[ohio]

3rd, its an inferior approach, no matter how much some random tiny group of enthusiasts insists otherwise.

Dismissing the 'improvement' as unfamiliar is the best counter-argument?

No.

Try explaining why it's an inferior approach.
Structurally, linkage forks are superior.
In terms of control over axle path, linkage forks are superior.
In terms of damping, rear dampers are as or more sophisticated than fork dampers.
In terms of handling dynamics, especially braking, increasingly sophisticated dampers are trying to reduce brake dive. Using damping to control brake dive is no more optimal than using damping to control squat/anti-squat in the rear.

The only areas of inferiority are feel at the handlebar depending on the type of linkage and familiarity. Clearly you do not follow motocross or motoGP, to understand how insanely fine chassis tuning is at this stage. Changing the CoG by a few millimeters sets these guys back a half a season of tuning. No team can afford to make the investment in a drastic change in chassis dynamics. ****, the new Yamaha YZ450 just flipped the engine around in the chassis and it's heralded as the biggest revolution in a decade, and required the "drastic" changes of about 3mm in fork offset.

 

[Kanye West]

Structurally superior? Give me a friggin' break. Maybe for certain road applications, but I'd have to see that proven for an offroad application.

There are SO many other things that need to be improved with MTB suspension before linkage forks can be considered reasonable (if at all).


And when you're going about 80mph across the desert and trying to corner on sand and gravel, that 3mm difference is VERY apparent if you ever have the opportunity to experiment with adjustable offset triple clamps. As is the springrate, the preload, the height in the triple clamps, the axle offset, the fit and finish of the gliding surfaces, the oil weight, the oil height, the oil quality under heat/cavitation/pressure, the midvalve float, the pistons porting and deburring, the damper shaft size, the base valve stages and crossovers.

Get a proper damper into a MTB fork chassis that doesn't suck, and exhaust ALL those tuning options I listed, and see if you need a linkage fork. If you have most of those options available and addressed, you can set up a fork/damper to physically ride and roll over obstacles faster. Changes in axle path become unnecessary, and brake dive is the last thing that needs tuning if the springrate and highspeed damping is bang on. Usually just some compression clicks.

 

[ChrisKring]

Ohio is correct. The 2007 YZ450 handled reportly much better when a little bit of metal was ground off the frame at the head tube. Go over to thumpertalk and listen to the debate of 20 vs 18mm fork offset.

I still think that riders could not deal with the effective fork offset changing through the stroke. Well, unless it was forward but that would hurt performance. The problem is with bikes (MX and DH) the rider mass is such a large portion of the combined mass.

 

[Kanye West]

I still think that riders could not deal with the effective fork offset changing through the stroke. Well, unless it was forward but that would hurt performance.

I thought about that too. The contact patch migration would be so damn weird.

 

[Huck Banzai]

Try explaining why it's an inferior approach.
Structurally, linkage forks are superior.
In terms of control over axle path, linkage forks are superior.
In terms of damping, rear dampers are as or more sophisticated than fork dampers.
In terms of handling dynamics, especially braking, increasingly sophisticated dampers are trying to reduce brake dive. Using damping to control brake dive is no more optimal than using damping to control squat/anti-squat in the rear.

The only areas of inferiority are feel at the handlebar depending on the type of linkage and familiarity. Clearly you do not follow motocross or motoGP, to understand how insanely fine chassis tuning is at this stage. Changing the CoG by a few millimeters sets these guys back a half a season of tuning. No team can afford to make the investment in a drastic change in chassis dynamics. ****, the new Yamaha YZ450 just flipped the engine around in the chassis and it's heralded as the biggest revolution in a decade, and required the "drastic" changes of about 3mm in fork offset.

Familiarity again.

Superior is superior, people realize it, especially the pro's.

"Clearly you do not follow motocross or motoGP, to understand how insanely fine chassis tuning is at this stage"

- ultimately self defeating; seekers of uncompromised performance dont, umm.. COMPROMISE.

