Better Fork For 20" Bike - Advice Needed

[cep32]

Father Christmas gave our eldest a 20" Specialized Riprock for Christmas. The bike is great and has already got him down a few blue runs in Sticky Forest and Hammys in Queenstown. The only thing I would like to change is the fork which seems to be a waste of time. It is the usual Suntour pretend suspension fork that moves only on the biggest hits and then trys to throw him off the bike on the undampened rebound.

The options I can find seem to be the RST F1RST and the seeming yet to be released RST Snyper. Both are air forks with rebound dampening. They are both 24" forks so the axle to crown measurement is about 430mm (at around 60-80mm travel). The current fork is 400mm but doesn't sag into the travel at all so I figure by the time I set a proper air fork up with the right amount of sag I'm only going to be increasing the height of the front end by around 10mm or so.

The other option that I've found is to use a 26" Rockshox SID and reduce the travel down to 60 or 80mm (Dual air only). The axle to crown measurement of these seems to be around 430mm as well. The problem is finding a secondhand one cheap. I thought there would be heaps of them floating about but not the case it seems.

So the question is, accepting I'm an over indulgent father, would increasing the height of the front end do to much harm and which of the options is likely to be best cost/return?

Cheers,

Chris

[el_booto]

MRP (formerly white brothers) offer a proper 20" fork called the Rustler

not a cheap option, but definitely the coolest

[cep32]

Nice fork but I was hoping for a fork that didn't cost more than the bike.

[dwgknz]

Spawn kids bikes from come Canada with Spinner air forks but not sure where'd you get just a fork in NZ (or a Spawn bike).

Also going rigid with a wide front tyre would probably give you better damping.

[Dougal]

Does the current fork have springs in both legs? If so, take one side out.

If not. It gets tricky to find a soft enough spring and get forks running smoothly enough for really light riders.

[cep32]

It does but when I removed one of them the fork twisted and bound on compression. I assumed due to the tolerances being not great and the bushings just being relatively soft plastic.

[w00t]

Dreeeeedge. Did you end up finding something? The Suntour M3010 on my sons bike is a piece of sh*t.

[cep32]

I found an old 26" SID but the 2.8" tyre wouldn't fit unfortunately. I'm hopefully going to use it on his 24" bike when we get one.

It would be worth talking to Trailcraft bikes if you don't mind it getting a bit spendy.