The road to Chaco Canyon Vs. Bilstien 5100's
And the road won.. Usually you can go over wash boarded roads fast to smooth things out but this road was so bad I was stuck doing 5 to 12 mph.
Forum Discussion
skipro3 wrote:Hodag1 wrote:
On washboard roads the tire travels on the ridges of the ruts as speed increases therefore decreasing shock travel and heat. This is according to the engineering rep for Fox shocks at the overland expo
If your shock isn't allowing the tire to keep in full contact with the road at speed, then it's not doing it's job properly. As a reminder, shock DAMPEN the oscillation of the suspension moving up and down. The springs allow for travel in the suspension. If the suspension is not moving up and down at speed due to the shock's inability to dampen AND travel the same length as the spring needs to travel in order to keep the tire in contact with the ground, then the shock is way too 'stiff' or slow in it's rebound valving, and could be way too soft on it's compression valving. (If the shock even has metering that has independent compression and rebound damping.)
You're not taking into consideration that gravity is only 32 ft/sec^2. It takes time for a tire to fall from the peak of the ridge to the valley, especially if the wheel has a little upward momentum left over from going up the ridge. If the tire reaches the next ridge before it can fall all the way into the valley, it smooths out the washboard.
