Have a 2017 Camso kit that has pretty much every update except the bigger rear wheels. I have never been able to get the weight distribution so that it wasn’t either a pig to steer on hard pack, or squirrely as hell. It also bottomed out way to easily when we were doing longer rides and had to pack a lot of gas in. Wanted to try the Zbros strut shock, but at $750.00+ Cdn it was a bit rich for something that only a few people seem to have installed (although everyone seems to feel it was worth it), so I decided to see if I could do something similar.
First step was finding a shock, at first I tried looking for a used dirt/street bike shock that would work, but not having access to a parts yard that I could pick thru buying online seemed a bit sketchy, as it was really hard to tell what condition the shock was in. So I decided to see what I could find for an ‘offbrand’ (read made in China) shock.
Found this:
126$ US with shipping.
Then made this at a friends shop.
Sized it so that I could use two of the Standard Camso rubber donuts, and a few washers to adjust how long the overall length was by swapping from top of the kit to underneath, similar to how Camso has you set the basic length.
Installed:
First ride was inconclusive, shock seemed to have way to much sag and didn’t seem to be helping with the ski weight, so I swapped the fixed strut back in and rerode it and it was better with the fixed strut. Bit disappointed. Decided to try again after cranking the shock preload down quite a bit and adding more air pressure. I wasn’t able to do this with the shock in the bike as I didn’t have a shock wrench for the preload, and couldn’t rotate the ring by hand.
Now it rode way better, in fact it was so much better on the road that I was able to go probably twice as fast as before while still feeling like I was in control of the bike. Before it would try to throw me off if there were any ruts, now it seemed to track far better, bonus is that whoops are way less painful. Think I may have to play with the rebound to tame a bit of a pogo affect.. Riding off trail didn’t seem to be worse, but conditions were pretty much perfect, 60cm new snow on a solid base. It did seem to climb really well, and it pretty much never bottomed out riding thru windlips and sudden transitions so that was a definite improvement.
So a bit more tweaking to do, and this summer I may disassemble the shock and upgrade seals, and maybe play with valving if I can to stiffen the compression a bit, but for around $170 Cdn for the shock and a few bolts and washers, plus a days work making the adapter I am pretty happy with the results.
First step was finding a shock, at first I tried looking for a used dirt/street bike shock that would work, but not having access to a parts yard that I could pick thru buying online seemed a bit sketchy, as it was really hard to tell what condition the shock was in. So I decided to see what I could find for an ‘offbrand’ (read made in China) shock.
Found this:
126$ US with shipping.
Then made this at a friends shop.
Sized it so that I could use two of the Standard Camso rubber donuts, and a few washers to adjust how long the overall length was by swapping from top of the kit to underneath, similar to how Camso has you set the basic length.
Installed:
First ride was inconclusive, shock seemed to have way to much sag and didn’t seem to be helping with the ski weight, so I swapped the fixed strut back in and rerode it and it was better with the fixed strut. Bit disappointed. Decided to try again after cranking the shock preload down quite a bit and adding more air pressure. I wasn’t able to do this with the shock in the bike as I didn’t have a shock wrench for the preload, and couldn’t rotate the ring by hand.
Now it rode way better, in fact it was so much better on the road that I was able to go probably twice as fast as before while still feeling like I was in control of the bike. Before it would try to throw me off if there were any ruts, now it seemed to track far better, bonus is that whoops are way less painful. Think I may have to play with the rebound to tame a bit of a pogo affect.. Riding off trail didn’t seem to be worse, but conditions were pretty much perfect, 60cm new snow on a solid base. It did seem to climb really well, and it pretty much never bottomed out riding thru windlips and sudden transitions so that was a definite improvement.
So a bit more tweaking to do, and this summer I may disassemble the shock and upgrade seals, and maybe play with valving if I can to stiffen the compression a bit, but for around $170 Cdn for the shock and a few bolts and washers, plus a days work making the adapter I am pretty happy with the results.
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