Fox Factory Forx goodies

After lending my Fox 44s years ago, they returned with rounded off / burred over top caps. And, some vicious divots in the lower triple clamps where said lendee had thought it was OK to take a file to them. The mate I lent them to, ceased to be my mate.

I've been lately considering making new fork caps, but, using the same square section as the bottom damper rod retainers. I still have the 2 tools I made up for the forks that pretty much did everything needed for a full rebuild.

Dangling from the axle in the picture below are one of the tools and, 2 disc brake caliper set ups I made. One the tiny, flexy little Brembo twin piston caliper, the other a Brembo Gold Line 05 rear Road Race caliper (that actually stopped the bike) that I used on the Fox Forks . They are much like a rear caliper carrier, that the axle goes through, and which keys onto the backing plate rectangular lug. They are somewhat dodgy set ups made at a time when I had a much more basic set of machinery at my disposal.

The other tool - being just a small ringy for the axle clamp nuts, an open ender for the axle, and another hex key welded together, has jumped ship off the axle, and is buried, I hope, under a pile of swarf behind my mill. I'm just not maneuverable enough to get to it - there's a job for my 5 year old grand nephew, he loves the workshop, and can get into, and, I hope, out of, any tight spot!

Prices on your bits , if you are commissioning a batch? Often, it's 'cheaper' than my own time taken to make things. I used old single bolt Husky bars mounts, years ago on my FFs - they had 4 bolt top clamps on each one, and were offset, so with rotating them, and the 2 original holes, I had 4 optional positions.

Machine work making shiny stuff is good! Will you remove the angled back mounts on the top triple clamp?

Phil makes great stuff at a pretty fair price to the buyer. He an I exchanged messages about doing caps like that to run a vertical bar clamp several years ago; TyDog ended up doing a set for me of caps for me, but I've been dormant for the bar clamps being sidetracked on other nonmoto stuff.

FTE- you are correct, Phil produces some of the nicest ,if not THE nicest trick bits available. Very fair and easy to communicate with. Much cooler dude than some other " master machinists" around here,lol..(not meaning Tydog--hes cool too) He has fabbed me up several pieces that were a little beyond my capabilities on my mini lathe and mill. His silencers are the most unbelievably nice pieces ive ever seen. Got 2 and have 2 more ordered. Just a great guy and superb machinist---and it hasn't gone to his head.

I've owned at least 3 sets of those forks and struggled with the same issue (swept back bar mount). I hated it, but what really put the nail in the coffin for me with these forks was the blown seals (they blew out on a regular basis). I decided to take a set of 43mm's and use modern internal technology...problem solved, but if you are building a bike like the one you described then you want FFF on it for sure...can't wait to see how your clamp comes out.

Nice, Phil is one of the good guys out there making stuff for us vintage nuts. He sent me a 3D computer file on Fox triples he made. I spun that around on my computer till I was dizzy...lol. Good stuff.

Swatdoc,

the front rim is one of the original Sun rims while the rear is one of the newer Sun rims. I would love to find a matching rear original Sun rim. Also, Thor rebuilt the Fox Forxs I had on my RM in that photo and he also rebuilt the Simons forks currently on my 76 CR125 exactly as you explained using Race Gold valves and no air. Thor lives about 75 miles away from me so I drove down to his place one Saturday and we drank some beers and rebuilt my forks. Thor is man and he can defintely get it done for sure!

There's a lot of cross over among some on the Sun rim part #'s. Here's a list: http://www.ftemoto.com/othergalleries/VMX/Sun_Rim_part_nos.pdf

Personally, I'd get a little queasy thinking about taking the patina off my forx but it'll be awesome in the end I bet.

FTE, let me know when you are ready and we will get you some risers going!
Thank you for the kind words swat & 277, there ARE some real goobs around here from time to time but those sightings seem to be less frequent. I built a little cylinder head one time for a dude in this thread and a certain master type someone had a total come-apart over it. Unreal.
FFs are over the top in the cool factor no doubt and doing away with the air in them is a good start but IMHO they still do not work as good as cartridge internals in the 83 lowers.

