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Ouch @jeff.brines
in contrast.. intend guys recommend low cost racing bros seals, and without foam ring, as its not essential for USD...perhaps a god chassis, with good tolerances is most important that the seals ?
Yeah that's rough - modern fork "wipers" all have an integrated oil seal and shouldn't be an issue here. It does look like they have a unique part number for podium seals but I haven't seen one so got no idea what's different. The thick 20wt gold oil can leak easier under certain circumstances (it would leak if you put it in forks with the old flanged seals) but that wouldn't explain the leak in the damper side which should be 4wt oil. So yeah its pretty weird - I don't see new forks leaking that often these days
Ah! I thought they were a bit of a hybrid seal (dust + oil in one seal). Regardless, they are failing and I don't know why. One thing worth pondering, if it was a RSU configuration, and the seal had "failed" like this I'm not sure I'd really notice. Yeah, I'd see a little ring and my dust seals would get dusty faster but what really causes this to be an issue is the fact a column of oil is held back by the seal, which really isn't the case in RSU configurations.
@TEAMROBOT said in his review the seals were 36 seals, and maybe they were for the initial run and they've since swapped to something a bit more "aggressive"?
They are specific podium part number. Fox has the wiper seal replacement guide up on the website now. https://tech.ridefox.com/bike/service-procedures/3125/2026-podium-dust-…
I had both wiper seals leak out of the box. Fox Vancouver just put in the new wiper seals yesterday, they just got the new design this week. So even the current part # isn’t up to date. Fox service guys told me you can put a 36 wiper in, but it won’t last long.
Interesting! Not sure how they got this far without picking it up, and I was going to speculate on other causes but decided against it. I've never worked on one of these
And yeah having more oil on the seal doesn't help, although a failed RSU seal quickly makes a huge mess too. Ideally seals are always "leaking" a tiny bit to maintain a film on the surface, so the RSU fork should be getting at least some oil back up on the wiper. Good lubricating oil sticks to the surfaces so its not 100% relying on gravity. A proper leak is when the oil side of the seal is allowing too much out and the wiper scrapes away the excess. We use those same 36 seals with things like smashpot conversions that are designed to use lots of oil so the bushings are properly saturated and have no issues
Also I found it amusing that they used the same image from a 36 service and took the time to edit the lowers out when they had a podium open at the time anyway? I thought I had a close up of the Podium wiper until I went to check the 36 version of the manual 😂
I have been using the SKF flangeless 36 seals in my Dorado for the last 2 years and they havent leaked a drop. The blue/green ones and no seperate oil seal.
funny how that didn’t occur in those initial, handpicked by fox, reviews, eh?
Speaking of FOX wipers, when doing service on forks in general, do you lubricate them as per picture or put them in dry? RS recommends to put them in dry and, to me at least, it seems to make sense as putting them in dry as they should be held in place better due to more (dry) friction...
I put a light coat. RSU fork I don’t see that being an issue either way.
Rockshox ones go in dry - they are a looser fit/slightly more flexible wiper so there is a real chance of them popping out under pressure, especially on older forks. Fox forks have a stiffer reinforcement ring so I will lubricate them a little bit. Normally just installing a soaked foam ring first is enough, but if they go in dry they will be really tough to remove next time around
Is that still an issue with the current Charger 3 gen?
Hmmmmmmmm....
(JKW's Podium is leaking too)
JKW appears to be leaking due to the massive scratches he has on the stanchions. I don’t think a RSU fork could hold its oil with that much missing material.
Ah! I probably should have watched the whole thing. I thought that was fixed and this was a new thing. My mistake.
The bottoms of his Podium is why I think it's hilarious that some of the Intend evangelists claim you don't need guards for the lowers. What's impressive though is how extensive the damage he has is - there must be a story there.
Every time I'm tempted by a USD fork I look at the scratches on the lowers of my 36. They are no issue on that fork but would be a problem on a USD fork.
Pedal on another bike was rubbing on it in transport.
To be fair, I also didn’t finish the JKW video, his stuff isn’t for me. Like you I just watched until I got the information I wanted.
In full disclosure I have a podium and find the ride quality amazing. The only issue I’ve had is that I now want more performance out of my rear shock.
Oh man... that sucks. Expensive loading error.
Even Phil Swift can’t help you now
The LBS that I'm affiliated with is passing around a fox podium for the core riders to try, we were previously passing around a v1 nine.one. I digress, I just picked up the demo podium to try out for 2 weeks... There was a delay in my ability to try it because it was leaking and needed to be dealt with. We'll see if it leaks in my 2 week stint with it... I'm planning on getting 6ish rides on it. After that, I'm going to try a v2 nine.one...
With Intend, that's a sub-$100 fix including fees and shipping to the US of A, IIRC. One leg replacement is significantly cheaper than new uppers of RSU forks.
just to clear it up, JKW killed his first podium due to user error, loading 2 bikes on a rack such that the pedal of one was rubbing the podium stanchion. It sounds like the replacement one is also leaking now, thus he's back on a Z1 for the time being. fwiw, my podium hasn't had any issues with oil leakage, though I'm certainly not beating on it to the extent he is. On pricing for lower legs, idk how available those are retail yet but msrp from Fox is 263$ a leg for factory and 210$ for performance. It's weird really, after 2.5 seasons on my Intend the stanchions are still perfect, but in the ~4 months I've been on the podium I've put a good few scratches on the guards. maybe unpainted carbon just isn't as durable to light strikes as hard anodized aluminum, idk
How's the podium stack up vs. your time on the intend?
Ah ha! That's what I originally inferred. I couldn't make myself go watch the whole thing so just assumed others were right. I just found it a touch funny because his is...
A) leaking (like all of mine)
B ) he's now pumping up the Marzocchi (like I did)
With his reach, I wonder if we'll see Marzocchi coil forks flying off shelves lol
I managed to watch to get the info what he did with the zocchi (way to get those watch minutes, it dragged and dragged before getting to the point), but, maybe I missed it, I didn't catch the fact that his replacement was leaking. He only showed the gnawed stanchion. I did not expect that one after all the baiting at the beginning of the video.
Does Marzocchi use a different tune in their dampers because people seem to hate the 36 Rhythm but love the Marzocchi Z1 and I don't understand because they're the same fork with different stickers.
My 36 Rhythm really lacked HSC but if Fox started putting stiffer tunes on the Z1 dampers I could see how it would be a lot better.
Cannot offer anything more then anecdotal hand "dyno" experience but it sure feels "stiffer", I rarely ran the compression dial more then the 1-2 o'clock position on my Z1 as it made midstroke harsh during repeated hits/heavy chatter.
I will say that the Z1 coil grip2 configuration is amazing, the only real drawback is the limited coil rate offerings from Marzocchi.
They're the same part number and same tune, the grip damper doesn't change much with different valving, it mostly only effects the resolution of the adjustment. The only real difference between the 2 forks is the shape of the lowers
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