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I need help.
I can’t seem to work out how to get a good tune on my rear shock.
I’m only on my second full suspension bike and on my first the manufacturer had a tuning guide. It was so simple, once I found my settings they just seemed right and I rarely changed it.
I’m now on a bike with more travel and a more expensive shock but I have no idea how to get the rebound right.
I’m on the Privateer 141 with a Rock Shox Super Deluxe Ultimate, 172cm tall, 74kg with kit.
Any help appreciated.
If you haven't heard of it go search on youtube for bracketing.
Don't worry if it takes a while to get it feeling right, it normally takes me many weeks and lots of fiddling. The added bonus is that once you start to get an understanding of how it all works you can tweak it a little depending on what type of trail you happen to be riding that day.
Set the sag, then get the rebound from the manual for the pressure that you’ve set it at.
Rebound should be one of the easier settings, after sag. I find it's compression and spring rate to be hard to get right. Also the frames themselves have their own suspension personality which will impact on the shock setup.
There isn't really a right setup, it can also come down to personal taste like whether you're a wheels on the ground type or like being airborne as much as possible.
I'd just look at a YouTube video to get a basic starter setup then write this down (along with your weight and season as temperature can affect air shox). So if you try to fine tune the shock to suit you and your riding style, you can always go back to the beginning if you don't like how it rides.
This videos says the shock is hard to setup which doesn't help.
Good luck 🤞
Go to a reputable suspension workshop (e.g. Sprung) and spend a half day with them getting your whole bike's suspension professionally set up. It is worth its weight in gold, your bike will feel 100% better and you'll come away with knowledge on how to set up any future bikes.
You might as well spend a little bit more money to make sure your shiny expensive new bike is performing at its best.
The Rockshox trailhead app gives a reasonable starting point, just put the shock's serial number in
https://trailhead.rockshox.com/en/ as I can't seem to just add a link
I'm in a similar situation on one of my bikes. So I'm going to start from scratch, setting sag with all adjusters fully open, then add the absolute minimum of compression damping and rebound …then ride. Adjust. Ride. Adjust. Ride. Adjust it back, maybe. I've never had a lot of joy with factory suggested settings as I'm heavy, but not very fast/aggressive.
I really liked this video. Nicely presented.
but I have no idea how to get the rebound right.
What is the bike doing/not doing that you think it should/shouldn't do? BUt also; what other's have suggested, there's no right or wrong, just bracket* it until it feels right to you
*Bracketing: find a bit of trail, DH is best, that's long enough to give the shock a work out. In your case, wind on full rebound, do a run, note how that feels, go back to the top, take all the rebound off, do a run, note how that feels over the same bits of terrain, now go for full minus a click, then open plus a click...repeat until you're changing between one or tow clicks.
Companies like TFTuned, Sprung, J-tech can and will 'tune' your suspension for you based upon weight, riding, terrain etc.
We've used https://www.rsrbikeworks.co.uk/ as well which uses telemetry on your bike to set it up. (along with knowledge)
I've used a Shockwiz and think they're brilliant. But i'd love to try something like RSR on my own bike and see if they could get it better... it's not a lot in the grand scheme of things.
After sag, look at volume spacers if you're vlowing through travel even on simple terrain
pump it up to the psi based on your weight, stick rebound in the middle, then + / - rebound until its right, takes about 2 minutes.
am i missing something?