Not sure we got newmann's review on his emulators. Mi surely could have missed it tho

Mine are hanging of the wall , racked with 6 other sets of forks - I could barely get to them, they are right at the back.

I've never been a fan of polishing / fine machining of things that were originally a bit 'raw', but hell, I'd forgotten just how raw the 44s were. Wonderfully Ugly. I ran with the original plastic protectors for years, then thin Aluminium ones to protect them.

I'm thinking of putting in modern cartridges if ever I refit them to one of my older Bikes - probably the RM125D chassis that I ran a variety of 4t engines in. The removable lower damper rod holder, lends itself very well to carrying a modern cartridge. As a side note, I'd prefer the duplication of the simple 1"/ 25.4mm square 'drive' of the lower cap, for the fork cap. An hilariously simple "special tool" was that - just a short section of 1" square steel tube in the box.

I was just able to reach the original Fox Factory Forx box that's been collecting dust for decades:



In the box I've 2 sets of Fox Springs, the full set of negative springs ( though I very early on went to no air, and generally used progressive springs, which are stacked up in another cupboard). The aluminium protectors are there, but the original semi translucent plastic / nylon guards I think long since disappeared. The plastic bag has a variety of bits, including all of the options of Rebound main valves. I think my manual is in the Fox Factory Shox box I have tucked away, gathering dust as well. I've always been a bit of a hoarder, though, the Big Problem now is remembering the 'safe place' things were put in - I'm forever coming across things I forgot I still had.

Yes, pretty basic, but hell, you can't get something more basic than a 1" long section of 1" square galvanized tube as a "special tool". When we first opened a box of 44s at Competion Development, I think we were expecting some sort of fancy tool to match the forged lower legs and triple clamps - to see said bit of 'offcut' was quite a chuckle. But, it worked / works, and I've used the same 'tool' with those two hex keys TIG'd to it for decades now. I do love simplicity.

I've got quite a few things with their packaging and parts from over the years - when I pay for (nice) things, I keep (nice) things. Moto Hoarder, basically.

Here is a picture of the Husky bar mounts I used decades ago:


They used a single 10mm bolt to hold them on. I just drilled out the original 8 mm holes ( and made up 'upside down top hat' insert to enable me to refit the original Fox HB mounts) and long bolts with spacers to both clear the webbing under the clamps, and adjust the height of the bar mounts on the top side.

Modern KTMs use single 10mm bolts - if you use 12.9 specification bolts nothing would ever break them. Well, nothing that didn't kill you outright well above the shear force required to break such a single, or pair of bolts.

HOWEVER : I Always encourage people to make their own things - to Not just be a 'buyer'. No disrespect towards the blokes above making things for others, by the way. I make and sell things to people as well. Hell, if they haven't thought of this method themselves, I urge them to consider it - though, it's not the sort of thing you could charge much for. Most would want to market a full set up. Fair enough.

But, Fox Factory Forx are incredibly easy to fit multi adjustable bar mounts for, using KTM ones. So, here's a set up some might want to do themselves:

The 'male' landing on top of the pre 2016 KTM triple clamp is 22mm ( 7/8" = 22.225mm, so you may be able to get that as a std thickness in the US and just sand / file one side down by hand) in width. Most KTM mounts have an equivalent 'female' landing as their base to 'key' onto the top of the triple clamp. Most people are capable of finding / cutting / fileing / finding a machinist to do a 22mm wide piece of Aluminium, in whatever thickness they desire and drillng / tapping holes accurately. I would suggest minimal thickness being 15mm or thicker for adequate thread engagement of a correctly lenghted bolt. The KTM bolts go through the bar mount, into threaded holes. You can make a few different threaded holes in the plate for a variety of positions, and bolt the 22mm block to the top of the triple clamps with 8mm bolts going up into the blocks, or, indeed thread the Fox Forx original holes to the 10mm bolts you use ( most common are 10.5mm pitch, but you can get 10 x 1.25 and 10 .1mm thread pitches) and have as many as 4 different mount points - it's up to you. I've got a freshly tweaked shoulder, so I can't reach above my head to take a few swingarms, shocks and 6 sets if forks off my racks to give you accurate bolt spacing dimensions of the mount holes for the original bar clamps , you'd have to sort out the mount point / numbers yourselves today.