EDIT: added 'Quote' so as not to be misinterpreted as being my statement. Not my reference.

Reality has a way of manifesting that, thus a complete lack of acceptable linkage forks.

You keep on with that fervor and passion.

Pragmatism and lots of experience - not pie eyed idealism.

So high leverage, low volume dampers are infiinitely more advanced than 1:1 levered, high volume dampers? do tell? maybe you can see the obvious reasoning behing the greater application of, and need for, technology and adaptation given these aforemention qualities......

Remember, no matter how hard and eloquently one insists, the obvious remains in play.

now get out there on your rigid belt driven single speed 29er and git r done!

 

[ohio]

Familiarity again.

Superior is superior, people realize it, especially the pro's.

"Clearly you do not follow motocross or motoGP, to understand how insanely fine chassis tuning is at this stage" - ultimately self defeating; seekers of uncompromised performance dont, umm.. COMPROMISE.

John Britten disagrees with you.

Besides "uncompromised performance" is idiotic marketing speak. Doesn't exist. Every design is a balance of competing factors.

Just because you underestimate the importance of familiarity doesn't mean it doesn't exist. No race team on the planet is going to set aside 20 years of refinement, and at least a year of a top racer's practice time to experiment with radical change. See the challenges Ducati and their riders faced just moving from a steel to a carbon chassis of essentially the same exact bike.

So high leverage, low volume dampers are infiinitely more advanced than 1:1 levered, high volume dampers?

Dude, why bother responding if you're not even going to read what I wrote. My words: "rear dampers are as or more sophisticated than fork dampers."
I can just repost the whole thing, if that's helpful.

On your bike, today, which performs better: the front or rear end? Which requires more maintenance?

Christ, it's not like I'm saying telescopic forks suck, or that your mom's a whore. I'm saying that linkage front ends have tremendous potential IF both manufacturers AND riders are willing to make a very significant investment. Given how highly refined telescopic forks and the chassis associated with them are at this stage, it would be a huge amount of effort for an uncertain payback from a small market. My god, the horror of such blasphemy!

 

[Huck Banzai]

Indignation, insistence, it...cetera..

There must be a conspiracy holding back this revolution! LIBERTAD!

 

[FlyinPolack]

WTF are you people smoking? Might as well make the whole thing outta carbon, spring & all.

 

[ohio]

Structurally superior? Give me a friggin' break. Maybe for certain road applications, but I'd have to see that proven for an offroad application.

See my original post. I agree with you. Long travel solutions are really difficult in a linkage format. However, linkage systems are vastly superior structurally. It should be obvious that putting your front wheel on a 30" lever arm is not actually that efficient... it requires relatively thick stanchions (compared to frame tubes) and a massively reinforced headtube/downtube on the frame.

There are SO many other things that need to be improved with MTB suspension before linkage forks can be considered reasonable (if at all).
...
that 3mm difference is VERY apparent if you ever have the opportunity to experiment with adjustable offset triple clamps. As is the springrate, the preload, the height in the triple clamps, the axle offset, the fit and finish of the gliding surfaces, the oil weight, the oil height, the oil quality under heat/cavitation/pressure, the midvalve float, the pistons porting and deburring, the damper shaft size, the base valve stages and crossovers.

Again, agreed, and that's even with 20 years of refinement of the chassis and dampers around the telescopic paradigm. Imagine starting from scratch, versus being able to use what you know from last season. And you're introducing tons of new variables into an already complex set. I'm saying it's just not worth it, even if the end result may be superior.

 

[ohio]

Indignation, insistence, it...cetera..

There must be a conspiracy holding back this revolution! LIBERTAD!

Are you retarded? I'm the one posting detailed explanation of how it ISN'T a conspiracy. It's a very reasonable decision about where and how to devote resources. You're the one posting the indignation and insistence, with nothing to point to except "if it were better, people would do it." Brilliant.

