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Confused about Rear Shocks

4K views 2 replies 3 participants last post by  Procter 
#1 ·
I want to get an air shock but confused on what to get. First, doing some searches it's hard to find shocks for sale online in a variety of places. I think I've found 2 online bike shops, Amazon, and eBay, and Amazon & eBay's selections are kind of iffy. Got it narrowed down to RockShox Monarch, Ario, X-Fusion O2 RL, or Manitou Radium Expert. I need a 6.5". I'm confused about the difference between the Monarch and Ario and also there's a Monarch RT3 and a Monarch RL; what's the difference there as well? Why does RockShox list different "tunes" but the others don't. I'm 200 lbs. Any clarifications on all this?
 
#2 ·
ignore the Rock Shox and get the Manitou or Xfusion...

I've had 3 Rock Shox shocks and all three had issues in the first few months and honestly didn't ride all that well. My cheapo Radium WAY out performed them all. Ever one of the Rock Shox was stiff with little of no small bump unless I set the sag so low that it would bottom out. MUCH prefer the Manitou's never tried a Xfusion but they are getting good reviews mostly. I'm right at your same weight class and use the same length shock.

Right now Im using a Risse Racing Astro.. it's pretty nice but it being an air sprung, but Oil "Shock" it's temp sensitive and changes the ride with changes in weather.. :skep:
 
#3 · (Edited)
The tune is pretty important and will affect the way a shock performs on different bikes. For example fox shocks have a compression tune L/M/H, low might be appropriate for frames that have dwlink or vpp because they utilize a rearward initial stroke to battle pedal induced sag. A higher compression tune is better for single pivot bikes which are more prone to pedal sag. Same is true for the rebound and velocity settings.

So I would recommend finding what shock is spec'd stock on the bike (including the tune settings) and buy that exact one, or if switching model and brand, try to emulate the stock shock as best as possible by carefully matching the tune.

if you don't, you could end up with a shock that is too firm, too soft, sags too much, too little, rebounds like a pogo stick or feels like mud. You can obviously make adjustments in all these compression/rebound once its installed, but it may just feel 'off' no matter what you try.

No offense to thomllama but we haven't mentioned a specific frame here, different shocks will perform dramatically differently on different bikes for the above reasons. You should probably repost the question in the manufacturer forum for your bike and get recommendations from folks with your frame.
 
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