The Split-Shock DH Cannondale Bike Explained – World Cup Fort William DH 2019

Not so long ago, Cannondale was a prominent figure in top-flight downhill racing, with names such as Myles Rockwell, Cédric Gracia, Anne-Caroline Chausson, Brian Lopes and Missy Giove, who made motorcycles made in Canada. United States at the peak of the sport. At the time, it looked like the far west of bike design, and no company could stand out from Cannondale on that front.

There was the double-link Fulcrum that had five trays and more chains than a tandem; Gemini had two shocks and a secondary link that allowed the rear axle to move in a sort of "travel envelope"; and that strange stiff suspension thing for Aaron Chase who used a Lefty upper tube strut.

Simmonds used the split-shock system at the first World Cup in Maribor (above), but he picked a single shock for Fort William, where he finished 23rd.

Of course, there were some weird ones, but that's what happened in the 1990s and early 2000s, when everything was possible. It looks like Cannondale is back on the double-shock path with its un-named carbon descent bike, driven by Matt Simmonds during this year's World Cup season.

Technically it is a "split shock" system, not a double shock one, and the idea behind it is very different from the scandalous Cannondale machines of two decades ago, but the motorcycle is not less wild.

Without the split shock configuration, the Cannondale uses a single Fox damper mounted low in the frame, which is compressed from above by the rocker arm.

Split-Shock Explained System

So what's up with this thing? Pinkbike's Ross Bell stuck Tom Duncan, the Cannondale Factory Racing mechanic and the guy who worked hard on Simmonds during his development, to understand exactly that. Straight from the horse's mouth:

& # 39; & # 39; It's quite complicated, but the basic idea of ​​the shared damper is that if you have a really progressive bike … the Fox DHX2 shock is responsive to speed, so the High speed compression and low speed compression, and this damper is designed to operate in a range of speeds. Many motorcycles are now very flexible at the beginning of the race, which corresponds to very low tree speeds, and this is really progressive at the end of the race, which corresponds to very high tree speeds. This range could, if you have a really progressive bike, be outside of what the shock absorber is designed for. As a result, you lose a little control of the depreciation in the feature. The idea is that we can reduce the speed range and then keep total control of the shock throughout the race. "

The front triangle (left) has all the holes. With the split-buffer configuration, the empty coil-spring unit is mounted on the upper rear of the scale (right) via geometry-controlled chips. The shock is compressed from the front of the rocker and everything pivots from its center to the center.

Cannondale has focused on adaptability, but how far will we see if and when the bike is made?

As you can imagine, there are many different ways to configure the bike: "We can so much change the leverage rates of these bikes that we can absorb these different spring rates.We can use a very linear bike and very linear, or we can opt for a very progressive bike with a lower spring rate. "

Do you have all this? Yes, me too, but here is an easy way to think about it anyway. Cannondale can separate the rights on the spring from the rights to depreciation, thus creating different leverage rates for each. When it is configured with split dampers (which Simmonds does not handle at Fort William), the Fox unit with the coil spring on it is actually empty – it does not offer any damping. In this configuration, the damping comes from a Fox fender inserted into the bottom of the downpipe, giving that appearance to an electric bike a bit.

The deflection pulley appears to be positioned lower on the Cannondale than on other high-pivot motorcycles such as Aurum HSP and Supreme DH, which betray its lower instant center.

"The idea is not to work the damper too much, which seems to be a problem for some modern downhill bikes," Duncan told Bell in the CFR booths. "Or you can do it as we have decided here, and there are slightly different features of simple shock to split shock."

Of course, this seems like a lot of work when you will only experience one shock during a World Cup race, is not it? "We had the shock on the BDS, and then we stayed a few days later. [single shock] and we were going pretty much at the same speed with a lot more comfort, "Duncan easily recognized before defining the strategy.We are just going with the fastest in each race.Indeed to say that the split shock will not come back to At a given moment, it depends a lot on what you need from your bike on this track – Fort William has some unique features that are well suited to the current bike setup. "It will be interesting to see where and why Simmonds opted for the system of dampers.

Additional tests, tests and tests

While we just saw the bike for the first time a few months ago, Cannondale has been working on it for two years. Duncan said the first step was to understand how they wanted the vehicle to behave. Simmonds spent a lot of time on the bikes of the competitors who performed well on the World Cup circuit. & # 39; & # 39; We then tried to take the best pieces of each piece and proposed this, which we had in December '. and this bike was immediately packed and shipped to Italy where Simmonds pointed it on the San Remo test tracks.

The Simmonds large bike has a range of 485 mm when the helmet cups are set to the longest position.

"Simmonds and I spent forty days on this bike trying out all its pieces," he told Bell. This is not surprising if you see everything that can be changed. Links can be exchanged, among others. Of course, as well as the upper and lower damper mountings, the position of the axle and the scope via staggered inserts, and probably a few other things too. Multiply that number by two because of this split shock mechanism and sounds like Simmonds and Duncan. Cannondale has made a unique size of idler pulley and its position is not adjustable at all.

However, they remained faithful to the same triangle before, largely thanks to all the adjustments that allowed them to sort things out without having to make major changes to expensive carbon molds.

After a year away from the World Cup circuit, Simmonds has qualified 16th and 23rd on the ruthless Fort William circuit.

Geometry

At the present time, there is only one size. It is said that Simmonds bike goes like a "big big", with its staggered cups set to a maximum length to provide a number of 485 mm. It is almost as long at the back, at 455 mm, with the Simmonds axle being in the longest position for the Fort William Trail. Bryceland has also just received his bike and Duncan said that he was probably gone for a shorter and more fun setup. The angle of the head is at 63 degrees, so nothing too crazy here either, but the CFR parts box is full of helmet bowls to offer Simmonds a lower number when needed.

At this point, it's pretty clear that Cannondale will probably form a full World Cup downhill team (more details below), but it's still early on that front and their runner, Matt Simmonds, took the 2018 season of. That means he's joining the circuit with a very high number of boards, certainly higher than he deserves, and the team's only goal in the first round at Maribor was to allow the British rider to qualify and get their hands on a point. Done and done, with a number 44 on his plate this weekend at Fort William.

Add Cannondale to the list of companies that make high-pivot descent bikes, although theirs is much more complicated than anything else.

The future of Cannondale

If the mountain bike market was a big pie, the semi-rigid and semi-rigid motorcycles and semi-rigid motorcycles would constitute the vast majority. Downhill bikes? This slice is so tiny that even a cross-country World Cup runner would eat it without guilt. Downhill bikes – and downhill races – sell a lot of other motorcycles, and it looks like Cannondale is not just diving his toes into the pool.

Everything we do here is based on testing new things and trying to speed things up. And then, finally, try to build one of the best downhill teams in the world, "said Hespeler. & # 39; & # 39; But it's a project that will probably last in the next three, four or five years, and that's our goal. & # 39; & # 39; Could this mean the return of Bryceland? Cannondale has signed other big names?

Some teams have tried to change the position of the user, but Cannondale has a unique location and size.

All we do here is to test new things and go faster with that. And finally, try to build one of the best downhill teams in the world.– Daniel Hespeler, Cannondale team leader, on the future of the company in the DH races

And if you face all these problems, would not you want to sell the downhill bike that cost you considerable amounts of time and money? "At the moment, this bike is really in the testing phase and we will not start selling it next week," said Duncan. "We are still playing, some races are in shock, some races, we are on the starting point of the shock, so we have to finish with this issue to make sure the product is ready for production … If that can go that far.

Something tells me that this will probably be the case, and if or when it will happen, will the Cannondale be on your short list?