 

[Jm_]

The way I see it, linkage forks would make sense if bikes had vertical-wheelpaths like cars or quads.

But, bikes do not have vertical wheelpaths, and in most cases the rear wheel moves closer to the bike as it cycles through the travel.

With this limitation, the next best thing is to have the front wheelpath also get closer to the bike, because you can have the same relative center of gravity as the suspension compresses due to something like a G-out or turn. If you have the wheels moving in radically different directions, you're going to have issues with your center of gravity and you'll have to move a lot up and down the bike to get the optimum center of gravity given whatever point the suspension is in it's travel. Some might even argue that it's much more optimal to have a wheelbase that shortens some in the turn (allowing you to turn quicker).

This is acheived quite easily with a telescopic fork. I realize you can design almost any wheel-path you want with a linkage fork, but if you're designing the same or similer wheelpath as telescopic it's kind of pointless to introduce that kind of complexity in terms of design. Lets also not forget that a telescoping fork has a 1:1 ratio, which gives you room to have things like a mid-speed valve, hydraulic bottom-out cone, and other features.

I also wouldn't want a linkage fork that doesn't compress at all when braking (more weight on the front = more braking ability), not so much for that reason, but also that again the rear end might squat, causing your relative center of gravity to shift if the front doesn't compress as well. Not saying I want a lot of dive, I just want it to be relative to what the rear end is doing.

You'd also have a hard time convincing me that a linkage fork is going to take abuse as well as a good ole telescoping fork. Motorcross forks are inverted due to the size of the uppers and bushings, they are extremely strong/stiff fore-aft to hold up to big jumps and occasionally casing jumps. Sure, the linkage fork would be extremely "stiff" in all directions, but now those tiny bearings have to take the load that was previously distributed along big (and multiple) bushings. What's the point if you have to have 2lbs of big industrial quality bearings? I'd probably want some tapered-bearings in there, but then there goes the weight savings.

 

[Kamanchi]

How many seconds off a race run will a linkage fork offer?

 

[Pete..]

How many seconds off a race run will a linkage fork offer?

1.753 seconds.

 

[Steve M]

Indignation, insistence, it...cetera..

There must be a conspiracy holding back this revolution! LIBERTAD!

Don't be a tool.

Ohio is correct. The 2007 YZ450 handled reportly much better when a little bit of metal was ground off the frame at the head tube. Go over to thumpertalk and listen to the debate of 20 vs 18mm fork offset.

I still think that riders could not deal with the effective fork offset changing through the stroke. Well, unless it was forward but that would hurt performance. The problem is with bikes (MX and DH) the rider mass is such a large portion of the combined mass.

I don't see why you couldn't deal with the fork offset changing through the stroke - think of all the other variables a rider deals with. You're already used to the way the wheelbase changes (which varies significantly from frame to frame anyway), you're used to the pitching and bounce characteristics of your bike - over time I'm pretty sure you could get used to a lot of things that feel very strange to begin with. John Britten's linkage fork originally had a few options, of anti-dive ranging from ~50% to 100% anti-dive IIRC. Reportedly, virtually everyone who rode it initially wanted the lowest anti-dive setting possible because they were disconcerted by the lack of dive and the way they usually used that as feedback. Over time, the riders also tended to want more and more anti-dive as they got used to it, and found that once they'd gotten used to the initially-weird feeling, the braking distances shortened significantly. This, I believe, is what Ohio is referring to regarding prior knowledge and experience.

As you and Ohio both pointed out, with motor vehicles, the handling dynamics are far more refined, and with almost all motor vehicles, the vehicle weight is at least as much as that of the pilot - often significantly more. Their masses are also more or less rigid, vs the flexible and highly adaptive human body. A car or motorbike with no suspension is extremely sketchy on anything but the smoothest surface at any kind of "normal" operating speed, whereas bicycles are nowhere near as reliant on mechanical suspension simply because the person is highly capable of adapting to and compensating for the suspension. I think people could get used to many things that would initially feel completely whack on a bicycle, and ride it as fast or faster than what is currently being done.

