Joined
·
9,108 Posts
CR1 Engineering
1 - 20 of 76 Posts
Joined
·
659 Posts
I had him "re-do" my Swinger 4-way for my Demo 9 about a year ago. The final price ended up being higher than the quote (thats not a good thing).
And so far I have been somewhat "un-impressed" with the results (but I'm a sucky rider, so your results may differ).
To my uneducated riding style the shock feels dead and spongy and changing the air pressure and rebound dampening settings don't seem to affect anything.
If I take the coil spring off the shock and check the action seems like it's valved for a motorcycle rather than my heavy bike and fat rider.
but maybe it's just me.
And so far I have been somewhat "un-impressed" with the results (but I'm a sucky rider, so your results may differ).
To my uneducated riding style the shock feels dead and spongy and changing the air pressure and rebound dampening settings don't seem to affect anything.
If I take the coil spring off the shock and check the action seems like it's valved for a motorcycle rather than my heavy bike and fat rider.
but maybe it's just me.
Joined
·
514 Posts
While I have no doubt that CR1 can do some neat stuff, I'd send it to a suspension specialist like Craig at Avalanche first. Better price by a long shot too.
Joined
·
334 Posts
I've actually had them rebuild both my 5.0 and my 40 and the turn around was crazy fast, and Adrian actually threw down a quick tune on the 5.0. I am totally happy with them, my shock feels better than it ever has and all he did was set it up with the right air pressure, used nitrogen instead of air, and adjusted bottom out. They may be more expensive than others but they are local to me, and i will support a great guy like Adrian and his local business over PUSH or Avy
Joined
·
780 Posts
Adrian is a suspension specialist. He designs some crazy stuff, and knows how to make a shock work EXTREMELY well. I design off road race vehicle suspension, and can tune these shocks myself, but I trust Adrian to do it as he's a pro. It's fun to bounce stuff off him for even my line of work, as I'm always impressed with what he knows.dropmachine.com said:
Joined
·
648 Posts
Actually, ya, they do: http://www.avalanchedownhillracing.com/5th element speed sensitive conversion.htmthuren said:
Just noting the price difference for almost the exact same tuning...
Joined
·
780 Posts
I see cool! Just note there is quite a difference in parts.Bikesair said:
CR1 replaces the entire piston, piston base, and rebound needle with their own design parts. Avalanche seems to use the OE parts, but remove/rework some stuff, toss the SPV housing, and throw some shims on the compression side where the SPV salve sat. The CR1 piston uses a smaller ID shim stack, which will let the shims deflect easier, blow off more, and do it more reliably.
I'm not saying there is anything wrong with Avalanches setup, but it's not "basically the same" by any means.
Joined
·
41,618 Posts
lol...yes. I believe Craig at Avalanche has a PhD in hydrodynamics or something like that.thuren said:
Avalanche Downhill Racing, Inc. was formed in 1998 by the owners of C Cycle Suspension and WTE Racing to provide the industry with a high performance front suspension capable of meeting the demands of extreme down hill racing. The performance goal was to design the front suspension with the latest features of motocross technology, while maintaining down hill racing requirements.
Craig Seekins, owner of C Cycle Suspension, provides 16 years of motocross suspension tuning and 19 years of mechanical design engineering experience to Avalanche. Eric Wold, of WTE Racing, provides Avalanche with the insights and contacts of a NORBA expert racer, as well as 13 years of top quality CNC machining experience. Riders like Lars Tribus,"Pistol" Pete Loncarevich, Adrian Cortina, John Moore, Fred Bassett and many more have provided valuable input during the development of Avalanche forks. Today, Avalanche is committed to providing limited production "Works Forks" for the most demanding downhill rider. Each fork is custom set-up for the individual needs of the rider. Our dedication to the sport will ensure the highest quality and performance, guaranteed.
Eliminates SPV piston and replaced with a tapered shim stack revalved for speed sensitive damper piston set-up.
New low speed compression adjuster to replace beginning stroke adjuster screw, increases range of low speed adjustment from firm to super plush.
New higher rate spring, reconfigures end of stroke adjuster to a high speed adjuster with a rate adjusted blow-off valve.
