Looking through the bikes that people have posted on here I'm curious how people get on with rigid forks.

As I've mentioned before I'm quite keen on building up a bike which will stop costing me a monthly premium in both time and money. I seem to get through an inordinate amount of chains and cassettes but not being much of a single speeder I quite fancy a gear hub.

Along the same lines, I spend a fair bit of time servicing forks to keep them smooth so I was curious about rigid forks. What sort of environments do you regularly use them in? Living and riding in the peak I do ride rather a lot of rock trails but also end up putting in a few road miles too. Perhaps I should consider a big hefty front tyre too?

Anyone got any sage advice? Both on trying rigid and on what to try?

Ta

Rigid's great. I'd take the 'fail-proofness' and lack of dive of my rigids over a sus fork for any loaded trip. Bikepacking means you're rarely hitting things as hard and fast anyway. Climbs better. Copes with hard, loaded braking better. Suits any terrain. And the added weight of kit makes sus forks less effective by the time they're adjusted to suit.
Ride position and tyre/rim choice - some of the weight you save can go into a bigger rim and tyre, it helps. Your position on the bike makes a huge differance too, weight as far back as you can with layback post and short stem etc.
We rode plenty of steep, techy and steppy / switchbacky trails in the Alps last summer and loved it, 2 of us on rigid bikes seemed to cope better that the FS rider, mainly as the load meant he couldn't pick up that much speed and remain in control anyway. Comfort-wise he had an advantage, but also had to work harder on the smoother trails. He was on a 26", we were on 29" or 69er.

It's not expensive to try either, just get a basic steel fork?

I haven't ridden my suspended bike for as long as I can remember with the weather being as it has. It's been nice using my Swift with an Alfine for the lack of upkeep required. Obviously, living in Suffolk means that I don't spend much time clattering down rocky descents but we have our fair share of sand, mud & grit. All I can say is give it a try, you might find you don't need suspension as much as you think.

I've only got one bike with any form of suspension now and that only gets used for instructing (people look at you oddly if you coach them on a rigid bike )

You do have to change your mindset slightly but once adjusted you won't (actually you might but I don't) miss suspension. I really don't believe riding a rigid bike slows me down much, just makes me think more.

Salsa steel forks would be a good starting point or exotic carbons.

I'm very tempted. My new frame should be here before too long so I might give some a go when I build that.

My current frame has a confusing headset situation that doesn't seem that easy to solve with a 1-1/8 steerer.

Know of anything with a qr15 on there?

s8tannorm wrote:I've only got one bike with any form of suspension now and that only gets used for instructing (people look at you oddly if you coach them on a rigid bike )

You do have to change your mindset slightly but once adjusted you won't (actually you might but I don't) miss suspension. I really don't believe riding a rigid bike slows me down much, just makes me think more.

Salsa steel forks would be a good starting point or exotic carbons.

I don't thinkit would slow me much. I went from 5" travel sus to 100mm 29er in October and the forks spend most of their time either packed up at full travel going down or annoying me by not being plush enough on the flats. A bigger tyre would probably be better

Know of anything with a qr15 on there?

You mean a fork with a 15mm wheel axle ?

http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/Mode ... elID=64390

Yeah. Axle. I think the qr15 is a good design. I like it.

I did see those forks but they're a wee bit ugly, especially in the red striped team version there. I'll have a look about. I think my frame is a couple of weeks away still.

On one seem good value. Would have to get used to the idea of qr again that's all.

I've got a steel singlespeed with a rigid fork, a carbon hardtail race bike and a 120mm full susser.

I can ride most stuff on the rigid that I can on the others, and for casual riding os actually I would say more fun to ride, forces you to pick your lines correctly and you have tp learn technique to overcome lack of gears and suspension.

This also in turn I find makes me appreciate the whippet like characteristics of the carbon bike which is more comliant when racing (no idea what it's like at bike packing!) and can use the forks to advantage. Also I find the full susser enable me to compared to the rigid destroy rocks, trail centres and large drop.off's etc! I like having all 3 types of bike, but rigid is fine for MTBing I find, you just have to learn how to ride it. it does occasionally destroy my arms, but only on terms of getting tired quickly, but I am a bit of a weed!


also excuse any typos, I'm on a mobile device...

No idea of cost but you can get a salsa cro-moto with a maxle:

http://salsacycles.com/components/cromoto_grande_maxle

*EDIT* Just seen the price. The carbon above is cheaper!

Been riding my Swift for a while with a full sus fork and Alfine 8 hub
Quite like the combination but agree with the comments above that you dont really need a bouncy front for bikepacking (and the added extra weight it brings). Im going back to rigid soom to lighten it up for the summer.

In terms of maintenance the Alfine has been extremely lacking in anything and been trouble free, I just wait until the mud falls off and if lucky the chain gets oiled

jameso wrote:And the added weight of kit makes sus forks less effective by the time they're adjusted to suit.

This is a good point, but also because of the added weight of bikepacking gear, you/the bike doesn't get pinged around as much as you might imagine on rough terrain. ~35lbs+ of weight tends to pin the bike to the ground fairly well, and if you use a high volume casing tyre at moderate pressure (tubeless recommended for this), then the tyre works quite effectively as "passive" suspension.

However, that said, I made a conscious decision to ride BB200 last year with suspension. I took the view that due to the duration and in places quite rough terrain, some of which is/was covered in a sleep-deprived state, it offered some comfort benefits as well as insurance against selecting the wrong line. Also, because I was travelling very light the bike was more susceptible to rough terrain than it would have been in full bikepacking mode.