As for the change in fork offset - you already deal with changes in trail (the main reason why the offset matters) according to pitching variation, if the changes in trail were similarly small (or even made more beneficial) with a linkage fork then what would it matter? Front axle paths are already significantly "rearwards"; we deal with ~30 degree changes in rear axle paths between different designs without even blinking, as if you couldn't vary a front axle path a few degrees and make it work. A more rearwards axle path would actually increase trail as the fork compressed, which has the potential benefit of increasing dynamic steering stability as well as the potential detriment (or benefit - who knows without trying it?) of moving the CoM further forward relative to the wheelbase under compression.

I think honestly the main reason that linkage forks have never taken off (esp in long travel applications, as Ohio said) is the packaging - it's difficult to utilise short links to get long travel, when the wheel path wants to come directly towards where you want the links to be, without getting massive change in the IC position (which needs to be well-controlled to get the desired anti-dive effects) AND without getting some wack axle path that may cause other undesirable effects (like excessive changes in trail). If you only wanted 3" of travel it wouldn't be that difficult to do, but at 8" you need longish links or you're gonna have to deal with a LOT of IC migration and potentially a pretty whack axle path.

However, I don't think it's an impossible task to make a linkage fork that meets or beats the existing telescopic offerings... just extremely difficult. You've gotta consider weight, strength, stiffness, sensitivity, spring and damping rates (though with a linkage you have the option to make these better than you could with a tele fork... or worse for that matter), axle path and the change in wheelbase/trail, fitting it all to frames with a variety of headtube lengths, axle-crown length and so forth. It'd take a considerable amount of development before you caught up with the telescopic offerings, and messing up ANY one of those characteristics would render the thing craptacular. You've pretty much gotta nail everything for it to be worth it. I'm not convinced that it'll ever happen, but I don't think it's beyond the realms of physical possibility.

 

[HaveFaith]

One clarification:

Fork dive does not equal more mass transfer. It's simple physics.

Another interesting point: You know have loads more potential in geometry setup and kinematic performance. Want a shorter wheelbase with more rake? Done. Longer wheelbase with reasonable reach to the bars and a steep HA? Done.

I am by no means claiming the death of the telescoping fork. There are however, some very interesting chances to improve the existing design

 

[Steve M]

I'm also pretty sure my massive nerdification there probably killed this thread... shame.

 

[worship_mud]

I'm also pretty sure my massive nerdification there probably killed this thread... shame.

as soon as the word "wheelpath" came up, the thread was doomed anyway.

if it wouldn't have been killed by your nerdism, then by someone else's...

 

[Huck Banzai]

Are you retarded? I'm the one posting detailed explanation of how it ISN'T a conspiracy. It's a very reasonable decision about where and how to devote resources. You're the one posting the indignation and insistence, with nothing to point to except "if it were better, people would do it." Brilliant.

Nothing yet put out by anyone is, or has ever been, at all competitive overall with any telescopic fork. Pardon my pragmatism, but despite it being a 'great' idea, the reality doesnt manifest.

Detailed explanation of repeatedly failed designs and inability to compete with telescopic forks. You make a claim that has long since been debunked, yet you insist it hasnt and that the majority are wrong, and you accuse me of being retarded?

Enlightening? "You betcha!"

But you keep championing that cause!

 

[TrueScotsman]

Socket was right- you sir are a tool!

Just because it is not the "normal" way of doing, doesn't mean that it is not worth investigating. You could have a linkage that changes the trail of the fork as it moves through it's travel or a linkage that decreases the amount of brake squat through it's travel. All woth looking into.

 

[Huck Banzai]

Socket was right- you sir are a tool!

Just because it is not the "normal" way of doing, doesn't mean that it is not worth investigating. You could have a linkage that changes the trail of the fork as it moves through it's travel or a linkage that decreases the amount of brake squat through it's travel. All woth looking into.

