Incoming... small boys bike, Specialized enduro S-Works.

[weeksy]

Yeah tell me about it, i can go down another road and get a used/nearly used shock from Ebay for say £200 and then £110 on the Yoke, which comes in at a reasonably sensible cost, which is the road i'll likely go down if the service doesn't fix things.

However, he's still at the stage where he wants to go out almost every minute of every day and it's hours at a time outdoors with his mates, so it's hard to argue really. It's either that or the X-box and the wife is very much against x-box/phone so this can only be a good thing.

[Taff]

Fingers crossed

[weeksy]

Well i've gone down the route of a pre-emptive strike on this and ordered

s-l1600 (2) by Steve Weeks, on Flickr



Between this shock, yoke and the RP23 i've spent only £10 more than i had on the Cane Creek DBair IL. Might even be the same price, but essentially it's pretty close.

This way, if the Ohlins is serviceable i can either fit it and use until it does again, or keep it as a spare... and vice versa with the RS shock above. That way, he'll always have a bike with a working shock (in theory)

I'll also have the same with the G-160, having the RP23 fitted and the Monarch RC3+ as a spare, unless SRAM send me a new one and i'll likely sell it on as a new item due to being able to get decent money for it

[weeksy]

" HI Steve, your Ohlins shock is terminal. The inner body is scored and worn and can't be repaired. It's no longer available as a part you can buy, so it's all dead"

So that there is a bit of a bummer... But happily i've already got the BikeYoke installed in the bike and his new 210*55 shock is currently 'in the Hermes network" and on it's way here. So we'll be back up and running by the weekend i hope. It's disappointing as the Ohlins is a massive part of the selling point of the bike if you ask me. But there's not a lot i can do, it's a fairly common issue/fault with the Ohlins STX22 and the reason why places like TFTuned no longer support/service them, because they fail so often.

[Taff]

But of a bummer, but on the other hand the ohlins can't be a selling point of is a known failure in waiting. Have replaced the duff shock for a reliable one is a greater selling point imo

[weeksy]

True true,.... But it's not off anywhere until he's too big for it anyway.

I did a test fitting with my new RP23 and that fits lovely. Doesn't foul on the frame/extension etc. Obviously 6mm longer will slightly affect the geometry, but we'll now keep the Monarch RC3 as a spare for both bikes when it's warrantied.

2021-02-25_02-27-43 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[weeksy]

I've posted this over on STW as it's a bit more MTB orientated that on here, but i thought i'd lob it up on here too just out of interest.

Afternoon, still shock week in the Weeksy household. I'm happy with the RP23 i've got in the G-160 now but we've now moved onto my lads shock.

As you may recall he has a Specialized Sworks 2015. This came with an Ohlins STX22 which has now been binned due to catastrophic failure.

Due to Specialized using a funny ended shock we've ended up with a BikeYoke 2.1 installed which allows us to run a 210*55 shock in there.

So we've bought a Rockshox Debonair Deluxe in a 210*55.

First question may or may not be completely daft... but i've had to fit it inverted due to clearances.

2021-02-26_05-37-53 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

If i flip it i can't quite get it in as the frame contacts with the housing at the top end, so we flipped it and it fits fine. Firstly, is the any reason i can't run it this way round ?

Now when we do shocks usually it's 1psi - 1lb weight. So him being a small lad, usually 100psi does us nicely, this method has worked well as a baseline for shocks for years for me. However at 100psi he's getting 40% sag. So we've upped it closer to 120psi to get 30% sag which i can live with, but he's saying that's really hard. He may just need to get used to that though.

The problem is, even doing small jumps off kerbs he's bottoming it out at 120psi.

Is this shock compatible with bands/spacers or do we just have what we have and that's it ? Any thoughts on bottoming it out ? Would increasing rebound help us there as it will then rebound earlier in the travel ? He has always liked his shocks fairly soft and quite slow on the rebound/pressures, but that's because we use a Shockwiz and dial it for 'soft/poppy'

We've got the Shockwiz on there now, but we're not out testing until tomorrow. But thought i'd get some ideas from anyone here first.

[weeksy]

I had the genius idea of getting up at 5am this morning as this was all playing on my mind and swapping my RP23 to his bike for the day.

