Elka stage 5 issue

Elkas make a noise from new. they sqwelch on compression. mate of mine had one in a Jedi for a year or 2. He changed it out for a cane creek I think.

Likely it's an o-ring around the adjuster at some point. Problem is you usually have to reset the IFP/bleed the shock and set the nitrogen pressure after replacing whatever parts might be bad. This is a few steps above changing cranks or a derailer.

Take it to a real suspension shop and get it fixed. It's a damn nice shock. I sure wouldn't trade it for a CCDB, and I've owned multiples of both.

If you get it fixed it will still just be an Elka, just get a Vivid or something else cheap and good.

On the early ones the valve stuck out so you could get adjust them easily, on the second gen ones they sunk the valve quite a bit to stop home mechanics having a fiddle. I'd imagine a moto shop should still be able to fill the thing up though.

Why dont you try contacting Elka and asking them?

I had the first gen with the nasty change of direction clunk, could have got it fixed under warranty but felt a later model shock and it was almost as **** so I didn't bother. Also the fat people springs had an ID that was far too large for the collars meaning the spring moved and rubbed everywhere.

On a high leverage bike I think they'd be alright but as soon as you go to a 2:1 leverage ratio the change of direction knock(that they still have) is too much for me went from a shock built by pretend French people to one built by real French people and the difference is night and day. Two mates had them and initially liked them but after the novelty of having something different wore off they went back to RS or Fox.

HardtailHack said:

On a high leverage bike I think they'd be alright but as soon as you go to a 2:1 leverage ratio the change of direction knock(that they still have) is too much for me went from a shock built by pretend French people to one built by real French people and the difference is night and day. Two mates had them and initially liked them but after the novelty of having something different wore off they went back to RS or Fox.

Click to expand...

On a completely unrelated note , do you realize your comment is offensive for Quebecois? No one is pretending to be anything in Quebec , stupid dumb english speaking people call us french because they are too ignorant to make the difference between the two .

Now back on topic, you're comment about the shock is spot on.Ive had 9 of those Elkas,within 3 months...I kept blowing them , the knocking sound was always very bad and overall, never really liked the shock on my Session...Great people with awesome CS but their product wasnt reliable a few years ago...

HardtailHack said:

On a high leverage bike I think they'd be alright but as soon as you go to a 2:1 leverage ratio the change of direction knock(that they still have) is too much for me went from a shock built by pretend French people to one built by real French people and the difference is night and day. Two mates had them and initially liked them but after the novelty of having something different wore off they went back to RS or Fox.

Click to expand...

Wow. Your experience with the shock was so bad, you then have to retort to belittling people that are not from France?? Also, what the hell does a language have to do with issues that the OP is experiencing with his rear shock??

lol french canadians

I've owned them only in the last two years, so I can't comment on their first run stuff. Both the ones I've had have been awesome. Feels more like my moto than anything else I've ridden, and the adjusters are all very effective. I like how the compression can be run pretty far in without getting harsh, and the further into the stroke you get, the slower the rebound gets. As opposite to the opposite, which I find with many shocks.

Of course I realise it was offensive, I'm Australian we cop **** for being stupid, drunks, throwing shrimp on the barby etc etc etc. But we know we live in a pretty cool country so most of us really don't care what the rest of the world think, we are a bit touchy about our "mountains" though, haha.

Oh Sammich quote Hacktastic and myself and asked for us to eloborate.

In all fairness the way the shock was setup with more compression and rebound near full compression was quite nice but other manufacturers have progressed more than Elka in the past 3-4 years, well, in my opinion anyway.

I'd imagine that the shock is making the weird squelch noise a bit louder than normal as when shocks get a bit low on oil they can get a bit noisy. I really don't know what else to add, only the dealers get the service manual so I doubt you'll find anything.
I was just looking through my emails but can't find the one I want, I'm sure they told me that most moto stores should be able to service their MTB shocks as I bought mine before we had an Aussie distributor.