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Hi, based on what I read on other threads, if I increase my fork by 20mm I lose about 1 degree in the head angle, correct?
Now let's say that I want to keep my head angle as it was before, can I simply increase the size of my rear tire with respect to the front one? If so, what would be a rule of thumb (e.g., for every Xmm increase in the rear tire you get back x degrees in the HA)?
I hope this makes at least a bit of sense!
To adjust for a 20 mm increase in fork length, you will need a 20 mm increase in the radius of the rear wheel. You will probably need a new frame to fit that, so you might as well buy a new bike that is set up for what you want to do.
Cool, thanks for the response, so in theory, though it would not completely restore the original HA, an increase in the rear tire would reduce the change that the fork would create (for example, 10mm tire increase results in only a 0.5 change).
Very educational!
Any other downsides besides frame limits?
You'd raise the BB which would have a negative impact on stability.
I'd say try it with the longer fork, give it time for you to get used to it - remember more travel also means more sag for the same percentage. Nobody I know has ever complained about handling after going slightly longer fork and slacker HA.
can I simply increase the size of my rear tire with respect to the front one?
You would give yourself much more grip on the rear than the front, which would worsen your bike riding experience far more than 20mm travel would improve it.
Fit an angleset headset to restore the HA. Not that you’ll notice much difference, tbh I’d be more concerned with invalidating the frame warranty, so check that first
20 mm more travel will make your bike much more fun. That's all.
it depends imo.
a much longer fork and really slack head angle (im running 150 front with a 63HA btw) raising the rear can make it a lot different. i found that it wanted to almost bounce you over the front for the same sag so also run less sag at the front and more rebound at the rear.