Submitted by
ButtonPusher
a Weekend Warrior
from Vancouver Island, BC, Canada
Date Reviewed: October 28, 2011
Strengths: Lots of adjustments, great feel, seems strong.
Weaknesses: Set-up takes some time for sure (flip side of the coin to all the adjustments), the stock coils are heavy (almost as heavy as the shock itself) but you can get a Ti coil to save weight, coil sizing is proprietary to Vivid so finding other coils and Ti coils can be tough.
Bottom Line:
This shock feels great. Never had a problem with it. No bottom outs ever, so far. The coil itself is quite heavy so i'd recommend getting a Ti coil if you want to save on the weight. Be sure to take note that Vivid uses a specific coil sizing so coils from or meant for other brands like Fox, Marx, etc won't fit it.
Strengths: light, smooth, strong, and it works good on rocky, muddy trails
Weaknesses: i am not really sure about the quality
Bottom Line:
I have this product about 3 months and i have to say that it has a lot strengths but unfortunately also a lot of weaknesses!!! First of all from the first week i had some really ugly problem with the shaft... for some unknown reason (probably bad quality) the gold color from the shaft has been destroyed in a point and now i can see the inside metal (really ugly)... also rock shox say' s that you mustn' t overtighted the colar cause you may cause damage on the shock which i did and now i have some really bad play on the beginning when the shock is resting... so that means that you cant adjust the pre-load [bad :(] also when i tried to add some air on the reservoir i realized that the valve was broken so i had to change with a new one (bad quality)... Other problem that i am having with vivid is all these stupid marketing things, like the ending stroke rebound (which is actually useless) and the bigger spring which it makes you buy it only from rock shox and nuke proof for none reason... Ok i am done with the bad things now lets go to the good ones! Well i have to admit that it works pretty good on rocky tials , it response pretty good on small bumps and it gave me a lot of confidence to drive faster... you can also use all the travel (especially with the soft drop stop) so you will not have any problems on big drops!
Similar Products Used: fox van, fox dhx 5.0, manitou revox
Overall Rating:
Value Rating:
Submitted by
Dan
a Weekend Warrior
from Connecticut, USA
Date Reviewed: September 8, 2010
Strengths: Awesome tunability, ease of setup, set it and forget it. the best compliment for a suspensin product is that you dont ever think about it when your riding.
Weaknesses: 1/2in shock mount sizing isn't easy to get mounts for every frame. Had to have custom mounts made for mine. not a hue deal, you just have to factor that in, along with a spring.
Bottom Line:
If you can live with the weight, and can afford one, they are awesome. i havent had any issues and i will rebuild them both this winter so re-buildability will be another review.
I might trade my 7.875x2.25 vivid5.1 for a vivid air, and save a half pound, but im weary as the coil is soo smooth.
Similar Products Used: older rock shok deluxe, marz WC coil, fox coils
Bike Setup: 2- one is a jamis xam, lyrik up front, xt drivetrain ect, the other is a versus trigger, boxxer up front x-9 drivetrain. Performs awesome on both a low and high leverage bikes.
Overall Rating:
Value Rating:
Submitted by
zaffi69
a Downhiller
from buena yerba
Date Reviewed: October 27, 2009
Strengths: adjustability
Weaknesses: its not possible to adjust air pressure.
Knob clicks are LAAAAAAAAAAME!!!! and knobs are VERY VERY VERY fragile, and hard to reach/operate them. Hey! RS guys is not that hard to copy another brand knobs!!! indeed is not that hard to redesign it and making them more accesible. For instance you need an allen wrench to adjust it
Bottom Line:
Even though the shock is GOOD is not superb, the thing about the knobs is pretty frustrating and they are VERY VERY FREAGILE, ridiculously fragile. And what is the thing about selling a shock were you are not allowed to regulate the air pressure!!!! Or what is the idea behing giving a shock with like 5 cm of thread and in the owners manual says clearly "Do not adjust the spring more than 3 turns"!!!!
I will save some money and buy a new shock from fox!!!
Similar Products Used: Fox DHX 4.0, which is way way better!!!
Bike Setup: scott gambler fr10, travis, vivid 5.1
Overall Rating:
Value Rating:
Submitted by
robertbeckman
a Downhiller
from Cullman, Alabama, United States
Date Reviewed: July 22, 2009
Strengths: Its super plush and tune-able. Love the beginning and ending stroke rebound adjustments, and the way it bottoms out smoothly.
Weaknesses: None so far, everyone saying its un-reliable could have it sent to PUSH technologies, they'll make it bomb-proof (for a price)
Bottom Line:
I love the way this shock acts, it feels so much better than my other fox rear shocks. An article in decline also talks about the adjustments that are built-in and are not tune-able due to the amount of possible user error, that works for me! I've taken this off big drops, rock gardens, flowy berms and jumps, it handles everything with ease. I'm very pleased so far. People talk about un-reliability in these shocks, but i have'nt seen it after using it every week for 6 months now with no service of any kind.
Bike Setup: solid mission 9 fox 40 sun line stem bars mavic 729/ funn bulit
Overall Rating:
Value Rating:
Submitted by
Jan Meyer
a Weekend Warrior
from Sydney, Australia
Date Reviewed: May 23, 2009
Strengths: You can independantly adjust the first 25% and the last 75% of the shock stroke rebound. I don't know why all shocks cannot do this. I find this a much more helpful feature than begin and end stage compression.
