Suspension Smith

07/02/2026

Heres something unique I have been working on lately.

The dual suspension is working beautifuly and is sooo compliant and sooo good in rock gardens etc.....there has been one issue tho.

Because its soo compliant with 235mm of front travel, its main drawback is once you get onto a faster say more open flowy bit of smoother hardpack track, all that super soft travel is a bit of a drawback...the front gets pitchy and wallowy and imprecise when pushing hard.

The fix I have been working on and where the front Ohlins cross country TXC2 Air shock now really comes into play is the use of its lockout feature...this Lockout effectively Locks or closes the shock valving and prevents it from moving, hence no shock travel.
In the pics it shows I have rigged up the shock with a cable operated Lockout lever mounted on the bars...very typically XC tech and nothing really new.
Whats different tho is the effect this Lockout has on the dual front suspension.
When I lockout the shock the front suspension reverts to the Telefork, the Fox 40 fork for suspension travel only.
This has the effect of both shortening the available travel to 180mm and making the front suspension much firmer, much tighter in feel when pushing hard.
Because the dual suspension is an "in series" suspension system, the In series springs of the Telefork and the Ohlins shock spring give a combined lower spring rate at the wheel.
The following is a quick rough comparison.
The Telefork has say a spring rate of 11.6N/mm
And the Ohlins shock air spring rate of 40N/mm
When you measure these two in series they give a combined in series wheel rate of 9N/mm with 235mm of travel.
But if I lockout the shock then the Forks become the main suspension with a wheelrate of 11.6N/mm and 180mm of travel, which is a spring rate increase of 28%, which is quite noticeable....just by simply pushing the lockout lever on the left bar.

This Lockout lever ( in black ) is still a work in progress,it needs to be a little more easier to use as its lever throw is a bit excessive but its useable and proves the idea as being valid....the small silver lever just above the main black Lever is the return, simply touching it returns the Lockout lever back to full open.
The gold lever on the bottom is the Seat dropper post remote lever.

01/01/2026

Heres a Vid I have been meaning to do for some time now...it shows me riding the Kenevo with the dual suspension in action through a rock garden etc...shows the two in series suspensions working together quite well to provide a high level of overall bump compliance...its amazing how little of the bump forces are making it through to the riders hands...its just such a compliant and confidence inspiring ride even when hitting big stuff at speed.

A handlebar perspective of a ride through some rock gardens and tight bush trails showing the dual suspensions working together in action.2020 Specialized Ke...

25/12/2025

Yesterday I decided to do a comparison on the Kenevo between the 235mm travel Dual front suspension system which I have been riding and testing for the last 4 months and the Stock Fox40 fork configuration set at 180mm travel which I installed yesterday and rode yesterday as shown in the Pics.
I have to say I was very pleasantly surprised....the Fox40 only fork setup does not compare very well with the dual suspension setup using the same Fox40 forks.
The two front suspension setups use the same Fox40 forks....the forks being modified with burnished fork bushes to reduce any stiction and friction and a Smashpot coil spring conversion with the fork travel set at 180mm and using a dual coil spring setup of a Blue short spring and a 60lb main spring.
The action of the forks is superb with very little stiction/friction and hence great small bump sensitivity and great big bump eating capability.
The Fox40 only setup I rode yesterday whilst quite good...was noticeably inferior to the Dual suspension setup in about every way....the Dual suspension has way better small bump compliance and much much better big hit sharp edge compliance.
When pushing hard through a rough gnarly section of track the dual suspension has way better stability and directional control and is so confidence inspiring and way less tiring to ride....very happy with that result, it pretty well confirms the superiority of the dual suspension in a very clear and convincing manner.
I have the data logger running on the bike and will do a telemetry data comparison between the two setups in the coming days.

21/12/2025

Heres a look at the Zerode G3 in its latest incarnation of the dual front suspension.
This is running a 27.5 front wheel which allows me to run a total of 235mm front travel but stay close to the bikes original Axle to crown length at 615mm, 609mm being as measured when received, as well as staying close to the bikes overall geometry...I am also running a 1 degree steeper steering headset as this kind of suspension gives a better steering feel when run a little steeper and the adjustable offset and trail dialled in.
The bike is a size: Long
Basic specs are: ( stock is in brackets )
Wheelbase: 1288mm ( 1305 )
Steering angle: 63 degrees ( 62 as measured when received )
Trail: 130mm
Offset: 47mm
Axle to crown: 615mm ( 609 )
Travel: 235mm ( 200 )
The forks are using a smashpot coil conversion at 180mm travel with the 55mm travel link suspension set at its most rearwards wheelpath setting.
Tires are Schwalbe Albert radials 2.6 x 27.5 F&R

01/12/2025

Heres an interview I just did with Pinkbike on my MTB suspension....

The axle path is bump-dependent.

13/11/2025

Heres a quick Vid of the dual front suspension on the Zerode being pushed through their respective travels...180mm for the Fox40 fork and 55mm for the Link suspension....I have reduced the air pressure in each to allow this push travel....

Pushing the Dual suspension fully through its respective travels of the Fox40 fork 180mm travel and 55mm Link suspension....235mm total travel front travel o...

11/09/2025

So been getting out on the Kenevo most days for a week and a half now testing the new front suspension and having a fun time...its brilliant!!