Improved common bleed rebound circuit for more lively feel and increased lift over jumps, improved rebound adjustment with modified rebound needle profile and machined shaft bolt to accept a more progressive tapered rebound valving shim stack.
Improved bottom out bumper for smoother full stroke
New and inproved seals, DU bushing and dust wiper to reduce stiction
Improved teflon insert bushings for increased wear and reduced weight
I sure wouldn't dump $300 into a 5th element when Avalanche can do it for $170 or so. If I had that $300 I'd save it up for an Avalanche DHS or Chubbie, it will be more capable (bigger piston diameter, ability to flow under extremely fast hits, real high/low speed adjustability, etc) than that upgraded 5th. $300 is a lot to dump into an old shock, probably why Avalanche offers the service for $170. Push does something similer with Fox shocks. Get your hands on an old Vanilla, or a DHX, or newer Vanilla, they essentially gut it and put in their own piston and shim stacks, bottom-out bumper, IFP height, all tuned for you. Still quite a bit cheaper than sinking $300 in a 5th.
Is the CR1 5th mod better than the Avalanche one? Possible. Will it perform noticably better? Hard to say, despite what you claim, there are going to be limitations of the piston size and chassi that may make further modifications pointless. It doesn't make the CR1 stuff useless, if you want the best performing 5th chassi I guess you can go for it. Fork cartridges may be a good market if the price and performance is right.
Joined
·
780 Posts
Honestly I'm not digging the Avalanche bumper too much, as it's short and fat like the original, which would create a quick transition. The CR1 bumper is a long soft BASF type foam cone, so you don't even know you bottomed. Just look at the high flow machining on the CR1 piston.
![]()
![]()
Joined
·
41,618 Posts
Avalanche showed ONE bumper in the picture.thuren said:
You do realize that Avalanche has a variety of bumper shapes and durometers to use right? They even have special shaped cups on their other shocks that force the bumpers into shapes that add even more progression when needed. I think you can safely say that Craig knows what he is doing. Not only that, but the IFP height, rider weight/style, and bike the shock is being used on all contribute to the proper bumper being speced, at least that's how it is with my other Avalanche shocks.
I see some features on the Avalanche 5th mod that aren't offered on the CR1.
$600 on that CR1 fork cartridge. Willing to compare to Avalanche's $400 cartridge?
Cortina should KNOW that Avalanche knows what they are doing. Avalanche made linkage/shock kits for their bikes with the MTN shock after all.
Joined
·
225 Posts
plain and simple Adrian Cortina is a evil genius when it comes to tunign and getting the most out of your suspension. i hate to say it though but the people who are not happy with his stuff are the people who have no business having shocks custom valved because more times then not they are the ones at fault because they really have no idea what it is they want from the tune. They are the peopel who just say i want my shock to be smoother. then they complain its to "dead" aka plush as hell and lacks pop. and they complain when they come up short on a local gap that the rear end bottoms out to easy. when dealing with CR1 you really need to know what you want out of the tune and you need to be specific.
Joined
·
2,775 Posts
Nice guys and all, but way too high-dollar for half-assed work, or work done incorrectly (which is the more common scenario). Once they get their stuff assembled right it generally feels pretty good though.
They also have some hyper-expensive sealed and pressurized cartridge for a 888 which makes no sense to me at all.
They also have some hyper-expensive sealed and pressurized cartridge for a 888 which makes no sense to me at all.
Joined
·
41,618 Posts
There's no doubt that you need to be specific when getting a custom-valved shock. I don't understand all the guys that keep talking about the "pop" or whatever off of drops and jumps. I've been riding Romics, DHXs, 5ths, Curnuts, Avalanches, and many many more, and I've never had any issue with that. Jumps, drops, gaps, whatever. These people don't know how to ride or something. I had no problem getting the 5th to jump off of stuff, in fact I blew it up the first day I had it at Northstar doing all the fun features (this was back in the day). It definitely lifted off of the ground fine. Maybe you don't go as far or launch as sharply or something (still, I've had no problems here), but I want my shocks to work, so it must be a trailbuilding problem, in that the launch isn't sharp enough, the run-in doesn't allow for enough speed, it's too "big" for the speed you can get, and so on.bigEhit said:
1 - 20 of 76 Posts
