anything as the bike moves, though. The equations don’t leave anything behind.
If you do what you’ve done with sag, it will ride exactly the same as it would with the 60 mm stroke at 30% sag up until the bottom out point and then it just happens to have 5 mm more stroke on tap. This is why I don’t understand when bikes are sold with a shorter stroke than what they can clear. You can get the same feel just by running less sag but you’ve got extra bottom out protection.
Thanks for validating. My guess is a combination of the brands wanting to have certain even travel numbers on the spec sheet (advertising their bike as 162/160 looks weird to people), and them assuming most people are too dumb to follow basic suspension setup instructions.
Companies lie about rear suspension travel numbers all the time, so if a bike actually has 162mm of travel it will almost certainly get bumped down to 160mm or up to 165mm in literature, depending on what marketing niche they're trying to sell to ("super enduro" vs. "heavy trail" vs. "downduro cross-DH"). Unless you're Kona, in which case your bikes are referred to by their actual travel number, i.e. 111, 134, 153, 167, etc.
Size specific chainstays also play into things as well, I have a Privateer 161 and in my size 3, it's got 164mm actual travel while the size 1 is something like 158.
Also if you're lucky enough to have a chainstay adjustment they never tell you what position the stated travel is in. I assume its always the shorter position because we still default to short chainstay being the norm in MTB but I wouldn't be surprised if it was the average of the 2 positions. So any reality you might never have the stated travel of your bike. Pinkbike had a good series going "by the numbers" and basically ever rear travel stated by the manufacture were different than actual travel. I wish every manufacture just put out numbers like the megatower article. https://www.pinkbike.com/news/behind-the-numbers-santa-cruz-megatower-suspension-analysis.html
Nerds
I over-stroke whenever possible for exactly that reason. It's so stupid! It's literally an identical ride experience to before, except if I fuck something up my bike just absorbs it instead of going clunk.
I guess marketing would have something to say and noobs will get confused.
Yes, but it depends on how they adjust rear center lengths. If they have a different length swingarm or chainstay for different sizes like YT (and sounds like your Privateer too?), then yes the travel will change. Norco and Santa Cruz adjust their rear center lengths by moving all the pivot points forward or back on the front triangle, which means the travel amount stays constant and the kinematics stay pretty much the same.
Amen to this! I have a V2 Forbidden Druid and there is no way it "only" has 130mm of travel. It rides every bit as capable as a 150mm bike IMO.
The misleading travel numbers can be a nuisance when trying to calculate spring rates or use TrailHead to calculate pressures, since the more accurate calcs use both stroke and wheel travel to estimate average leverage ratio. Sure you can fine tune after, or fiddle with another variable to compensate, but I'd rather just start with accurate numbers to begin with.
A few mm rear travel might not sound like much, but when I put on a Cascade link on my HSL, the apparent travel increase only was 6mm (150->156), but I ended up adding 30 psi to my shock to get to the same sag. 4% travel increase but 15% pressure increase.
Revisting the anti-rise question after the release of the new Canyon Sender today. Wondering what my fellow nerds on the kinematics forum think about the numbers.
I was surprised by the kinematic numbers on it and the new Pivot, because both bikes feautre high anti-squat and high anti-rise (both well over 100%), which is basically the opposite of what most other brands are doing on their dedicated DH bikes (Specialized, Frameworks, and many more). Curious to hear more about this bike after testers get extensive testing on home trails over the summer, but obviously it's working for Troy, Tahnee, and Luca. Specialized and Canyon are both winning races on their bikes so I’m not sure this is a case of right or wrong, but they're taking very different approaches to get there.
Neko in the floating brake video mentioned that some riders specifically like a high anti squat, and Angel wanted to test a 140% anti-squat like his old frame and mentioned it gave him more confidence.
Quite a few teams said with O-chain that can use higher anti-squat which would save time on motor way sections pedalling.
If high anti-squat doesn't negatively affect the suspension performance it could save time? Maybe that's the logic.