Another experience on rigid forks came on the last day of the Welsh Coast to Coast route I did in 2011. A section of Sarn Helen was utterly punishing on a rigid bike where the uniformly rocky trail left no choice of line. For 255 miles of the route, rigid was fine, but for one 10 mile section they were appalling. Doesn't affect my decision to ride rigid if i did it again, but to be prepared for sections where they're not so well suited.

So, in summary - it's horses for courses. Rigid is good, but depends how far/fast/long you want to ride and where.

It was a learning experience for me just riding a loaded bike for the first time and not having increased the tyre pressure.

Really unpleasant feeling cornering as the tyre went all wibbley. Much nicer on the ride home with some proper pressure in them.

I keep meaning to try rigid as picked up a pair of forks in one of On Ones sales. Just seems dangerously close to a "special" bike packing bike

this very morning, i have just fitted a new set of singular forks to my on one 29r.
as the bike is my only one, and the main bulk of my riding is commuting on the canalside, and the rest of my riding is slow pootling/touring, a rigid for is far more suitable than a heavier sus fork, that spent most of it's time locked out.
i rode a full rigid singular as my bike of choice for offroad touring for a couple of years. managed a 300 mile tour in scotland on it, with no adverse affects.

and who likes maintainance? :D

Lots of good points here. Interestingly nobody is reporting horror stories from swapping to rigid.

I am a little worried that my location in the peak could count against me a little. But, half of the riding I do is on the smoother trails in between the rough stuff. I think a change in style would more than likely cover and loss of suspension. I'm also sure there would be times I wish for suspension forks, as indeed there is the odd time I miss a rear shock too.

As I say, I will likely wait for the new frame to arrive. I've been considering a rohloff too for a long time but they are a little spendy.

I ride in the peak quite a bit and never found the switch to rigid a problem. It did coincide with me going to 29" wheels though and I found they more than compensated by rolling over ruts and rocks that would catch me out on my 26" wheeled Soda. I also found that the stuff where they start to get out of there depth is the stuff I dont want to ride down on a loaded bike I do have 2 MTB's though and not sure I would want to loose the front suspension on my Soda if I am just out for a day ride in the Dark Peak.

I tried a Rohloff to try and decrease maintenance costs and figured I would save in the long run. Never really got on with all that weight out back and it made for a very heavy bike! I ended up selling it and bought a second-hand Alfine 8 instead. I fit it to the Fargo for winter duties, come spring and its back to 3 x 9. Reduces wear on chainset and means you hardly need any maintenance over winter months. Best of both worlds in my opinion. If you want to try a Rohloff though they hold their value well if you decide its not for you. I bought mine on STW and sold if for £50 more a year latter :D

Thats good info on the rohloff ta. The weight is a bit of a worry. I expect it will be on my mind a little if I decide to go for one. I would just go for an alfine 11 for cost wise if it wast for that god awful shifter!!!

Thats good info on the rohloff ta. The weight is a bit of a worry. I expect it will be on my mind a little if I decide to go for one. I would just go for an alfine 11 for cost wise if it wast for that god awful shifter!!!

I built some bikes for a couple to tour Aisa on, they both had Alfine 11 hubs. I thought the spread of ratios was much better than on the 8, I also thought the shifter was okay but I'm used to Deore and SLX

I've decided to give a set of rigids a go. My next big question is axle to crown.

The rebas I have on now are 510 a-c which is what the frame spec says it should have.
Sat on the bike with my kit on I generally have 20 to 25mm of sag, descending its always 40mm to 100mm into the travel I guess.

The forks I've been looking at are either 490a-c or 470a-c

Do we think that the 490 would be a little too releaxed? or the 470 a little too low?

Basically I was wondering if anyones tried anything similar?

I think static sag is misleading for working out rigid fork lengths, since once the bike's moving over the bumps the fork's average length seems to be shorter, or 'active sag' is more than sat-on static sag. You're right looking at stood-up position or downhill sag, same reason. If your sus fork uses 20-25% sag, a rigid fork of about 35-40% or so sag equivalent seems to feel right to me. Of the 2 options I'd try the 470mm (29er 100mm correction std length) personally, unless the bike is already a bit fast handling - your bike's a 100mm fork design right? A 5mm deeper lower headset cup and/or a bigger front tyre can both take the edge off a slightly-fast handling bike anyway. And shorter rigid forks are better rigid forks )

I'd recommend buying my rigid aluminium Exotic's...for the bargainous price of fifty quid! :D

I replaced the worn out (less than 2 years old too) Suntour XCR 100mm forks on my Felt Q620 with Kona Project 2 rigid steel forks... Bike feels far more responsive, and I don't really notice the lack of suspension to be honest...

Thinking about a Genesis Fortitude to replace the Felt nearer the end of the year too. Rigid keeps it lighter and more simple...

Cheers all. I'll be giving the 470 a go. Like you say, static sag is a good starting point but never a true measure of where forks spend most of their time!
They're the cheaper of the two anyway. :D

Now, last thing is to look at big but fast tyres.

FLV wrote:Thats good info on the rohloff ta. The weight is a bit of a worry. I expect it will be on my mind a little if I decide to go for one. I would just go for an alfine 11 for cost wise if it wast for that god awful shifter!!!

J-Tek said last year that they were working on an alternative shifter for the Alfine 11.