Sure its worth investigating, and it has been. Technically, on paper, it offers superior performance.

Practically, in all current applications and tests, it has not been able to come anywehere close to realizing those benefits.

Arguing that the major obstacle to their success and subsequent proliferation is familiarity with current products is inane and not an 'affirmative defense'.

Simply deriding me, and calling me names is inadequate to adress the core failure of the argument (and design) and is a cop out to the practical reality. THere are a plethora of ideas that suggest greater product and performance, but reality in the form of broad review shows that the applied products fail ultimately.

If you seek to undermine my case, present an application that demonstrates this superiority. I propose that you can't, and thereby call you, and all involved by extension, a tool - that which you accuse me of.

Really people, the elite minority that chastises the majority -- a true load of bull.

 

[TrueScotsman]

Ok- no more namecalling. I my be a tool also but at least I am an open-minded tool.

As for examples, how about we flip things around a bit. Single pivot rear swingarms rules in most other high-end bike sport (MX/MGP) but we as a bike industry have come up with arguably better methods such as DW-link, VPP, etc. Methods that take account of braking and acceleration forces and that change throughout their travel. Why is the front so different? Why do we put up with a high front dive or compromise by winding on the slow speed compression damping?

The telescopic fork is not ideal- a high leverage force, initial stiction, 1:1 ratio(avantages and disadvantages), varying trail distances (maybe has some benefits), varying wheelbase distance, etc.

Maybe DH is the IDEAL place to experiment with alternatives.

 

[MrPlow]

I see what your saying, but VPP,DW,FSR are all about pedalling efficiency. In my opinion MTB needs suspension when coasting (last time you sprinted through a rock garden?) and MX wants suspension to work under power over bumps. This dictates the difference in design there. But the front ends are another story. Really they are quite similar. IMO anyway.

 

[Inclag]

Sure its worth investigating, and it has been. Technically, on paper, it offers superior performance.

Practically, in all current applications and tests, it has not been able to come anywehere close to realizing those benefits.

Arguing that the major obstacle to their success and subsequent proliferation is familiarity with current products is inane and not an 'affirmative defense'.

Simply deriding me, and calling me names is inadequate to adress the core failure of the argument (and design) and is a cop out to the practical reality. THere are a plethora of ideas that suggest greater product and performance, but reality in the form of broad review shows that the applied products fail ultimately.

If you seek to undermine my case, present an application that demonstrates this superiority. I propose that you can't, and thereby call you, and all involved by extension, a tool - that which you accuse me of.

Really people, the elite minority that chastises the majority -- a true load of bull.

You are being a tool right now. Sorry, but that is pretty cut and dry.

I guess I'll start by asking how many years (cough decades) and millions of dollars has it cost BOSE to develop their suspension platform??

You know that just because you're stuck in a paradigm doesn't mean that it isn't possible or worth investigating further. Aside from yourself, every other engineer (if you are one in which case I pity your lack of creativity) in this thread agrees at least loosely it is plausible to optimize a linkage suspension fork to exceed the performance of common telescoping forks. To point out that previous design iterations within this industry have all failed is laughable. We were riding bikes with urethane elastomers that functioned as dampers less than 15 ears ago! A proper linkage fork would require extensive amounts of design, research, data acquisition, distributed discrete evaluation simulators testing, and real world testing, which is something only a few companies in our industry are even capable of. It's a very complex problem and therefore would entail no easy solution. Personally, based on what I've seen regarding the bike industry, I highly doubt that anyone could handle such a monumental challenge.

If you want to be a naysayer or call people dreamers, then fine. I just find it funny that your coming across with a douchey tone, completely discounting this idea because of lack of previous works, yet in the same breath you contradict yourself and acknowledge that it is completely plausible.

 

[TrueScotsman]

Just because it is the way the majority does it, doesn't make it the best way to do it.