If you can isolate pedal kickback (high pivot or ochain) and you have enough travel and can set up your shock correctly, there's no real downside to having the better stability that high anti-rise and anti-squat offers IMO.
I still maintain that most of the issue that people have with high AR designs is just pedal kickback, which is WAY worse when the wheel is locked.
Braking over chop with a really high pivot bike (ie no kickback, heaps of AR) that has a decent amount of travel and a well set up shock is quite comfortable for your hands and feet, very comfortable in terms of your body position and weight distribution, as well as being much more settled and allowing for much more braking through the rear compared to a standard bike. It's night and day.
And having more than 100% of AS and AR does make sense for stability. 100% AS on paper isn't enough for high cadences, or standing and pedaling. 120-130 feels better to me through most of the cassette, and in the top gears you can go higher. And for AR, 100% AR only stops the rise from the rear brake. It doesn't stop the rise/weight transfer forward that you get from applying the front brake, which you're almost certainly doing at the same time.
I'm thinking the high anti rise is to maximize stability in less technical, high speed sections of the track. Like flowy sections with man made berms. Should result in a more consistent feel while trail braking on hardpack, possibly at the expense of a little plushness. I guess they figure it's more beneficial to chase speed in the bike park sections vs a super plush active feel in the rough stuff. Maybe it's just so the production bike feels decently fun in the park.
Thinking about it a little more, considering the chainstays start off a bit short, but then extend because of the axle path.. The high anti rise will make sure you get max stability whenever you're on the brakes hard. once you let off the brakes and the suspension extends, then you get the maneuverability of the shorter stays. Should allow for a pretty aggressive over-the-front stance all the way through the corner. Possibly helps a softer fork feel better/less overloaded in the less technical parts of the track?
High pivot bikes definitely do make it easier to initiate a turn (if you compare it to a normal bike with the same chainstay length at sag-to-midstroke-ish). But they do compress in the turn and immediately want you to run wide when they do. If you're used to it then it's great - changes direction easily but in the guts of the turn it's really stable and gives the sense you can really push into it. If you're not used to it then it feels like the bike just won't get "in" to the turn. But the other way of looking at it is that you're used to compensating for a shortening rear end and a loss of stability as the bike compresses into the turn, and you're still compensating for the loss of stability on the high pivot bike when you don't need to be.
This is my two cents on anti-rise... I prefer bikes with anti-rise that starts slightly high and then tapers off through travel. I get along really well with VPP bikes because they do this. My experience with low anti-rise is that it exacerbates the geo changes due to forward weight transfer and causes the suspension to be less active in some scenarios in an entirely different way. Under heavy braking, especially on steep trails, the shock easily will go to full extension. The suspension can't really be active when the shock is fully extended. That coupled with with the fork compressing makes for some rather undesirable geo as well, especially when a trail is steep. I prefer bikes where anti-rise starts high but then drops because, when deep in travel, braking forces start to fight packing up whereas on something with universally high anti-rise braking forces increase the occurrence of packing up. The trails where my anti-rise preferences are strongest are steep tech trails (especially one with lots of catch berms) and anything where speed has to be shut down as fast as possible. On rolling flow trails it doesn't really matter much to me.
@CascadeComponents I have a v6 nomad and I'm considering one of your links for an upcoming whistler trip. I have a few questions if you don't mind... my hope is that this doesn't come across as "sell me" type of questions, but in case it does, please accept my apology in advance. I've had CC links on 4 other bikes, so I'm quite happy with your products...
1) My v6 nomad frame has had a propensity to eat lower link side bearings. I had an 11.6 S-series on the bike (still have it, but running a 24' x2 now) and I would go through their spherical bearings in ~4 weeks (~8 long rides in laguna). They set me up with bushing style lower shock eyelet hardware but I'm concerned about making this problem worse by changing the radii of that link and loading the bearing more. I cannot get confirmation on if this is an alignment issue with my particular frame, both SC and Push don't seem to think so (I also had my LBS check it) and Push suggested that they have seen this out of the v2 mega and v6 nomad. Do think this concern is valid/invalid? Maybe you could provide comment in general on what seems to be a trend of backing off of the initital super high starting leverage rates that we saw in 2018-2020 of ~3.5 and seeing those reduce into the mid 2's.