Its very compliant and very forgiving over very rough terrain roots/rocks/ruts etc...very confidence inspiring...just doing a lot of trail riding at the moment...not any jumping or steeper going yet.
No issues have surfaced....its been rock solid and reliable...the front shock feels great...about the only adjustment I think I need to make is soften the Hydraulic bottom system as its not using the last 8mm of shock travel.

At first I was testing the setup with the 160mm travel Fox40 fork and 55mm travel link so giving 215mm total travel...and it worked so well....
Then I got curious and I put the Fox40 fork back to its original 200mm travel so giving me 255mm total travel...now that would normally give issues with the resulting change in steering geometry...notably too much trail with such a raked out front.

But within my system I have built in adjustable offset and hence adjustable trail...this is by changing a set of oval flip chips located at the top crown/upper link pivot...this allows me to rotate the crown/fork/wheel in relation to the steering axis and so change fork/wheel offset and resulting trail....I have 24mm of total adjustment at the axle with 13 positions with 1.8mm increments.
So I am able to fine tune the trail when making big changes in fork travel and height of the front end....I can make the trail geometry tight trail fast and agile or Down hill heavy and stable...and anything in between.
Also I have another adjustment I have been playing with which is the ability to change the wheelpath of the Link suspension....I can change the wheelpath from 50 degrees of rearward travel to 63 degrees of more vertical travel with 7 overall increments of around 2 degrees each....again using a number of flip chips which reposition the rear pivot of the upper link.... this has a big influence on the suspensions ability to handle very rough terrain ( rock gardens ) with the use of the 50 degree rearward wheelpath....
Then if Its being ridden at say a bike park with much smoother groomed hard pack tracks and high gee out cambered corners then I can switch to the more vertical wheelpath...which more vertically loads the front tire and so gives more consistant grip on firmer surfaces.

The 255mm travel setup with the 50 degree wheelpath is amazing hitting big rocks/roots/ruts at speed..its so confidence inspiring and forgiving...and much less tiring to ride.

02/09/2025

Just putting the finishing touches on a new project I have been working on...I in fact started this back in September of 2023 with the building of a prototype single crown MTB dual suspension system as shown in previous posts....so two years to get to this stage.
This latest build is a follow on from that but designed around a Double crown fork for Down Hill use and agressive E-Bike use.
I built two complete front ends so that one I can put on a new Zerode G3 DH bike and the other on my Kenevo comp E bike.
Really happy with how its turned out so far.

So the general premise of the design is incorporating a dual crown fork into a Girder fork type Linkage making up a dual suspension system of the type that I have been overall developing for the past 8 yrs....and making it an easy bolt on conversion for MTB bikes/frames.

This uses a Fox 40 200mm fork which I have shortened the travel to 160mm...I plan to test the full travel fork at some stage....this is incorporated into a girder fork type linkage design which gives 55mm travel...it uses a really compact and lightweight Ohlins TXC2 Air shock usually found on the back suspension of XC bikes....this shock is ideal for my purposes as it fits really nicely into the compact design and so helps to minimize steering inertia of the steered mass...it also being a XC design has a lot of damping platform built in which I think will be perfect for what I am trying to acheive with this design...also being Ohlins its very high quality and designed to be easily worked on and tuned.

So total travel is 215mm with a 606mm axle to crown height which fits nicely into the Zerodes stock 609mm axle to crown fork length...so the bikes overall geometry remains unchanged.
The Kenevo originally used a 180mm travel fork and a 572mm height and so with the new front end sits around 34mm higher but with 35mm extra travel.
Weight wise the new front end is 1100 grams heavier than the original Fox 40 setup on the Zerode G3...thats not to bad considering its the addition of a complete extra suspension system.

Anyways the plan is to spend some time riding the kenevo with the new front and and get to know its personality...and its potential strengths and weaknesses....I plan to fit a full BYB Telemetry system next and start gathering some in use data on the suspension.....once thats done to my satisfaction I will start developing the Zerodes DH application and see how that turns out.

12/12/2024

Hi Everybody
Just letting all know I am back in Business and working out of Riders lane at 20 Essington st Mitchell….working through Chrissy and new years so if any body needs some suspension work let me know 0407903652…cheers.

03/02/2024

Hi all.....just letting people know I have closed my Suspensionsmith business for maybe a year or so....I am having a year off and doing some backpacking through central/south America to recharge myself.
On the topic of the front MTB dual suspension I have been working on...that has been a great success....definately is a viable design that has a lot to offer in furthering front MTB suspension tech/capability.....I already have a refined final design good to go for some serious DH/Enduro race testing.....this is something I plan to further pursue once I get back...cheers.

23/10/2023

Just finished putting together the MK2 prototype version of the Girder/Telefork dual suspension.
The first prototype was a rough baseline start to start working on the steering geometry and suspension geometry and just getting familiar with fits and working clearances etc....its steering geometry was problematic in that the fox fork crown with its dimensions was limiting my options with the steering geometry so I needed to replace the fork crown with my own custom job...made to fit...this now allows me to relax the angle of the fork a few degrees etc to get a better offset/trail balance between the fork and link suspension...
The DPS shock has been revalved for softer comp and rebound valving...it was a rear linkage shock which typicaly run motion ratios of around 2.5:1 and I am running this shock at 1:1....hence the shocks Air pressure is significantly lower.
The redesign has allowed me to fit an extra 10mm of fork travel in so with the 53mm of the link and now 140mm fork gives a total of 193mm within the stock bikes height.
Its getting there.....