As an example, The majority of people were riding twin-shock motorbikes until the '70's when Kawasaki "re-invented" the rocker-type monoshock that is now almost universal.

What would happen if RockShox/Marzocchi/Manitou or Fox were to "re-invent" the linkage fork? It may then become mainstream.

 

[ridingsupreme]

FAIL. no offense bro but you must have had too much soda or something to think that a linkage fork was a good idea. LOLZ!

 

[xy9ine]

i saw this at interbike years ago. scary, but a sexy bit of machining:

 

[Huck Banzai]

We were riding linkage forks at the same time as those elastomers, what happened? Girvin forks were common when the Manitou 4 and Judy SL Elastomer forks were on the scene; Quadra 21r, etcetera....

The thread evolved into the superiority of the linkage fork; no demonstration has come anywhere close to proving that assertion. At no point did I cniotradicty myself or consider a linkage fork plausible. It is not, and will not be. Call me a naysayer, I call it experienced pragmatism; The need to degenerate into name calling (not my actiion, yours..) is the clearest indicator you have no argument.

I live in reality and am very open minded; someone put something on the table that makes sense and I will consider it. That hasnt happened, and I propose will not, because the liabilities outweigh the benefits through and through and all demonstrations prove this, and any but the dreamiest engineer will concede this.


As I said - you/others continue to insist the case, but the reality and prospective reality dont support you.

No matter how many times you call me a tool, you're argument is non-existent and suppositional.

 

[kidwoo]

^You really have no idea what anyone has been trying to explain to you.


Because they're very good arguments being presented. You're actually the opposite of open minded.

 

[Huck Banzai]

^You really have no idea what anyone has been trying to explain to you.


Because they're very good arguments being presented. You're actually the opposite of open minded.

No one is explainging anything, they are making claims about performance. Some lateral comments from other naysayers play to the adjustable wheel path, but aside from that, no technical or plausible explanation or argument has been presented. Please reiterate valid points of these arguments? I have read them, I have seen the same arguments >10years ago with no change. They remain impractical, and nothing offered or proposed accomplishes the simple goal of being an acseptable alternate to a telescopic fork, much less superior, and a replacment.

Really - 'we used to ride elastomers' was thrown out there, and validly rebutted with a 'we were riding linkage forks at that time too' -- what happened? Its not like people in this sport wont shell out ridiculous sums for the latest or coolest, so thats not the issue.

You are usually pretty reasonable IMO, and I am NOT averse to admitting my failures.

So what is the plus of a linkage fork? Anti-Dive? one quality is superior when all others are inferior.

Rear shocks use more advanced technology BECAUSE they need to, because ofg the high leverahge rates and restriction on size of the damper. These SAME limitations do not apply to a fork - it is a 'different animal' so throwing a 'rear shock' into a fork linkage is a misapplication at best.

It is very easy when speaking of possibilities and faith to call someone closed minded; I propose that god is a robot, and dogs are the true dominant species - and I insist this -- prove that wrong.

 

[Huck Banzai]

Ill concede the POSSIBILITY along these lines:

Fusion is ideal! So much superior to Fission.

 

[kidwoo]

Are you on meth?


(serious question)

 

[kidwoo]

Please reiterate valid points of these arguments?

Quick summary: you keep listing the current lack of implementation in moto etc. of linkage forks as reason to believe that there's no possible way a superior design could exist without showing itself in this realm. Ohio and others have pointed out that at this point, switching from the current telescopic designs would give rise to so many new performance factors that doing so would create an adjustment period too severe to pursue the idea without a setback no one is willing to deal with.

Just because you haven't seen one, doesn't mean it couldn't happen. It just presents an amount of work that no one is willing to engage in.

And you could easily put a 1:1 damping system on a linkage fork.

 

[Inclag]

Quick summary: you keep listing the current lack of implementation in moto etc. of linkage forks as reason to believe that there's no possible way a superior design could exist without showing itself in this realm. Ohio and others have pointed out that at this point, switching from the current telescopic designs would give rise to so many new performance factors that doing so would create an adjustment period too severe to pursue the idea without a setback no one is willing to deal with.

