Mind you, after riding the Enduro SL we were wondering a bit about the benefits of the entire FSR range, but that's another story.

Care to elaborate on that, and/or post that story Mike? :-)

tbh, i reckon it's just that the damping in the shocks is becoming so advanced all the linkages are becoming useless

i think

scrap that, i reckon the epic's their xc bike

the fsr's their trail bike

the enduro sl is their ? bike

but he thinks the enduro is so good it's a fantastic trail bike

Ah. It is confusing that Specialized use the same name for their general suspension design (FSR) and for two of their bike models (FSR XC, Stumpie FSR).

Yeah, that should say "Stumpjumper FSR", really. To wit: The Enduro SL is marginally heavier than a Stumpy FSR but pedals just as well and descends a load better. So why buy a Stumpy? To which the main answer would seem to be "because it'll be a lot cheaper" at the moment ;-)

I do reckon that all the fancy valving in rear shocks is saving bike designers from having to do any work to make their bike suspension work well. Going back a few years single pivot bikes were dying off due to the problems with pedal bob and brake jack effects. Now they're more popular than ever thanks to the shocks bailing them out (And floating brake calipers) so the reduced maintenance benefits can be enjoyed without the performance downside.

A dead giveaway as to whether a suspension system is any good is often whether the bike ships with a lock out on the shock or not - that basically is the manufacturer saying their suspension doesn't really work, but you can turn it off so it doesn't frustrate you (This doesn't really count for stupidly lightweight XC race bikes where the suspension is a token gesture anyway).

The Horst link on the Specialized bikes is useful as it can be used to seperate the braking forces from the bump forces on the suspension, allowing it to remain neutral while braking.

The Giant Maestro system is the most impressive I've ever used under braking in that it stays completely neutral, allowing the back wheel to maintain traction under braking on rough surfaces where pretty much anything else I've used skips all over the place.

Mike D what travel have the stumpy fsr got? Is it still 120mm for the alloy and 130 for the carbon frames?

It appears to be 120 across the board, but that might be wrong ;-)

Thanks for info.

That makes sense with the enduro going SL.

New toys, given them a year to get the bugs ironed out and I'll be tempted by the 2008 models.

2008 FSR with Brain pls :)


* got to plan ahead *

and save up.....

Well finish off the finance on the HT anyways, before signing up for more :)

So does the shock technology mean the single pivot is a match for true 4 bar such as a Turner, or is it all hype?!

I would like to know how qualified/experienced people are to answer that question. Only a handfull of people on this site imo anyhow! I dont include myself or DYLAN TURVEY in that select group either before he puts his ore in ;-)

Well my unqualified answer is,


No, the Shock is just a bodge, doesn't actually help with brake jack anyway.

Personally FS wise I'm a I-drive Fan, which is single pivot and the weight being ( while stood ) on the rear swing arm.


Mixture of Both is best.

"Personally FS wise I'm a I-drive Fan, which is single pivot and the weight being ( while stood ) on the rear swing arm."

That's not how i-drives work, that's a URT. I-drives are sort of like a single pivot, but with the bottom bracket isolated from the rest of the frame to (sort of) eliminate pedal feedback.

I-drive is a URT, with the BB linked to a ecentric thingy with bearings and linked to the main frame with a dog bone.

Very good for peddling over rough terrain, makes a excellent technical climber.

Lighter I-drive 5 would be sensible.

The I-drive is designed to deal with pedal feedback by maintaining a more constant chain length than other single pivot systems. It can't deal with brake jack without a floating disk mount linked back to the main frame (Effectively making it behave like a 4 bar system and adding extra complexity and with it shorter service intervals/reduced reliability).

Brake jack is a problem on any single pivot system (This includes the likes of Konas FS bikes and the Trek liquid which are single pivot rear suspension with a big shock linkage but look like 4 bar systems). If there is only one pivot between the BB and the rear axle it's not a 4 bar system.

"adding extra complexity and with it shorter service intervals/reduced reliability"

I'd disagree with that, not complex at all and faultless for 2 1/2 years, only plays up when the BB goes, which unscrews the I-drive system LOL

New I-drives haven't got the same problem.

I think he meant that it's more complex if there's a floating brake mount used, not i-drive itself.

I don't think you can really describe it as a URT when it has the eccentric bearing/dog bone linkage to reduce chain growth. URTs, IMO of course, were a fairly silly idea on the whole.