Mountain Bike Fork Maintenance

Mountain Bike Forks are found on both full suspension and hardtail mountain bikes - providing much needed suspension on a mountain bike, when travelling off road. In this post, we look at the fork in greater detail, and what you can do to keep your fork running in excellent condition.

Mountain Bike Fork Lubrication

The most important thing any rider can do to keep their suspension forks running well, is keeping them lubricated. There needs to be lubrication inside the fork itself - away from contaminants and dirt which can be picked up during riding. To keep the lubrication in the fork, suspension forks have a number of different seals - to keep oil in the lower part of the fork. On opening up a mountain bike fork, you can expect to see a dust seal, an oil seal and a foam ring.

Washing Mountain Bike Forks

To help keep the oil flowing through the forks, and reaching the top seals -it’s a good idea to turn your bike upside down - allowing the oil to reach the seals. When washing forks, avoid jet washing and just use a hose - to protect the fork itself as much as possible. Clean around the seals if possible, to keep ingress of dirt to a minimum. Once this is done, there is no further need to apply any lubrication - the lubrication inside of the fork itself is enough.

Mountain Bike Fork Protection

There are many things people do to protect their mountain bike forks from wear and tear, especially if the forks have been purchased as an aftermarket/upgrade part. Protective tape can help protect rubbing from brake cables - and mudguards can help prevent the spray of muck and mud onto the forks.

Mountain Bike Fork Servicing

At Westbrook Cycles, as well as stocking mountain bike forks, accessories and maintenance equipment - we also offer mountain bike fork servicing in our North Yorkshire workshop. At Westbrook, we recommend cleaning and re lubing forks around every 25 hours of riding - and a full mountain bike fork service every 200 hours.

Many of our customers do the interim servicing at home, inspecting seals and bushes and topping up the oil themselves.