2) Related to #1, I've had 2 coil shocks end up topping out on this frame even with the rebound set to sane levels (the above mentioned 11.6 and a vorsprung tractiv tuned super deluxe ult coil). I gut checked myself on this and had both push, vorsprung and my LBS check my rebound speed to make sure I'm not running it too fast, with too much pre-load or that I'm crazy. In addition, I've noticed that the bike has a slight bit of harshness that happens on initial touchdown with a coil shock that isn't there on the float X2 I'm currently running... which is why I switched to the air shock. I can manifest this when the bike touches down from a bunny hop or when I gap into a feature. I realize there isn't much of a question here... but I'm just concerned that I may make this worse, or more pronounced. I suppose, with increasing the initital leverage rate, it would make this better...
3) I'm slightly worried about upping the initial leverage rate. I have no real educated reason to be concerned on this... but certainly I realized that on my v1 megatower (both with and without your link) that there are nuances and challenges (complications maybe?) to a very high starting leverage rate. Certainly one of the things I've noticed about my v6 nomad, and other 23' and earlier era bikes compared to 2019 era, is that the leverage ratios have come down slightly. It seems to me that this can make shock tuning a bit easier and make the setup window a bit wider. Is there anything there or am I being pedantic?
4) Does the v6 nomad link change the bb height at all?
I was going to just send an email in, but I figured maybe some discussion or learning would be available to the masses if I asked the question here.
1. My opinion on the lower link bearings is that the fact that they are shielded and not sealed makes them wear faster. While it gives you the ability to purge with grease, you can't do that while you're riding and it also overfills the bearings with grease. So I think worst case you'd see the same wear as current and best case it would be improved on account of sealed bearings. Around here sealed bearings definitely help, but it's also very wet most the year. As for leverage ratios, I think what's really happened is brands have realized smaller shocks aren't necessarily that sick and there's not much of a reason to use the full 65 mm stroke to get 170 mm of travel. That said, we haven't seen any trends with bearing wear related to leverage ratio. The only trend we've seen is that smaller bearings don't last as long. I've never seen a 6902 explode, but I've seen 6801 bearings completely disintegrate.
2. This is an odd one. Yes increasing initial leverage ratio would improve this, but why multiple coils would do that to begin with I'm not really sure. My best guess would be low speed rebound is maybe a little fast. With a lot of shocks, by the time you get to top of stroke, rebound speed is slow enough that it's in the LSR range. Too little LSR is the only time I've really run across noticeable top out other than too much preload on the spring. The harshness in compression could be due to a few things. I would double check your sag/spring rate. Sometimes there's this mentality with tuning coils that you should run as soft a spring as possible and get bottom out resistance with damping. This works vehicles where you can rely on the tire for small bump but doesn't really work on bikes.
3. I think the whole leverage ratio thing isn't as big of a deal as people make it out to be. It does make the window a little larger and each click does a little more though. On any bike, if you specify a travel amount and shock stroke, increasing progression will always increase initial leverage ratio and decrease final leverage ratio. So there's not anything that can be done about that without going up in shock stroke. The big downside to higher leverage ratios is bigger people start running out of springs. But as long as you have spring rates available, it all washes out. To be honest when it comes to suspension feel, my V4 Nomad is still something I try and get to. Geometry has come a long was since then, but the suspension itself feels really good by any standards and it has a pretty high initial leverage ratio.
