Softer springs for cheapo RST fork?

[John Davies]

My daughter weighs only 70 pounds and the springs in her RST 281R fork
are intended for a 160 pound rider. (This is according to the RST
service booklet.) Neither my local Trek dealer, Trek USA, nor RST
offers the optional soft blue 145 mm springs. Any advice on where to
acquire these would be greatly appreciated.

The bike is a 2002 Trek Mt Track 240 (24 inch wheels).

Is there a source for an inexpensive suspension fork for a 24 inch
wheel that is tunable for rider weight?

I thought about grinding down about 1/3 of the OD, but fear the
springs will just fracture during use.

The springs are retained top and bottom by threading into bushings, so
I can't just stick in any old springs from Home Depot....

Would shortening the elastomer inserts have any noticeable effect?

Thanks for any help. Surely someone has had this problem before? My
daughters arms are getting pounded by this fork ;(

John



John Davies TLCA 14732
http://home.comcast.net/~johnedavies/
'96 Lexus LX450
'00 Audi A4 1.8T quattro
Spokane WA USA

 

[Phil, Squid-in-Training]

> Thanks for any help. Surely someone has had this problem before? My
> daughters arms are getting pounded by this fork ;(

Doughnuts. Lots and lots of them.

--
Phil, Squid-in-Training

 

[Werehatrack]

On Fri, 05 Nov 2004 10:28:05 -0800, John Davies
<[email protected]> wrote:

>My daughter weighs only 70 pounds and the springs in her RST 281R fork
>are intended for a 160 pound rider. (This is according to the RST
>service booklet.) Neither my local Trek dealer, Trek USA, nor RST
>offers the optional soft blue 145 mm springs. Any advice on where to
>acquire these would be greatly appreciated.
>
>The bike is a 2002 Trek Mt Track 240 (24 inch wheels).
>
>Is there a source for an inexpensive suspension fork for a 24 inch
>wheel that is tunable for rider weight?
>
>I thought about grinding down about 1/3 of the OD, but fear the
>springs will just fracture during use.
>
>The springs are retained top and bottom by threading into bushings, so
>I can't just stick in any old springs from Home Depot....
>
>Would shortening the elastomer inserts have any noticeable effect?
>
>Thanks for any help. Surely someone has had this problem before? My
>daughters arms are getting pounded by this fork ;(

I don't know if the bridge on that fork is stout enough to permit
this, but some suspension forks employ a spring only on one side, and
it seems to work. As lightly as that bike is loaded, I suspect that
what you really need is one of the cheapie forks from a low-price
unit; the kind that would be regarded as hopeless junk by a rider of
my mass. These can often be had on eBay for $20 or so.
--
Typoes are a feature, not a bug.
Some gardening required to reply via email.
Words processed in a facility that contains nuts.

 

[Pizza Man]

John Davies <[email protected]> wrote in message news:<[email protected]>...
> My daughter weighs only 70 pounds and the springs in her RST 281R fork
> are intended for a 160 pound rider. (This is according to the RST
> service booklet.) Neither my local Trek dealer, Trek USA, nor RST
> offers the optional soft blue 145 mm springs.

John,

This sort of thing really chaps my hide. It seems to be more and more
common for manufacturers or distributers of many products to fail to
carry even the most basic of replacement supplies. This is a bit of a
sore spot with me lately (along with crummy customer service for any
software product, but I digress).

My Trek 4300 has RST MCU shocks as well. They work fine for me, but I
would like to try a little fine tuning as well as having some spares
when the stock MCUs wear out. Not so easy as you have found out.

After extensive surfing I could only find two sources on the web.

bikeparts.com lists the pink (firm) and blue (med) mcu foam
replacements.

http://www.bikeparts.com/search_results.asp?ID=RT65532 (for the blue)

Unfortunately they are out of stock on both.

mtbstore.com lists two as well. RST Tuning MCUs: soft - grn/blu and
med - tan. $3 each.

http://www.mtbstore.com/find.php?PH...=rst+tuning&cat=&zip=&discount=&affiliate_id=

You may have to cut and paste this long link into your browser.

Good luck, Tracy

 

[zulutime]

mcmaster.com or any industrial spring maker.

 

[John Davies]

On 10 Nov 2004 22:32:48 -0800, [email protected] (Pizza Man)
wrote:

>This sort of thing really chaps my hide. It seems to be more and more
>common for manufacturers or distributers of many products to fail to
>carry even the most basic of replacement supplies. This is a bit of a
>sore spot with me lately (along with crummy customer service for any
>software product, but I digress).

I am pretty steamed about it too. What really irritates me is the way
Trek sells these bikes for little kids but uses the springs for a 160
pound rider. How many kids are turned off to mountain biking because
their forks don't move up and down like Dad's?

>My Trek 4300 has RST MCU shocks as well. They work fine for me, but I
>would like to try a little fine tuning as well as having some spares
>when the stock MCUs wear out. Not so easy as you have found out.
>
>After extensive surfing I could only find two sources on the web.
>
>bikeparts.com lists the pink (firm) and blue (med) mcu foam
>replacements.
>
>http://www.bikeparts.com/search_results.asp?ID=RT65532 (for the blue)
>
>Unfortunately they are out of stock on both.
>
>mtbstore.com lists two as well. RST Tuning MCUs: soft - grn/blu and
>med - tan. $3 each.
>
>http://www.mtbstore.com/find.php?PH...=rst+tuning&cat=&zip=&discount=&affiliate_id=
>
>You may have to cut and paste this long link into your browser.
>
>Good luck, Tracy

Thanks - but what I really need are the soft springs, not the MCUs. I
emailed mtbstore.com to see if they could help. I appreciate your
comments, and if I locate a source for tune-up parts I will post it
here.

John


John Davies TLCA 14732
http://home.comcast.net/~johnedavies/
'96 Lexus LX450
'00 Audi A4 1.8T quattro
Spokane WA USA

 

[Pizza Man]

> I am pretty steamed about it too. What really irritates me is the way
> Trek sells these bikes for little kids but uses the springs for a 160
> pound rider. How many kids are turned off to mountain biking because
> their forks don't move up and down like Dad's?

John,

I picked up a li'l full suspension bike for my daughter. The rear
shock looked like it might be better off removed entirely since her
weight is too low to compress it and all the extra unnecessary weight
the suspension assembly adds to the bike. I looked at the design a bit
more and was able to unscrew the shock bracket a bit to take some of
the pre-load off the shock. It sort of works now. Components like
brake levers still seem to be made for an adult size hand not a kid's
hand (like your adult shocks on a kids bike)


> Thanks - but what I really need are the soft springs, not the MCUs.

I made the assumption based on your wondering if you could shorten the
"elastomer inserts". I assumed that was an MCU and I figured softer
inserts would be better than shorter inserts. Does your shock lack
MCUs entirely?

My RST shock appears to be a bit of a combo (without actually taking
it apart). It has MCUs and I believe another spring based component to
dampen the compression. Maybe yours is similar and could still use a
softer MCU? Just shooting in the dark without seeing what you have
there.

> I emailed mtbstore.com to see if they could help.

Good idea. They seemed to list one of the largest stocks of fork
parts. Give bikeparts.com a call too to see what they have to say.

Good luck, Tracy