madbiker555

Leave it to Manitou to make a 203mm single crown fork. Their 170mm forks were sketchy enough, but 203mm? I would think that this fork would have a high chance of snapping but I guess its been tested several times.

Manitou Travis




What are your thoughts on the Travis?

norcodirtjumper

Oh-ver-bored.

cryptid01

Not a whole lot of stanchion overlap in that fork, but you'd be running a lot of sag, so it cancels out somewhat.

zx108

there was a section on it in mountain bike action, they seemed to like it.

dccool879

8 inches!! OOO AHHH

Drunken Chicken

I actually think it's gonna hold up pretty well.

Maelstrom 

Still gonna feel like poop. Its esentially the spv valving turned upside down. So instead of the stiffness at the top, it is at the bottom. Very plush in the beginning of the travel and very inconsistent and crappy feeling at the bottom

Dannihilator

I just can't see the purpose of an 8" sc, let alone a 7" sc.

snakehunter

I think manipoo and rs are still playing catch up on marzocchi

seely

I haven't seen Marzocchi do anything even remotely new or innovative in 5 years.

Maelstrom 

the 888 and 66 are using brand new cartridges. Which actually work better than the old hsvc. Regardless, why do something innovative when other companies can't even compare valving on other forks are just now catching up to the quality of marz forks from 1999 and the first sets of z1's. Excluding possibly fox who had decent valving from the start.

cryptid01

Come on. ETA or TST don't qualify?

I have blown up three of three Manitous, zero of three Marzocchis.

seely

I think ETA and TST are both poor attempts at innovation.

And I quote:
"This is our very own on-the-fly compression dampening adjustment. Select between 5 modes depending on where you’re at on your favorite trail. from climbing to descending, it’s as simple as toggling the switch to fine tune your fork as you ride."

Terralogic (especially the new version) and SPV Evolve do the same thing, automatically, and about 10x better because they differentiate between rider input and ground input. This is just adjustable compression--thats it. Nothing new.

ETA? Most of the forks I have seen with ETA, it hasn't worked well/right, and seems rather inconvenient to me compared to just having a real lockout. It just seems far too gimmicky with the only real benefit being a lower H/A, which is stupid on an XC bike that already has a 70.5-72 deg. H/A. For downhill/freeride bikes, I don't really know anyone that actually uses an ETA setup so I won't comment on its usefulness there, though I still would rather have a lockout I would think.

Marzocchi's quality hasn't been all that impressive to me in the past 2 years, and many of their forks seem to have gone "stale" at the sake of innovation in their big hit freeride series. Even there, we still see the heaviest forks on the market with systems that work great, but haven't changed much (if at all) since around 1999.

To be fair, I DID just put a 2002 Marzocchi MXR on my P.1, because I loved the fork so much on my Cindercone, but I figured why buy a new Marz when the quality has suffered and nothing has changed since then?

cryptid01

I have an ETA fork and the more I use that feature, the more I like it. To each their own, I guess.

However, I will take you up on your assertion that they havent done anything "remotely innovative," followed up by your statement that "many of their forks seem to have gone "stale" at the sake of innovation in their big hit freeride series." Since this thread was started in reference to an 8" freeride fork, I kinda figured that's what we were talking about.

And the difference between my '03 Z1 FR and my '05 66 (both forks designed to target similar markets and riding styles) is remarkable, both in the quality of damping and in the overall structural stiffness of the fork.

Raiyn

Just another Manipoo in my opinion. Not something I spend my money on

Hopper

I reckon she should hold up fine. So what exactly is this intrinsic damping and how does it work?

Gerst240

How can you say that the other forks were sketchy i have ridden a pro-valved dorado and it was the smothest fork ive ever ridden. The only downfall to it was it was flexy. But ive come to learn its give/take with forks.

FF 6800

i dont really know, a single crown, 203mm travel fork seems a bit too much

Raiyn

That's always been one of my main complaints with manipoos. They feel like wet noodles to me

[bEn]

Interesting fork... I wonder how it holds up.... I also wonder if it is just as weak as the Manitou Kingpin. I've never seen a 203mm sc before.

seely

Improvement is hardly innovation. Not saying they haven't gotten better, but I haven't seen any truly NEW technology from Marz in a looooong time. Even ETA, if you call that an innovation, has been around for some time now.

Gerst240

This isnt a cheapo fork like the stance lineup, i dont see the issue with being 203mm it is a 1.5 steerer only fork. The extra strength from the 1.5 will be more then enough to handle whatever you could throw at it. The way i see it is it will be awesome to see barspins/x-ups off drops