Mountain Biking - Fixed Gear and Suspension Forks

Greetings.

I normally ride fixed gear road bikes.

I ride all year around, including severe winter weather.

This year, the ruts and bumps left by cars with chains have pretty much defeated me.

I think a suspension fork on a hard tail mountain bike (with a long travel Thudbuster seatpost) would solve my problem, and it would let me move up to even fatter Nokian's with more studs.

I know less than nothing about suspension forks.

For riding on rough, chain-chewed snow, with a disk brake and fat, studded Nokians, what suspension fork would folks recommend?

Cost-effective (good enough) would help.

Thanks.

How fat is you front tire going to be?

what is your budget?

I would stick with 80mm maximum for this application.

there are some cheap manitous out there (nashbar, pricepoint, jenson) that I wouldn't recomend for trail riding but would be sufficient for snowy roads, street bumps, etc.

there are some cheap manitous out there
Manitou Axle would probably be pretty good. I wouldn't go with anything better than a manitou black though. You could probably do one of the rock shox j-series, but I think most of them are really trash, but they may have a nice one or two in the line up this year. I'd say get on ebay or something and look for something used. If you do that be sure to find out the steerer length and make sure there are no scratches on the stantions(the shiny shafts that companies used[or still do] put those rubber boots over). Lockout may be a nice option, but I wouldn't say you need it. You probably don't need a rebound adjustment either, but preload or compression would be good; travel adjust is unnecessary. Air forks are probably overkill. If you are heavy (170+) you may want to consider getting stiffer springs(or something on ebay may already have them). Avoid chili works, sr suntour and rst. The last one is iffy, but they are kind of the cross over between a good name low end and a high end junk fork.

Make sure that the fork isn't an elastomer-based system, like the old Rock Shox Judy forks or the older Manitou forks. The elastomer bumpers get hard in the cold and lose all their travel. I'd recommend a used Marzocchi coil spring fork. They always work, and you don't have to worry about air seals leaking or getting cracked in the cold. I rode my Fox Float RLC through most of last winter, and it was fine. Rebound was a little slow, but that was it. This year, I'm going fully rigid with spiked knobbies. Not super smooth, but it's a pretty light setup.

Does the cold affect the action of oil-filled suspenision forks?

I'd recommend a used Marzocchi coil spring fork.

Word. Make sure there is a dampening adjustment knob if you are going to ride in cold weather, which of course thickens oil. I used to have a vintage 1997 Z1 that could be tuned to feel smooth as low as -25C with no oil change.

Manitou Axle would probably be pretty good.
The Manipoo Axel is a turd of a fork that they should have named the Flexel. I have a old Jett C that's laterally stiffer than that POS

The Manipoo Axel is a turd of a fork that they should have named the Flexel. I have a old Jett C that's laterally stiffer than that POS

well I rode on one of those for like 10 months and and raced on it too and it did well, for being a peice. It definitely needed rebuilding and I bottomed it out once a ride atleast. But it is low end, and I do weigh 200+ lbs and I do break ****. So I was pretty happy with it's performance and I think it would be perfect for this application. the only reason I got rid of it was because I sold the whole bike to build a ss.