RST high five help

[Gotte]

I've got an old GT LTS 3000 DS, which I really like. It's in really good condition, but I want to try and get more/better performance from the forks. They are RST High 5's (single crown). They must be fifteen years old, and I was getting about 700 mm travel until I swapped out some elastomers from another RST (381 DH) and took one set of rubbers out of the spring, now I can get about 100mm. It feels okay for what it is, which is old and cheap.

I was wondering, though, what would happen if I swapped some of the elastomers for the small spring stacks from the 381 (the ones which lie at the bottom of the fork).

Am I right in thinking these are for small hits, and the elastomers for big hits?

Will doing that give it better medium hit resistance, or will it just turn it into a pogo stick?

Just wondering really, and not wanting to get my hands dirty unless I have to.

Thanks

 

[Barneyballbags]

Just give it a go and see how they feel

Hi5s are nice and simple to pull apart and maintain, so you've got nothing to lose.

There should be enough inherent damping in the remaining elastomers to tame the rebound and stop it from feeling like a pogo stick, but you won't really know until you try.

If it was my bike, however, I'd be tempted to replace the forks, especially if it's in really good condition. You can get a nice set of coil sprung, oil damped Manitou X Verts or even Marzocchi Bombers for well under £100. I think the LTS is well worth the upgrade

 

[Gotte]

I've been scouring ebay the last few days, and am watching some forks, so we'll see.

I tried adding the extra springs, and it's just too much. No control whatsoever, and less travel.

Then I messed around with the elastomers - cut some out a bit, and took out a half elastomer that was in there. I cleaned up the air valve at the top, and greased it all up, and you know, it isn't that bad. Actually getting some half decent damping.

One thing that does worry me, though, is that during my internet trawls, I found a warning regarding a recall of High Fives from 1997-99. Apparently the stanchions could break. My forks were never recalled. Don't know if that means they weren't affected, or that the dealers didn't have contact details (or couldn't be bothered).

Anyway. They're getting on fifteen years old now - though I don't know if that's a good thing (proven strong enough not to break), or a bad thing (more likely to go the older they get).

So, yes, over to ebay...

 

[Buzzsaw]

Relating to breaking stanchions on RST forks and I can vouch it did happen back in the day. It happened to my favourite bike shop owner in New Zealand on his twin crown RST shod Scott Octane bike. His face was pretty scarred up after his forks snapped on a trail. He wasn't happy and sore as hell.

 

[shogun]

Mine snapped. I'd find some early bombers or Xverts.

You can run full coils - mountainspeed did a kit - but its a PITA trying to sort the rebound 'damping'.

 

[simonlovell99]

I used to have some mozo pro 3.5 and 4.5s. i used one side speed spring and shorter spring/elastomer the otherside. bit better for rebound and dampning. but elastomers are not that good - warm/hot whether, forks are too soft and cold, too stiff

 

[Gotte]

Thanks guys.

Yes, I look at my High Fives now with much less confidence. Cr@p is one thing. Cr@p and dangerous is entirely another.

But then again, I've been looking at various fork reviews at MTBR.com, and the amount of different forks, some of them pretty decent in the day, which people report snapping. Maybe the technology just couldn't cut what people wanted from a fork and were doing to them, back then. But to have one recalled. THat really doesn't instill confidence - and to have a stanchion go. I can see it with a crown, that must take so much punishment.

 

[JabberingJimbo]

Yes, I look at my High Fives now with much less confidence.

You may be able to find some info as to what to check, but doubt it's on-line!

From memory it was an issue with the lower crown, where the stanchion tubes are clamped, the holes should have a nice rounded edge '(' on the inside facing downwards, NOT a sharp machined edge 'L'.
As the legs flexed forwards / backwards under use it would not touch very well on the sharp edge!

Also it was common for the pinch clamps to be done up to tight and squash the tubes...= breakage.

Nowdays we are all a bit more used to using torque wrenches and know what to do.....them were the days!

 

[We_are_Stevo]

Hi-5's were well thought of BiTD, and I'd rather have one of them than a Judy...

...dismantle the air-dampers and rebuild them with plenty of quality (waterproof) grease, clean up the inside of the stanchions and lower legs, install some decent MCU's (they're not elastomers) and stop worrying about stanchions snapping, if they were going to they'd have done so long before now

I'm a lardy 17 stone at the moment and have every confidence in my Mozo Pro's.

Oh, and what did you mean to type instead of 700mm(!) travel?

 

[Barneyballbags]

Just a thought, but you can get some nice 100-130mm travel Fox forks from around 2005-2007 now for next to nothing. In fact, I only recently sold a pair of 2008 ones myself for £150.

Now THAT would be a good upgrade! You don't need triple clamps