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I've been playing with some geometry calculations and it looks like adding 10mm on the fork travel and running a -1deg angleset in my Smuggler will slacken the HA a bit (1.5deg), lengthen the wheelbase a bit (15mm), raise the bb a wee bit (3mm) and not loose very much in reach (4mm).
It all looks ok on paper as I'd like it a bit slacker and the bb is low to start with but lots of things look good on paper but reality is different....
Am I missing anything that means it's a terrible idea?
Will
Try it out with just the 10mm travel increase first, you might just like it as is?
Then go from there.
Seat angle may steepen a tiny bit but the extra length in the fork may just cancel that out
1.5 deg from that sounds like a lot.
1 deg angle set will not slacken by 1 deg, it will be slightly less due to the rotation of the head tube around the rear axle as the fork kicks out.
The 10mm of extra travel hardly seems worth it but ay just get you back up to the expected 1 deg.
No, no major changes there. Try it. You could slide the saddle fwd a tad to account for any changes in weighting when you're climbing, if needed.
I did something similar on my Bandit 29er. Or rather, previous owner had upped the fork travel (probably raising the front ~25mm over the specified fork), it seemed a little high to me so I decided to go the whole hog and put in a -1.5 degree angleset and some offset bushings. That was a bit low so I am only running one offset bushing now. There is a lot of flop at low speeds, but you don't notice that once you get rolling. Being able to pedal sat down reasonably comfortably up hills and get down the scary steep (not trail centre) stuff are the priorities I suppose.
And @jameso yes I run the saddle as forward as it will go to compensate for the slackened seat tube angle (a couple of degrees at least). But I don't like a too upright pedalling position, so I am happy with a seat tube angle slacker than the current trend.
Basically willy, suck it and see.
Thanks for the replies. I am tempted to go up 20mm in travel while I am at it to 150mm at the front. More travel, would be almost 2deg slacker, 5mm higher bb and just 7mm lost on reach....
Basically willy, suck it and see.
S**** 😀
There's always one woody2000!!!