COLD AND SHOCKS?

[EVIL BOTA]

Ok has any one ever notice a difference in the performace of their shocks in the cold weather. I took a ride today and bottomed out my front shock quite abit. I have been doing this 2 foot drop all year and never had it bottom out before. Today it did it every time. Is it the cold or did I blow my shock out?350 miles on this shock and I never bottomed it out before. B.G. Z-1 WEDGE IS GONNA BE HERE SOONER THAN I THOUGHT.

[AA]

E.B.

The cold will effect the way your air shocks perform in the cold. I don’t know the correlation between temperature drop in PSI but it is enough to notice while riding. The cold also has the same effect on your tire pressure. For the folks out there with elastomer forks and suspension seatposts you will feel the opposite effect, colder temps, stiffer suspension.

AA

[EVIL BOTA]

Well if thats the case I guess I blew out my shock : :'(

[boingboing]

Thats food for thaught. I suspected my suspension was performing differently, but just assumed that it was because I was as limber as an oak tree cuz I was freezin my @$$ of.

[Drew]

Boyle's ideal gas law:

PV=NRT
P = Pressure, V= Volume, N=Number of moles of gas, R= about .082 and T=Absolute temp in kelvin

Assuming your shock didn't grow or leak, nothing changes except for temperature and pressure. If you set your uncompressed shock up at 100 Psi in August when it was 80 F (about 300 Kelvin), and you've left your bike in a 20 degree shed (266 kelvin) your pressure is now abround 89 psi. But then when you ride the air warms up by friction and the pressure rises slightly.

This doesn't quite apply to tires as the volume changes a bit with pressure.

[pk]

Don't forget the effect the cold has on the seals.

For a while I was testing K2 Razorback which had a Noleen front shock. The seals got so tight that the fork wouldn't rebound, they just bottomed out and stayed bottomed out.

pk

[AGENTGRAPE]

it seems coil and oil shocks are the least affected by the cold weather the rebound will be slower when the oil stays thick lots of winter riding will turn oil into sludge by spring so change it a couple times a year and you can check the seals at the same time