Max Fork travel on GT I-drive 4 1.0 / Marathon

[Flowta]

Hi guys

 

 

 

What's the maximum size fork I can put on a GT I-Drive 4 1.0 /GT Marathon?

 

 

 

Having to cut costs and get rid of one of my bikes. Playing around with different ideas.

 

 

 

Thanks.

[Flowta]

bump

[LazyTrailRider]

Technically, you can put any travel fork on any bike really..

What you'll notice as you increase travel is that your steering will become much more sluggish (due to the slackening of the head angle brought on by a longer fork). At some point, this starts having an effect on the smoothness of the stroke, seeing as forks are generally designed to operate between certain angles of attack. It won't damage anything, but you'll feel what's referred to as "stiction" (static friction), that little bit more extra effort required to get the suspension moving.

 

The above being said, I think marathons usually come with around 100mm forks? You could probably safely go up to 120-130mm without affecting your handling *too* much...

 

Hope that helps!

[Flowta]

Thanks Martin

 

When I bought my bike it came with a 100mm travel fork. I see now that the Marathons are coming with a 120mm fork. Has there been a change in the geometry? I was under the impression the I-drive 4 and the Marathon had the same geometry (ie. just a name change)

 

I have a Marzocchi All Mountain SL 130mm-150mm that I might put on there. I currently have a Manitou minute 100mm on there at the moment. The minute would then move the girlfriends bike.

 

If set to 130mm would that be too much for the frame?

 

[LazyTrailRider]

You're quite right, I have a friend with a 2008 Marathon, and he has a 120mm Recon on it. You should be fine with a 130mm. Try running it with longer travel even for a while, seeing as you can easily just dial it back to 130.

Put it this way: I had a '97 Kona Kula, which came standard with a 70mm Marzocchi Bomber Z2. In later years, I put a 90-110mm Manitou Black on it. At 90mm, it felt perfect, but 110 (although plush) just messed up steering too much. Same with a 24" BMX cruiser with a rigid fork, I rode it with a 100mm Bomber Z1, which was awesome, but just too lazy - and specifically, ended up causing a lot of stiction :-)

MartinHattingh2009-07-19 02:04:52

[Flowta]

Thanks, I'll do the switch this week