There are so many KTM handlebar mounts available, it's mind boggling.

Different heights, different offsets of the bar mounts themselves, and different thickness male / female machined height spacers. Then, things like the PHDS system, which you can get from X Trig re-sellers for well below $200. Just having a selection of mounts / spacers, and a variety of bolt lengths to ensure full thread / safe thread engagement ( and no driving of the bolt end into any mount hole that has solid triple clamp surface at its base) into the 22mm wide block you have on the triple clamp, gives you a huge amount of positioning options.

Hell, I think a fair few KTMs had No male 22mm landing on top of the triple clamp, for no twisting of the mounts, just a flat top, so there may be many mounts that don't have an equivalent female base of 22mm.

Simple, safe ( if you do things correctly) and plenty of 'bling' opportunity, if that's your thing.

It'd be awesome if you could free up the different rebound valves to Phil or Kenny or someone to repop the different options. I doubt there's many of those kicking around. I don't think any of them would be up to the emulators or the cartridge refit that Kenny did, but it'd be interesting to play with.

I've also wondered how much of the poor performance of the fork (aside from being a simple air and oil damping chamber) is due to people misassembling the system. When I pulled mine apart, only one side had the valve in the correct location. Fox also added a page to the manual at some point to deal with this.



Believe this shows the two different assemblies I confronted; one wasn't going to work as designed, however good the design might have been for the time.





BTW, I've got a site that has all the manuals and some other Red Rocket related stuff, feel free to download what you need, although i'd be pretty bummed if someone starts reposing them for sale; the reason I put them up was to help folks having to drop $20 on a photocopy.

FTE's vmx docs

I hear you on the hoarding, though this has been pared off to a couple other folks' projects.

I too am guilty as charged when it comes to CR250 top ends, DG heads & Mototek CDIs...and I'm not parting with a piece without some serious cash...:+)

Swatdoc,

I buy the Mototek's & DG heads when I can find them (Mostly CDI 125's) as these are the rarest and most sought after in my opinion (they were used on the 76-78 CR125s, mini Elsinores & 76 - 80 Suzuki RM125's. I see guys building bikes like FMF or DG package racers & this is the one item they either overlook or simply can't find. I am not in the market quite yet to build one of these package racers, but if I do I will be ready.

Not to hijack the thread (although I am anyway,lol) Mike-- Im in need of a DG head for an 80 YZ125....anything ? I picked up a couple in the past year for my RM's but the Yamaha one I haven't rattled any bushes yet....

I do have a 1980 YZ125G DG head, however that is the holy grail of DG heads. Not sure why this particular head is so hard to find as that was the most poplar 125 that year, but they are super rare (that one cost me dearly and I'm going to hang on to it for now)...if I ever sell you will be the first to know...I actually have 2 1980 YZ125's, one that's in pieces (that's the one I plan to use the 125 DG head on) and I have another that has an IT175 motor in it (see below photo), however I plan to put the IT175 crank in the other 125 bottom end.

This is top end of the 125 in pieces


This is the 80 YZ125 with the IT175 motor in it

Yeah RCM does excellent work.
Mike P, Would you have a Mototek CD100 for sale? The one for RM250 Been trying to find one for years.

Leith, I'm still trying to put my hands on that Super Trapp sticker for you, haven't put my hands on it yet but I know it's here. Apologies. I've got a couple things I need to locate here for a couple folks

Ok thats cool, i know what its like trying to locate stuff.