Tips on reducing stiction

[Red Rocket]

Hey all,

I am interested in reducing stiction on my DNM's as small bump sensitivity is rather lacking. I fully understand that my forks are in the, shall we say, lower end of the market yet there MUST be some tips from riders out there on how to make them feel better in general. First on the agenda is a high quality grease such as slick honey. My other idea was getting high quality seals from somewhere, pooring oil in, doing up the seals and running bath style lubrication, though I don't know if this is possible. Any feedback would be great,

cheers, Hugh

[Juls]

I'm not aware of oil seals for these forks, and I think the leg coating is not slick enough for a oil seal anyway.

Suggest just using a very thin type grease, make sure the grease is not lithium based, and make sure it's not too sticky, then remember to regrease regular. (like every 1-2 rides)

kind regards
Juls

[Grip]

Well here's a schematic drawing of the DNMs and there seems to be both oil and seals involved. So ?????.

Also, ANY external lubrication is only going to attract AND hold dirt and grime on the hard anodizing of the stanchions... not a good idea. Are you sure that "stiction" is the problem? The only way of telling for sure (by hand) is to disassemble the forks to the stage where there is absolutely NO mechanical interference to the suspension "action" and then "feel" the action as you slide the stanchion in and out of the leg. Any "resistance" spots requires examination (could be bend/damage to stanchion) but if all smooth then it's not stiction but fork "tuning" and "set-up" you need to look at.http://www.dnmsuspension.com/images/drawing/dra_for_usd_180.gif

[Red Rocket]

Grip I have done as you said a while ago, and the problem doesn't seem to exist with any parts of the coating or bending/damage, but rather that the forks does not have smooth compession because of the rubber seal causing resistance. you can unscrew the seal and place grease on the INSIDE but it never seems to work as well as forks using open bath lubrication.

[Grip]

R.R if you're talking about the dust seal at the very bottom of the fork legs then there's nothing you can do about that as they are actually a "wipe" designed to clean the stanchion before it enters the leg (and the workings of your fork).

I do think you can probably eliminate a lot of it with tuning though. For instance the combination of a heavier oil running with a lighter spring would soften the initial fork travel, but of course everything you do is going to have an effect somewhere else in the range... so it always ends up being a compromise somewhere... and the best bet is to get that compromise happening at the least important stage (to you) of the suspension action. One piece of advice before you start this (if you do) onle ever do ONE change/modification at a time AND write down exactly what you do AND test it out over the same terrain.

Another alternative would be to see a suspension tuning expert who should be able to set it up as per what you tell them.

[Red Rocket]

Cheers Grip,

I was talking about the dust seal, so it seems tuning is the best bet.