It's bombproof and super easy to setup.
The manual is fantastic and makes it very easy to understand the shocks settings.
Weaknesses: None.
Bottom Line:
I have the first 25% of the shock stroke rebound set to fast. About 10 clicks. This enables the shock to rapidly respond to small bumps like roots and rock gardens. It sucks it all up and makes it feel flat.
The other 75% I have set to slow. About 3 clicks. I never have any bucking or bounciness when taking big hits. It's super stable.
The compression is also only about 4 clicks.
This shock absolutely feels fantastic compared to the Fox range of shocks I have tried. It really sticks the wheel to the ground and is very predictable over jumps, rough sections and drops.
I highly recommend you give it a try and feel the difference for yourself.
The manual gives you base settings to give you a starting point. These are very good settings and makes it incredibly easy to set the shock up.
It is the best upgrade I have ever done to my bikes.
I have ridden a friends BOS Stoy as well and this shock felt smoother than the BOS and it's half the price. Great value!
Similar Products Used: Fox VAN R, Fox DHX 3.0, Fox DHX 4.0, Fox DHX 5.0
Bike Setup: Scott Gambler FR20 frame with Marzocchi 888 WC fork, X.9 gears, Avid Code brakes, and lots of other premium bits and pieces.
Vivid 5.1 9.5x3.0 with a 400 coil. Also tried the 450 coil.
Overall Rating:
Value Rating:
Submitted by
LooK OuT!
a Downhiller
from Wroclaw, PL
Date Reviewed: May 16, 2009
Strengths: great look and nothing more
Weaknesses: all that comes with it
Bottom Line:
I'm not sure if I really got the top line shock. All about it seems to be wrong: the overall performance, lack of plushness, need of special tools to perform a service and damping controls that works out of expectations. I compare this to Fox DHX 5.0. Vivid's rebound adjustment is just a marketing junk, ending stroke rebound knob almost makes no difference for the shock performance, the only positive I can say about it is a pretty neat compression adjustment which works fine and does it's job. But no matter how you adjust the shock, there is no plushness that DHX had. Also no option to change the air volume in reservoir, even no chance to change the air pressure. Maybe I was unlucky an got my Vivid badly assembled, but if this is common, just don't turn your eyes from DHX. At best I can rate this shock as fair and if further test will prove I am wrong, I will certainly write again.
Submitted by
delsapo
a Downhiller
from bariloche argentina
Date Reviewed: April 13, 2009
Strengths: It hasn't worked right since I've had it, so I'm having trouble with this section. Really, I should be able to give the neutral chilis, cause I feel like I havent ridden this yet.
Weaknesses: I got a lemon. This thing makes funny sounds, leaks oil and the shaft unscrewed from the eyelet and started to disassemble on the downhill. Its never been right from the beginning.
Bottom Line:
I don't mind that I was unlucky to get the lemon. That happens. What I find so frustrating is its impossible to deal with Rockshox / Sram. They just say to go to my local shop for whatever question I have even though I've explained that its the local shop can't do anything. I'm in Argentina. Not much works properly here. I explained that, but all I got is 'go to your local shop'. Yah. Thanks for the help, man. So now I figure I'll do what I did with my still-under-warranty Totem that was leaking like a sieve from all over from day 1. Order parts from the states. Ship them here. Repair shock myself. The thing is, these guys built the vivid with special tools (that are totally unnecessary to the design). There is one to open the body of the shock and another one for the air valve. What pricks. Now I have to buy their special tools and the service kit (which I'm having trouble finding in stock) so I can fix their lemon shock thats still under warranty. And I still haven't figured out how I'm going to get the 3wt shock oil. I just wanted to go riding and in the end I've become a shock mechanic. I needed to rant. That's all.
Bike Setup: pretty red bike with totem on the front and this thing on the back.
Overall Rating:
Value Rating:
Submitted by
brickbrick
a Weekend Warrior
from Raleigh, NC USA
Date Reviewed: February 1, 2009
Strengths: Simple and flexible. I've heard unsubstantiated claims of quality issues, but this thing feels solid.
Weaknesses: Non-standard spring ID, but not so much a problem now that many Ti springs are available.
Bottom Line:
This shock is super plush and easily adjustable. Lets you customize the entire travel of this shock to match the bike and riding style. I'm giving 5 chilis because I got a great deal on a great shock. Economical version of the CCDB.
Strengths: Highly tunable. Doesn't wallow in the hits. Highly predictable reactions to input.
Weaknesses: nothing comes to mind
Bottom Line:
This shock tightened up bike feel and predictability in hits significantly. So far it has taken some serious punishment and retained a sound action 100% It's early days for the durability test but for performance out of the box it has been an eye opener. I run this with an obtainium Ti spring [good people] of 350lb and I weigh 84kg.This is B tune, and although Sundays are apparently supposed to use A tune, I have nothing bad to say about the set-up. It rockets through the bad stuff. It is the first part i've bought in a long time that actually made me smile rather than feel bad about the coin I dropped.
