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So I'm reading all kinds of helpful guides and articles on rebound and compression and I'm sort of getting it but then read something else and I'm confused again. So far I've just been playing with the twiddly bits on the bike and seeing what happens but with more bits to twiddle I'm finding I'm not getting the set up quite where I want it.
I find the guides use different terminology and a couple of things in particular I find confusing.
For example, I have forks with Low & High Speed Compression. The knobs are labelled with Hard in one direction and Soft in the other. A guide says to increase compression or decrease compression. Others may say 'open' or 'close'. So which way is which?
And then I have another fork with just 'lock' on one end and 'compression' on the other. Go towards compression and it gets soft, but is this increasing or decreasing compression? Or to complicate it further some guides refer to increasing or decreasing compression *damping*, which is not the same, or is?
Likewise with Rebound. Guides say to 'Reduce' or 'Increase' rebound damping but but forks have 'fast' or 'slow'. Does slowing increase the damping or the other way round?
Close=Increase=Clockwise=More Damping=Hard
As you've almost suggested, "High & Low Speed Compression" is missing the word "Damping".
Low Speed Compression Damping controls how quickly your fork compresses when forced to moved by a smaller bump. High Speed Compression Damping controls how quickly your fork compresses when hitting a big bump. More Compression Damping makes the fork move in a slower more controlled way. Too much compression damping and your fork will feel sluggish, fail to react to terrain (robbing you of grip) and you may not get full travel.
Rebound Damping controls how quickly your fork rebounds from the compression stroke – comes back to a fully extended position (or more usefully, the sag point you have set with air pressure or spring preload). Reduce the damping and the fork rebounds more quickly ("Fast"). Too much rebound damping and your fork won't return fully after repeated hits (known as "packing up") which means you'll not benefit from the forks available travel. Too little rebound damping and your fork will buck around like a pogo stick.
http://locotuning.co.uk/tech-info.html
Glossary and setup guide with problems sover at bottom of each section, any queries feel free to give us a call for a chat 😀
Funny enough, your guide was part of my confusion 😀
The advise on set up is fine and clear, but the problem solver parts mentions increase/decrease this and that, and that's where I was unsure. Basically down to which way to turn the knobs to do that.
Confused myself further by reading the Rockshox guide for the Lyriks and various suggested settings, for example it has one for "Minimising harsh straight edge bumps" but I wasn't sure whether it's suggesting harder or softer as the setting example was somewhere in the middle.