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.
Purchasing suspension forks for mountain bikes isn’t as straightforward as it used to be. With numerous different styles of frames now available in particular engineered to a style of riding, made by different companies which permit a different size travel fork, purchasing suspension can just be a headache.
Cross country is probably what most of the people think of when they imagine mountain bikers a variety of terrain across hills and mountains normally ridden for fun or against each other or the clock. Whilst this is not the only form of mountain biking today it is certainly more than likely the most well liked in terms of numbers.
Like the frames that they fit, cross country mountain bicycle suspension forks must be lightweight to keep the general bike weight down that may increase rider performance. They’ll require some suspension ( normally referred to as travel ) but may not be rigid in order to allow some type of defense against the bumps and knocks a rider will encounter whilst riding on coarse tracks. The amount of travel routinely allowed on cross country suspension forks is around 80mm-100mm.
Original designs of trail bike forks used springs like you see on automobiles or elastometers however the design trend is now moving toward air sprung shocks. This change of direction in the planning of trail bicycle forks has a number of added benefits ; the absence of moving parts keep the weight small and air sprung forks are easily adjustable. The disadvantage of this change in design is the parts can regularly be more difficult to maintain and take less abuse than their coil sprung counterparts.
Costs of cross country mtb forks can vary significantly with the top of the range models like the DT Swiss and RockShox costing over £400 ( $800 ) to the cheaper Ritchey and Kinesis forks costing a little over £100 ( $200 ).
The Range Of Mountain Bike Forks On The Market
The front forks of bikes have changed significantly since the introduction of the mountain bike. Suddenly a requirement arose for cushioning the impact of rocky terrain. A need that simply hadn’t been there previously.
Commonly on mountain bikes these days you will usually find that the front forks have a built in set of shock absorbers, with the blades being made from upper and lower extendable cylinders, called ‘legs’. These telescopic tubes allow the impact of the rocky terrain under the tyres to be reduced, which will make the bike much easier to ride in rough conditions.
The characteristics for MTB Forks can vary greatly, with the suspension travel and handling style tailored to a specific style of riding. For example, the XC rider will need a different setup to a downhill mountain bike rider, who will have a different setup again to a freeride mountain bike rider. Cross country bikes will not require as much suspension travel, normally near eighty to one hundred millimeters and will be made from lighter material when compared to the suspension used on a DH mountain bike. This is basically as they don’t get as much punishment as they might in other situations.
When suspension was first introduced onto mountain bikes, a travel distance of the 80 to 100 mm was the form. Now though, downhill forks offer typically around 150 to 200 millimetres of travel. There are some DH MTB forks though which can offer anywhere up to 300 millimetres of travel for the most extreme conditions!
Some mountain bike suspension forks may also enable the rider to adjust the suspension travel to suit particular sections of terrain. A higher travel for downhill and extreme sections, and less travel for the not so extreme XC or up hill sections. The rider may even want to completely eliminate suspension movement all together which would be an advantage on a smooth concrete road for example. This lockout ability may even be used externally from the handle bars using a trigger.
Whatever the style of riding you do, it pays to choose your MTB front suspension forks carefully as when you choose correctly you will benefit from a massive performance advantage.