4. The Nomad link sets the BB height about where it would be in the low setting.
#1 - have you contacted Push again recently - there is a ball bearing kit now for Santa Cruz frames which fixes your wear issue - this is caused by the mounting tabs being too rigid and they can't squeeze the bearing enough to remove the radial play as the bearing or bushing expands outwards when clamped properly. Is your X2 running the roller bearing hardware kit? I have seen accelerated bushing wear on those bikes in all brands of shocks too, and pretty sure why SC specs bearing mount shocks. Forbidden bikes have the same problem as well, and Vorsprungs best practice document covers this -
"5. The frame’s shock mounts need to be able to squeeze inwards at least 1.00mm in at a torque of no more than 20Nm. Be very wary of making these mounts too short and/or stiff (this is easy to do around the bottom bracket area) as it will prevent the frame grabbing the hardware tightly, and you will get play between the shock hardware and the frame. You want as much of the bolt torque as possible to be clamping the reducer pin rather than just stressing the frame"
#2 - top out is pretty common in bikes with more rising rate, Pinkbike did an article on top out and it was mentioned there - https://www.pinkbike.com/news/burning-question-what-causes-suspension-top-out-and-what-measures-reduce-it.html , its mostly because when you lift the rear wheel the weight of the wheel can drop fast enough that the high leverage overcomes whatever topout mechanism the shock has. You can fix it with the rebound damping but that usually comes with a negative trade off. The top out and harshness is often exaggerated by the bushing wear problem, but otherwise its tricky to completely eliminate
Rising rates don't really contribute to top out the way people allude to. You can easily get a bike that's upwards of 40% progression to not top out harshly while still having a completely reasonable rebound tune. The weight of the wheel is extremely small compared to spring force. The shock can easily slow the wheel into the low speed realm of rebound, but if low speed rebound is set too fast it will top out.
Even with a dhx2?
As long as it has oil, yes. I actually set my LSR on that shock by making it as fast as possible before top out becomes noticeable. And that has worked perfectly well on a bike with an initial leverage ratio of 3.7.
Is the low oil thing a common problem? I haven’t had a dhx2 that doesn’t have annoying top out.
I think AR is very rider and trail dependent. Personally I like the 70% Anti-rise character because the shock still stay active when using the rear brake. I don’t ride “steep” sustained pitches much. It’s typically medium to moderate grade and I think 70% keeps the chassis balanced.
120-140% feels like it squats/compresses rear shock then as you let go of rear brake, it releases and weight moves forward. I think on steep pitches this works nice, but I also don’t like the way it packs the rear shock on braking chatter.
It’s all a give and take.
How much preload you running? With 1-2 turns, should be pretty easy to keep it from topping out harshly.
DHX2s are much more reliable these days than they once were. The previous version of it was quick to leak though.
Any experience with 2024+ model year Float X2 making lots of metal creaking sounds with Cascade links? The Cascade link is dead silent with a DVO Jade coil, and the X2 is silent with the stock rocker, so I'm thinking the X2 and Cascade link aren't playing nicely. FWIW, I had a 2022MY X2 before warranty and it never made THESE particular creaks which sound like the shock body making noise more than anything damping related. I'm just curious though, as the X2 is collecting dust again as a backup, and the Cascade link and coil shock are kicking butt right now.
No. What bike? There isn’t really anything special about a shock like the X2 that would make it creak with some linkages and not with others.
Likely the shock extender. Any time I unbolt the shock from a shock extender, when I set the bike back up I always compress it a couple of times with the bolt torqued only half way. There is always clearance between the bolt and bushing. If the shock is slightly to the side due to that clearance, that misalignment will make a pretty loud noise. Compressing the bike a couple of times before fully torquing the shock bolt can help make sure everything is centered up. Specialized frames are what I find this most useful on, but anything with a shock extender can be like this. For those of you who are thinking, the Reign doesn’t have a shock extender, it doesn’t but our link includes a very short one because the dimensions are so different.
Sounds good, I'll give that another check next time. I had ruled that out in my head, as I thought the creaking would indicate movement, and the extender/shock repositioning themselves and returning to perfect alignment. Then the creaks continued and I thought "well it couldn't be the shock extender, that would have straightened itself out by now."
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