rubber covers on my manitou fork

zeffer111 said:

I have a trek 6000, with the rubber covers on my manitou fork.
I noticed that all the newer trek bikes do not have this cover.
Does the cover do anything? or is it just for looks? would it be a problem if I removed mine?

TIA

Click to expand...

basically all the cover does is protect it from getting dirt and crap in there. if you remove it, it wont really be all that bad for it. and if you have a fork with no cover on them, you can by lizard skins fork boots to cover them up. so all it does is protect it.

boots

they're called 'boots', they protect your seals and inside of fork from dirt/mud/water. it won't necessarly "hurt" to take them off but they are there for a reason (not for looks). you'll probably end up needing to service your fork (relube, replace seals etc...) more frequently if you remove them.

It makes sense that it does protect them... there is plenty of dirt on my "boots"

I was just wondering why they would remove them on the newer bikes...
better seals? want to sell more replament seals/forks?

i was told...

by manitou that with their newer models they have improved the quality of the seals and the boots aren't really necessary. as for the seals, they're pretty good about replacing them for very cheap or free. if i were you i'd keep them on if your fork came with them, just my opinion.

The boots are good for protecting your anodized stanchions from getting scratched.

But they're also good at trapping dirt that's near impossible to get to on a regular basis.

Manitou's Evil Genius seals are supposedly a cut above the old seals, but a better option may be switching to a set of $20 Enduro fork seals, which have worked great for me on my X-Vert and previously on a Judy.

Without the boots, you'll have easier access to your dirty stanchions to wipe them down after a ride, but you'll need to worry a little more about keeping the stanchion surface from anything hard enough to damage it.