1 hour later I'd fitted my shock to his after spending the time removing both, removing spacers, etc then went to fit his shock into my bike for the day and it doesn't fit due to the Whyte Yoke fitting issues, weirdly the RP23 falls in beautifully but his RSDeluxe simple doesn't fit unless i go nuts with a file again, which i didn't feel the love for doing.

So he's got the Deluxe today for better or worse LOL. Spacers are ordered and we'll get them setup

[weeksy]

Well that was a crazy interesting morning.

After I removed the shockwiz, removed the shock pressure obviously and the reinflated as I put back in his bike, it felt better. But I never mentioned it to him.

When out I asked him how it felt.
"Maybe 1-2 clicks of tortoise needed, but great"
So if checked shockwiz and it showed


1st goring by Steve Weeks - Flickr2BBcode LITE

So we gave it 2 tortoise but then also moved to the jump area with decent sized 10' gaps and 15' tables etc and got

2nd goring by Steve Weeks - Flickr2BBcode LITE


So we're not far off. Obviously every setting is compromised for one or another style of riding, the xc based ride over is very different to jump area, but not bad. Best of all, no complaints from the lad.

[weeksy]

[weeksy]

Changed the gear cables a few weeks/months ago on his bike, he was having shifting issues and it ended up being the outer gear cable.

However, for some reason i only had a red outer, i don't even know why i'd have ever bought a red outer.

2021-02-26_05-37-53 by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

I'd also managed to cut it a little short too, only 3-4" but that was enough to not give me a nice loop at both the top and the mech end, shifting often seems to work better with a nice longish loop. So i bought a new 2m length of black outer and some super slick jagwire inners. These are 5X the price of the ones i usually fit, but thought i'd give them a whirl, they're only £3 each, so not exactly crazy money. To me it feels absolutely brilliant and based upon today i won't be going back to the cheap ones... i'll likely even fit some to mine this weekend.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/JAGWIRE-Inne ... 2749.l2649

[weeksy]

[weeksy]

Noticed today when cleaning that his rear wheel bearings are shot.

So threw in an old spare wheel to test that's compatible, but i'll also need an 11 speed cassette for it, which i've now ordered.

Will debate whether i do his wheel bearings or whether i ship it out to Rotec to do, some of the freehub bearings can be a pain.

[formula400]

that looks pretty bloody big

[weeksy]

that looks pretty bloody big

In the reality in which i live, it's ridiculous. In his world, it's bordering on big. In honesty though, the only reason he's not gone bigger is because we've not found it yet. There's simply nothing we can find he won't have a try at. Obviously this stuff exists in the world, but we've not gone to it yet. He's done bigger, i was showing Crust the other one from a few months ago.... that's honestly hysterically big, but safer than the suicide gap as the jump you could actually do and fall off it at 5mph and be safe, but to jump to the true landing is daft.

[weeksy]

Rear wheel was making unhappy sounds last week so I pulled the hub bearings and swapped them, first time I've done wheel bearings. Luckily I had circlip pliers to sort.

Sadly that didn't resolve it, so there's 2 bearings in the wheel itself. They felt ok though when trying by hand. Sadly I didn't have them in spares so a 2-3 days wait for them.
They went in ok and wheel is silky smooth now! Ready for his xc race in Sunday

[Beancounter]

Out of interest, where do you get your bearings from? LBS or do you go to a bearing specialist? I want to replace the swingarm (for want of a better term) bearings on my Whyte T130 before selling it.

[weeksy]

Bearings on t130s will be free if you bought it new

However, you'll get charged 2 hours labour for swapping them.

[Beancounter]

Bearings on t130s will be free if you bought it new

However, you'll get charged 2 hours labour for swapping them.

Thanks. I did buy brand new (through C2W) but that was 5 years ago and haven't a clue where the receipt is. I'd quite like to do the job myself. Do you use a bearing press when you do yours or do you tap them in using the old bearing as a drift?

[weeksy]

Bearings on t130s will be free if you bought it new

However, you'll get charged 2 hours labour for swapping them.

Thanks. I did buy brand new (through C2W) but that was 5 years ago and haven't a clue where the receipt is. I'd quite like to do the job myself. Do you use a bearing press when you do yours or do you tap them in using the old bearing as a drift?

I use a bearing press. You're more than welcome to do here.

I've got a set here in spares.