Compilation of 2.5 Front/Rear Shock

I compiled the extended/collapsed measurements, part #s, price & piston valving style for a bunch of the 2.5 offerings. I reached out to the sales staff over email to get info when it wasn't available on the manufacture's website.

Sharing for those who are researching their next purchase and take into consideration the travel/articulation numbers as well as the valving in each shock.

Front Shocks

Rear Shocks

 

This is interesting to see it compiled like this, thanks for putting it together. To add another layer of annoyance, shock companies measure tennon shock lengths differently and often it's not intuitive.

I appreciate you listing the specs as piston design and not as valving profile, which is often confused as being the same thing.
Can you explain to me the difference between a progressive and linear piston?

 

It is confusing that the extended/compressed measurements are done differently depending on the company, ultimately the "stroke" column becomes the most helpful for comparing travel numbers.

Some of the sales teams I discussed with said their shock is linear but uses a progressive piston valving, so you are correct that they are different. I can't comment on how they differ from a piston design standpoint, I am still trying to wrap my head around all of this. I recall Accutune showing how the King/Fox/Ride pistons differ, such as round ports vs triangular shaped ports, unsure if that makes the piston more or less "linear".

 

Are you testing OP? There's no way you don't know the answer to that lol.

 

Yeah absolutely, it's also interesting how many shocks are limiting up travel and letting you smash into the shock before the bump stop. Interestingly in our mid budget shock test the setup that won was actually the shortest shock that was leveraged towards up travel... but thats only 1 product as an example, and we were exclusively testing ride quality so maybe the 1" loss in droop will be annoying slow trail riding or over rocks.
The Ride pistons are really cool, they've been working on the product line for a long time and it shows. I've always wanted a place that works on shocks first to create their own shock brand.
Port shape, position, and size, will all change your ultimate valving curve. A radial rectangle will produce a higher damping coefficient vs a round port, and both will produce more than a perimeter slot (assuming all have the same flow area). A round port closer to the center of a piston will produce more damping than further outward. You can actually model all this fairly easily but i haven't found it very useful at the end of the day, to be totally up front.

I'm not aware of anyone in the industry saying they have a progressive piston which is why i was asking, i was curious what those employees thought process is. The whole piston valving curve convo is fascinating from a birds eye view to me but ultimately i don't find it that useful... my personal truck had a digressive piston that was valved to have progressive compression. I switched it to a linear piston that behaves closer to a digressive curve with the valving profile im using. Knowing what style of piston they use doesn't necessarily indicate a valving curve (or if they are valved well). Like i often say, its sorta needlessly complicated in that regard haha.

Also as another random note, i've never seen a bypass with a digressive piston.

Hopefully i didnt come off as rude, i was curious if employees were saying that and what their reasoning was.

 

It is certainly possible the “piston style” column isn’t fully accurate and the emailed responses I received were describing overall valving of the shock. Elka was the only response I received that differentiated piston valving vs overall valving: “The piston in the suspension is progressive which offers a linear valving.” The other responses were one word so I can’t say for sure if they were describing the main piston

I’m tempted to purchase Ride Shocks based on the things you’ve mentioned (travel #s & who designed them), but for the same price as Fox Performance Elite it’s a tough sell as I’d rather see that Fox logo when I look in the wheel well.

Do you have a piston/valving recommendation that is best suited for rock crawling and slow tight trails? A lot of the content I’ve come across seems geared toward driving fast off-road and handling, having a hard time finding what would work well for the slow trails that we have in the PNW (tree roots, wet slippery rocks, gravel fire roads)

 

Nice detailed chart OP, good job

 

×2 Nice work

I know King deviates from the industry standard on stem mounts being measured from the base of the stem (shoulder where the washer for the bushing rests against) to the center of the eye, were there others?


For the front shocks, AFAIK it's always from the mounting surface of the top-hat to the eye (not sure any other way would make sense).



I see a lot of missing figures for lift height...
Should be able to fill those in based on the shock ext. length as compared to OEM shocks (provided the figures are accurate anyway, I have seen a discrepancy or two during my own research):

• Front shocks:
• 21.5" - 22.0" is 0-1" lift (OEM (Hitachi) is 21.75").
• 22.0" - 22.5" is 0-2" lift (may need aftermarket UCAs).
• 22.5" - 23.0" is 1-3" lift (will need aftermarket UCAs).
• 26.25" - 27.0" is 4-6" lift (for use with drop bracket kits).
  
  Rear shocks:
• 22.5" - 23.0" is 0-1" lift (OEM (Hitachi) is 22.75").
• 23.0" - 24.0" is 0-2" lift
• 24.0" - 25.0" is 1-3" lift (may need bumpstop extensions*).
• 27.0" - 28.0" is 4-6" lift (will need bumpstop extensions*).
  
  *Exception: Not needed if the rear lift is lift blocks underneath the OEM leaf springs.

Accutune has this on their site... Maybe help?
https://accutuneoffroad.com/articles/digressive-vs-linear-vs-progressive-pistons-shock-valving/

 

I've been looking at either ADS or 8100s as my next setup. For a noob like me, what does this info tell me?

 

Edit- I see you just said a bunch and not all. So the below is just in case you want it.

I believe that Ironman Foam Cell Pros are no considered 2.5. The shock body is (over) 2.5. The below info is from an email I had with them from a few years ago. They also considered them to be linear.


45710FE - Foam Cell Pro - Front
Extended: 22.20
Compressed: 17.0
45744FE - Foam Cell Pro - Rear
Extended: 24.01
Compressed: 15.70

 

Thanks for that info! I was mostly comparing 2.5" shocks that were extended travel & have remote reservoirs, since Foam Cell Pros do not offer remote reservoirs I left them off the list.

I forgot to add Old Man Emu BP-51 shocks to the spreadsheet. Those rear shocks have decent travel (9.25") however the fronts are not extended travel (4.17").