BEN’S PRIVATEER 141 ÖHLINS
MONTH 7: With the help of Sprung Suspension, Ben takes a deep dive into the inner workings of the Öhlins RXF 36 M.2 fork I’m now blessed with a butterysmooth ride
£4,499 • 29in • privateerbikes.com
For the last couple of months I’ve been meaning to get my Öhlins RXF 36 M.2 fork serviced, but life/riding kept getting in the way. Well, I’ve finally had it done and it was a pretty revealing experience. I booked the fork in with Jake Ireland at Sprung Suspension, near to my home in the Forest of Dean, for what was initially just a lower-leg service. But after talking with Jake he was keen to take a deeper dive as Öhlins forks can suffer from build quality issues, so we went for the full strip-down and rebuild instead. Which, incidentally, is what Sprung Suspension does with every new fork it sells, regardless of the brand.
When I mentioned that the fork had had six months of use, averaging around two rides per week, Jake was pleasantly surprised, as many Öhlins forks of a similar vintage are often in a much worse state, with scored upper tubes and knackered seals. Much of which is down to the limited amount of lower-leg lubrication in the RXF 36 when compared to other forks. That means more friction and wear, something that’s compounded by the lubrication oil getting ingested by the damper cartridge and negative air spring, leaving the fork dry and sticky.
Now, I’ll be perfectly honest here.
I’m nervous when it comes to bigger jobs like splitting a fork apart, so seeing the speed and ease at which
Jake dismantled the fork, as well as his knowledge of the fork’s specifics, was impressive.
During the inspection, Jake removed a plastic volume spacer from the negative air chamber to increase the negative spring volume and make the fork more sensitive. He checked
WHY IT’S HERE
for bushing tolerance then lubed everything up and reassembled the fork almost as quickly as he dismantled it.
Jake also suggested a couple of things to try regarding my set-up, namely removing a couple of clicks of low-speed compression damping and increasing the main air pressure, as he felt I was running too much low-speed compression to compensate for too little pressure in the main chamber.
Before I left, Jake also mentioned the set-up services they offer at Sprung Suspension, from a basic car-park check to a full-on repeated-runs-with