Hello Vital MTB Visitor,
We’re conducting a survey and would appreciate your input. Your answers will help Vital and the MTB industry better understand what riders like you want. Survey results will be used to recognize top brands. Make your voice heard!
Five lucky people will be selected at random to win a Vital MTB t-shirt.
Thanks in advance,
The Vital MTB Crew
The Shockcraft tuning kit is easily the most complex out of the three; the rebound circuit is fully checked using a new piston bolt and a one way valve system, the shim stacks configurations for compression & rebound are like nothing I have ever seen, and it includes a new base valve piston bolt as well so all shims are now metric sizing and much easier to source.
The test track is drying out rapidly and may be good to go by this weekend. Eager to get going with this one. 🤘
I've also installed the FF & SC Bomber tunes, Shockcraft is much more complicated. I've never been able to compare the tunes as I had them on different bikes, but am excited to hear your impressions.
Even though the Shockcraft kit is more complex, I found it easier to install. No special tools required. Unfortunately, I have not ridden a Fluid Focus Bomber, yet. Would be very curious how much difference the checkvalve on rebound makes.
What I love about both shocks is twostage rebound. Too few manufacturers provide such rebound tunes.
2stage valving isn't always necessary - sometimes a linear stack will give progressive damping depending on the piston design. And vice versa, if the ports don't need much shim lift then the second stage never engages.
And the effectiveness of the check valve depends on things like the are of the free bleed vs the area of the compression circuits, and also viscosity of oil used. The shims open at a certain pressure, which doesn't change too much due to viscosity. But the heavier oil reaches that point sooner regardless of adjuster position.
With a stock bomber CR if you keep the factory 10wt oil there is a minimal affect from the rebound adjuster on compression damping but if you change it to something lighter (like 2.5 or 4wt) then you will see a large change. I prefer having some free bleed to help with the shock responding but the piston needs to be designed to work with that, and in theory you expect the rebound adjuster to be set within a particular range so you can manage any minor cross-talk pretty easily. It only gets bad if you close it down fully which nobody would be using
Just reread your post here and then looked at the FF piston kit. I noticed that you said all tuning via the base valve, which I wasn't sure if that was a joke. On their site on picture looks like they're using a belleville washer on the main piston. Is this correct? Is most of the valving changes at the base valve? I got a Ohlins tuned through them and they actually told me they removed the belleville washer in favor of a traditional shim stack. I know that architecture is different between the shocks but I was surprised to see they may have gone this direction but maybe its easier for at home tuners to only build a single stack and not have any issues balance between mid and base valves.
No, definitely not just tuning via the base valve. But it is modified from stock for all the options being tested.
The stock base valve setup on the Bomber CR/Fox Van is quite stiff and uses belleville washers. All three tuning options (Avalanche Racing, Fluid Focus, and Shockcraft) remove the belleville washers and convert the base valve to a more traditional shim stack. All three use different base valve tunes, and Avalanche uses a different needle for the bleed (LSC clicker) as well.
Fluid Focus and Shockcraft both use a different main piston, while Avalanche uses the stock main piston. All three use different compression and rebound shim stacks that correspond to the base valve tune they spec. They all use standard shims, no belleville washers anywhere.
Just about ready to start testing shocks. The Vorsprung Telum was run to get a DAQ baseline and as a means of getting the fork setup dialed. This test bike is currently working quite well, the plan is to just swap in each of the three different shocks and keep the fork in it's current state. Also added a shorter track to the test procedure capable of 10+ runs/day. More data, more better!
Look forward to the impressions! Is that an intend fork out front?
Whats the new segment? Photo is from north of town.
Yes, it is an Edge running at 160mm.
Short review of my DVO Jade X Prime with Sprindex coil: immaculate.
Post a reply to: Coil Shock Shootout