Just because you haven't seen one, doesn't mean it couldn't happen. It just presents an amount of work that no one is willing to engage in.

And you could easily put a 1:1 damping system on a linkage fork.

Not directed at you Kidwoo.

Where did this misnomer of 1:1 damping being the end all be all come from?

 

[kidwoo]

Not directed at you Kidwoo.

Where did this misnomer of 1:1 damping being the end all be all come from?

I'll answer anyway.

Maybe not the end all be all but lower leverage ratios do present less work for the damper. The idea being that you can get better ranges of performance and/or longevity from the fluid and hardware, plus less heating through a run.

Not that you can't get a good system with higher ratios (obviously) but I can see why you'd want to shoot for it. You can use lighter springs too.


And on topic: I'm sitting about 30 feet from an original lawill leader fork. Yeah bitches. That thing is sketchy.

 

[xy9ine]

better pic of the hrc fork. i like it for the freak factor

 

[TrueScotsman]

Not directed at you Kidwoo.

Where did this misnomer of 1:1 damping being the end all be all come from?

Exactly, I spoke to a highly regarded supension tuner (MTB and MOTO) and in his opinion 3:1 is close to ideal, he has found problems with low leverage designs (initial stiction, etc).

I see the biggest advantage to linkage forks in integrating them with the frame designs to see an all-in-one front and rear package. In the same way as Elf (Cortanze) did in motorbikes.

 

[kidwoo]

he has found problems with low leverage designs (initial stiction, etc).

What's the 'etc.' part?

Having to use a larger and potentially heavier cartridge I guess?

 

[Huck Banzai]

Quick summary: you keep listing the current lack of implementation in moto etc. of linkage forks as reason to believe that there's no possible way a superior design could exist without showing itself in this realm. Ohio and others have pointed out that at this point, switching from the current telescopic designs would give rise to so many new performance factors that doing so would create an adjustment period too severe to pursue the idea without a setback no one is willing to deal with.

Just because you haven't seen one, doesn't mean it couldn't happen. It just presents an amount of work that no one is willing to engage in.

And you could easily put a 1:1 damping system on a linkage fork.

I did not ever say it was impossible to create a superior design, I said I dont believe it is practical. Anything is possible, not everything is reasonable or practical. Your inference is incorrect.

I discount the claim that "switching from the current telescopic designs would give rise to so many new performance factors that doing so would create an adjustment period too severe to pursue the idea without a setback no one is willing to deal with" as a load. That is quite simple to understand.

Linkage forks have been around, the attempts have been made, progress has not. Yes you could have a 1:1 ratio linkage fork, but where will you be placing the 16"+ damper? Does the obvious not present itself in unfolding the usefulness of that path, and correlate argument? The liability in that supposition is glaringly apparent.

I have welcomed many designs that others have resisted; long travel single crowns when the mass consensus was they were dangerous, and impractical. (in ref to 5 then 6, then 7 (and even 8") Single crowns.) I still advocate Carbon fiber bars and parts when so many doubt them - and of course use them, and so on..

 

[Inclag]

I'll answer anyway.

Maybe not the end all be all but lower leverage ratios do present less work for the damper. The idea being that you can get better ranges of performance and/or longevity from the fluid and hardware, plus less heating through a run.

Not that you can't get a good system with higher ratios (obviously) but I can see why you'd want to shoot for it. You can use lighter springs too.


And on topic: I'm sitting about 30 feet from an original lawill leader fork. Yeah bitches. That thing is sketchy.

Haha, knew that. I just wanted to drive home the point that 1:1 doesn't hold as much weight as some people would leave you to believe.

 

[TrueScotsman]

What's the 'etc.' part?

Having to use a larger and potentially heavier cartridge I guess?

Yeah, pretty much stiction, weight and packaging IIRC