U.S.E S.U.B. Monoshock alternate wheel fitment.

[GSB]

Not exactly a "Readers Bike", but more a "Readers front end", I bought this USE SUB fork (or to give it its full name, the Ultimate Sports Engineering Stability Under Braking Monoshock) a year ago and tucked it away a cupboard for later tinkering. 12 months later I dug it out and took a closer look to see if I could do something with it.

It was a bit tired and the linkage had plenty of play in it, but the important bits were all in very good nick with not a hint of wear on the main stanchion. So I stripped it down, cleaned it and treated it to a few new parts. I've installed 6 new bushes from Igus, fitted a new main bushing and lip seal in the shocker, overhauled the air sprung and damper, treated the whole thing to lashings of new grease, and slapped on a new SUB decal too. To all intents and purposes it's like new.

Originally they came with conventional 3 cross wheels built around a modified Hope Bulb or USE's own "SubHub", I have two such wheels already, but idle hands and a shed full of other bits had me wondering if something more interesting could be made to fit. A spare bit of stainless and an hour at a lathe (haven't used one for over 20 years - so I need a couple of goes!) resulted in this.

Just need something to bolt it onto now.

 

[JoeG]

Its Lefty's odd/strange uncle!!!

 

[GSB]

Its Lefty's odd/strange uncle!!!

If only the Lefty could be stripped, serviced, rebuilt and restored as easily. This thing requires three Allen keys, and can be stripped to its component parts by an utter bafoon in about 8 minutes. It's the easiest suspension unit I've ever serviced by a huge margin. Shame they didn't keep making them because the basic principle is sound, and with all the space inside the damping unit could easily have been adapted or replaced with one with more modern features like lock out and platform damping.

 

[bartsince1975]

That sounds like a dream compared to the fox terralogic lefty I have waiting for a rebuild... Good job on the wheel, looks great.

 

[kona_221]

Good to see another USE sub up and running. Got mine attached to my Raleigh Special Products Titanium MTB. Emailed USE and they sent me a couple of service manuals in PDF.

 

[GSB]

Re:

USE were very helpful with spares and info.

This fork is now on my wife's old Giant ATX, which was in a shocking state after it was left outside for a year or so. Rather than buy her a new bike I thought I'd restore it to its former glory. A couple of days with T-cut and a lot of new (old) parts, and it rides beautifully.

 

[bartsince1975]

Don't leave it outside again. Nice work.

 

[GSB]

Don't leave it outside again. Nice work.

Cheers.

 

[Mofofo]

superb job !!!

 

[royboy2cv]

Re:

Best up grade i've done on this Lefty ( after the original Lefty seized up ) Plus there is another one in the shed ready to go with a Lefty hub on the stub axel .