[Kanye West]

The Sunline V1 DH headset I had been running in my last 3 DH frames is no longer usable since the lower cup pressing surface is out of spec. In addition they are no longer attainable since Sunline stopped production. I've had King's in the past and every one I've had has had the annoying "clicking" noise, even with properly prepped frames.

I'm looking mostly at the Cane Creek and FSA headsets. I'm having a hard time figuring out what the hell the difference is between all the "Orbit" options for the FSA's. The Orbit Extreme Pro Ceramic appears to be their top-of-the-line model. Anybody have experience with it? What is the difference between the UF, XLII, MX, and Extreme headsets?? These acronyms mean absolutely nothing to me, and they don't even give the same specs for each headset to compare them...

What Cane Creek headsets would be considered DH worthy? All I know about theirs is the 110 is supposed to be retarded expensive and that I've seen a few of their cups fail by splitting the flange right off the bottom cup, but that was under some pretty extended use. Pretty funny, had a buddy over to do some riding at my place, and he was complaining about a rough headset, so we took off the fork to grease the lower bearing and disintegrated headset pieces came falling out...

 

[spocomptonrider]

Got a 110 this year. Does not disappoint. Expensive? Yes, Worth it? Absolutely.

 

[Kanye West]

How so? What is worth the cost over any other headset?

I should add that this is going onto a 3 year old aluminum frame that has had 2 or 3 different headsets in it previously. Steel cups are preferred to prevent accelerated headtube wear.

 

[Bicyclist]

Just get an FSA Pig or Cane Creek Tank or whatever they call it and be done with it.

 

[Kanye West]

Open cage bearings = no no.

 

[will d]

another vote for the FSA pig Dh 4 years old been in 2 frames and still going strong. IMO expensive headsets arnt worth the extra.

 

[Bicyclist]

http://www.canecreek.com/component-headsets?product=tank-jump

 

[manhattanprjkt83]

get the sealed pig, i have never seen a problem with one.

 

[jonKranked]

How so? What is worth the cost over any other headset?

I should add that this is going onto a 3 year old aluminum frame that has had 2 or 3 different headsets in it previously. Steel cups are preferred to prevent accelerated headtube wear.

Sicklines did a really good write-up of the CC 110:

http://www.sicklines.com/2009/06/24/spotlight-cane-creek-110-headset/#more-5375

 

[Jeremy R]

How so? What is worth the cost over any other headset?

I should add that this is going onto a 3 year old aluminum frame that has had 2 or 3 different headsets in it previously. Steel cups are preferred to prevent accelerated headtube wear.

Cane Creek uses a much harder alloy in the 110 than they did in their previous lightweight headsets. They have always been honest with me in what I should use for DH, like when they told me not to put a solos on my
dh bike for the reason you listed above.
Basically, as far as Cane Creek, if you want light and strong get the 110.
If you want workhorse, get the tank jump.