Chone

Well I've realized my RockShox Tora (Motion Control, Preload and Rebound adjustment) is very stiff and rough on the little stuff and when its a long path with lots of small stuff... well oh boy I'm screwed, its not much of a problem to me since I like the fact its 10/10 for big hit stuff and I like that better but I would really like it to be a little better for small stuff, just so the ride is a little more comfortable lol.

So yeah, anything I can to make the fork more plush in small, continous bumps? How should I set rebound and preload, preload is right now how it came out of the shop and I don't know how to measure/find the proper setting, rebound is at the slowest setting.

Jason222

Did it work better when you first got it? Maybe an oil change would help. Softening down the preload wont make a huge difference, it'll just give you a lot of sag. To be honest, shorter travel forks don't soak up all the little stuff as well, so getting a longer travel fork might be an option.

Flak

Make sure you set the sag properly. Go to sram site and read the manual, but it basically tells you to soften the motion control all the way, sit on the bike with a zip tie attached to fork, and it should sag about 15-25%. That aside, turn up the rebound a little. This made mine pretty good over the small stuff. Good luck.

Chone

Okay I'm going to set sag properly now... I'm lightweight (130 pounds) so most likely the setting is not set properly but whatever, so okay I put the ziptie on the lowest part of the upper tube, then sit on the bike, get off, and measure the amount of mm the ziptie moved right? and that measurment should be about 15 or 25 mm?, to increase sag I should turn the preload knob to the + or - direction? (yeah common sense tells me + for more sag but you never know lol).

Well thanks a bunch, I'm also gonna try a slightly faster rebound setting.

Flak

- for more sag

You "preload" the spring less with -, more with +. My fat arse has the preload fairly up there. Be careful with the rebound...all the way up its a pogo stick and will be bad for big stuff....you'll almost bounce

Chone

Phew... I almost messed up my fork (stupid me was curious to see how the fork worked without the preload "mechanism" lol I almost peed my pants, yeah I'm a dumbass) but I finally have sag set up right... I had to turn down preload all the way down and even then I still only had like 15% or so, maybe I'm doing something wrong but still, the fork felt a lot better and it didn't lose any of its big hit prowess , thanks a bunch, I also made rebound slightly faster to the point where the whoosh it makes when it compresses can barely be heard (I noticed that when the rebound is set to very fast there is no whoosh or pshh lol and when its on the slowest setting there is a lot of whoosh and pshh).

So, a few minutes and a scare to death later I'm liking my RockShox Tora a lot better, stupid me I have a curse with bikes, everytime I try to fix something myself I end up fixing it but not without making a very stupid mistake first, that is why I made my spoke tension topic lol but oh well, I just hope that the very little oil that leaked from my accident didn't put my fork at risk (it was just some tiny drops, enough to slightly wet the upper part of the lowers but nothing serious) or I didn't damage any internals.

Well, thats all, I still have to test the fork in a really bumpy road to see how it handles but I'm confident it will be a lot better than before.

blue_neon

Wouldn't the amount of air have an effect on sag aswell?

Chone

Yeah it does but my fork is coil so...

blue_neon

Ahh you have the U-Turn version! My bad.

Flak

You're only 130lbs. Im not surprised you had to back the preload almost all the way off