Big airs, enormous jumps and big tricks require an MTB Fork which can take some punishment forks not designed for this reason are responsible to be damaged or worse break ; causing heavy injury to a rider.
A dirt jump ( DJ ) bike will generally be a hardtail and front suspension, although some riders do still like stiff forks. Dirt jump forks will have little travel of 80-100mm and are routinely coil sprung as well as being much heavier because of the increased strength than those designed for other mountain bike disciplines.
If you know anything about dirt jumping you may know the name Marzocchi probably the best known and most generally used make of forks on dirt jump bikes with their infamous dirt jumper range.
The dirt jumper range starts with the entry level DJ3 fork. It is a quick-release fork, but the straightforward forged lowers are very well proven in terms of slam proofing. The coil-sprung internals get an easy but effective bottom out damper for slam control. They can also be stiffened up for emergency-only movement ( if that’s’s what you’re after ) by charging the auxiliary air spring.
The range then moves up to the Dirt Jumper one & 2 models, which, in the newly asserted 2010 models will exploit the updated Open Bath RV damper, which features outwardly adjustable rebound damping. The Dirt Jumper 1 & 2 models feature a coil spring and a low pressure pre-load system.
Weighing in at only 2240g for an open bath, coil sprung fork the DJ1 weighs a great 355g less than the 2009 DJ1 while accelerating strength by thirty percent.
If you can not spring the £190 £500 ( $200 - $1000 ) that the dirt jumper range can cost you may wish to instead consider a rigid fork. The advantages are not only cost, firm forks such as the Charge Nozzle will not only cost less but will also weight a ton less than suspension forks meaning you can save extra weight that might assist you with getting some of those technical tricks nailed.
