Setting The RAAW Madonna V3 Up | Onward MTB
Following on from my last blog post on bike set up, I want to share how I’ve got on with setting up the RAAW. PSA: This is going to get pretty technical & detailed. I’m not going to try and add to the vast amount of resources available about suspension terminology, as it’s been done a million times.
The Chosen Process
I have a BYB Telemetry System at my disposal, so I wanted to do a bit of an experiment with this new bike. I have always prided myself on being fairly aware of how my bikes feel under me, so this was to be a good test… Here’s the run down of the set up stages:
Initial ‘roll out’ set up - Adopt an initial set up using RAAW’s recommendations and static sag.
Adjust by feel - Ride the bike for 2 weeks and make adjustments based on my own feelings and heuristics.
Measure with telemetry - After two weeks, bolt on the BYB Telemetry system to measure how the set up I ended up actually performed.
Adjust with telemetry - Use the BYB system to make changes and reach a baseline setting/reference point.
Go back to ‘feel’ - adjust as required.
The end of the season is nearing, so I chose this process to allow me to get rolling quickly and keep things simple in the early stages of building my connection and confidence on the new bike.
Then, I wanted only enough time to have the the opportunity to adjust by feel without getting lost or having the chance to adapt to a poor set up.
Read on for how I got on at each stage…
Stage One - Initial ‘Roll Out’ Set Up
I had just assembled the bike before taking this picture. “New bike day” hits hard.
I’ll come clean, I stuffed up when I ordered my spring rate for the RAAW with an Ohlins TTX M.2 shock.
For a long time, I’ve been 85-87kg. I’ve been trying to make better nutritional decisions this season and I’ve done an awful lot of riding, so I unknowingly weigh 82kg now. That’s fully kitted up, but without my coaching pack.
Side note - My coaching pack weighs about 5kg and I can definitely feel it when its on me. I want the bike set up for without a pack, with enough range in the adjusters to firm things up when I do have a pack on.
With this shock, RAAW recommend a spring rate of 502lb for someone 80kg to ride at 26% sag (their recommended sag). I ordered a 525lb spring, doh!
I inflated my fork to reach the old faithful 20% sag. I left the damper settings unchanged from my last bike. The shock was set to RAAW’s recommendations, except the rebound was opened up one click - I prefer a fast rebound.
I’ve been impressed with RAAW’s set up guide, its mint (and accurate, as I found out). I studied it in detail before ordering - it has a bunch of detailed and helpful information on their suggestions on how the bike might work best for you, leaving you informed to make your final decision. Just don’t forget to check how much you weigh!
I am the proverbial ‘tinkerer’, so I loved RAAW’s toolbox concept for this frame. I opted for adjustability over a kickable derailleur hanger, so I stuck with the RAAW axle and hangers. I ordered a short chain stay kit to move -5mm from the stock 450mm. At the time of testing, I only had a high progression (28%)/high BB shock mount, and the stock mid progression (25%)/mid BB mount. I now have a low progression/low BB and a high progression/mid BB mount in my toolbox after I found out how noticeably they could change the bike (for me anyway).
Here’s what I started out with:
Roll Out settings for my new RAAW to use when MTB Coaching in Queenstown. Note, I ordered the wrong spring!
Stage Two - Two Weeks of Setting Up by Feel.
I don’t recall exactly how many times I rode during this period, but it was about 25 laps of riding and MTB coaching in Queenstown Bike Park.
Changes Made & Why:
I fell into exactly the same trap that I warn others other not to - the front wheel felt harsh, so I reduced the air pressure in the fork by 2.5 psi. This was the wrong adjustment as the harshness and fatigue was being caused by the shock being too firm (I did only have one spring though). Softening the fork made it worse, especially on steep trails. Nice one, Rory.
The bike’s back end was feeling firm (and it was at this exact moment, I went and got the bathroom scales and confirmed, I had fucked up with the spring haha). The bike was like a rocket ship with that firmer spring, man it was fast. But I struggled to hold onto it. I opened up the LSC of the shock to try get it sitting into its travel more and be a little more compliant to get moving. It was on a wet day where this became more apparent.
I changed to the high progression/high BB shock mount, again to get the shock sitting into its travel more. I wasn’t too worried about the extra BB height as this was still lower than my old bike.
Things I liked:
The bike felt like it was riding well, but admittedly there was a bit to get used to with a whole new bike. The Madonna is easy to make friends with, I felt well connected to the bike. There certainly wasn’t anything massively wrong or significantly undesirable with the bike’s characteristics.
With the different shock mounts, I enjoyed the extra life and energy the bike had when I pushed into it. It was also a bit more supple off the top of the stroke.
I felt like I had good control in most places and the back end of the bike still tracked the ground pretty well despite it’s firmness - testament to the suspension design.
Side note - the back of this bike had less flex than my old bike. I instantly enjoyed the additional security and lack of ‘twanging’ off lines and out of corners, particularly at speed.
Things I didn’t like:
Something wasn’t quite right with the shock - I needed the compression damping nearly wide open. I know that Ohlins shocks can ride quite ‘damp’ compared to the Rockshox kit I had been running prior. It’s not ideal to be sitting at the end of an adjustment range, so this was a bit odd.
From conversations (and testing) with others on Ohlin’s gear, it was fairly common to go down a spring rate or two in the Queenstown Bike Park to bring the damper more into play when managing bumps. After weighing myself (that’s so elementary, how embarrassing haha), that confirmed this.
I didn’t feel controlled when I was riding steeps (properly steep - Ants main chutes, Give it Barry, World Cup type trails). I couldn’t get enough of my weight through my feet and instead was riding heavily over the handlebars. Steering was a bit twitchy, there was a lot of tension in my upper body and I was gripping the bars harder than usual. This is expected on steeper tracks, but I knew this could be improved. I wasn’t able to get my eyes up and down the trail - defensive, rather than aggressive.
Otherwise, I didn’t know what I didn’t like. I was still feeling pretty chuffed about it all, considering how specific and situational the negatives I was experiencing were.
Stage Three - Measure With Telemetry | Onward MTB Telemetry Sessions
Okey-dokey, with all the settings recorded, I strapped on the BYB kit and set about the process of data acquisition.
Track Choice
The versatility of Enduro bikes means they need to perform across a wide variety of trail gradients, roughness and speeds.
For me, I chose Shikaka, Lazy Vertigo, Upper Grundy and Lower Grundy at Queenstown Bike Park. I spend most of my trails like this, the only thing it’s lacking is many long sustained steep sections. See the GoPro video to get a feel for it.
I wasn’t prepared to lay down multiple ‘100%’ runs, so I kept my riding to 80% ish efforts.
Cut To The Chase - What The Numbers Revealed:
At pace, the dynamic sag of the fork showed it was riding too deep. The deep stoke charts confirmed this.
The rebound speeds were not very balanced. The fork was much faster than the shock - both on average and maximum velocities. The peak velocities of the fork set a new record at -3.4m/s (that’s very fast!). This was a bit of a surprise to me, but the data was clearly showing some very spiky rebound events.
It looked very unlikely I’d get to full travel in the rear. The front was much happier to use most of it’s travel.
Stage Four - Adjust With Telemetry
A depiction of the changes made at each stage of this bike set up experiment.
Changes Made (and why):
Over two days of collecting data, interpreting graphs and making changes over 15 runs, here’s what changed from my ‘feel’ set up (NB: my fork damper is not stock - it has a Fluid Focus damper piston kit in it, which frees up the damper significantly):
Increased fork pressure from 72.5 to 74 to 76.5 PSI. These air springs in the new ZEB are super sensitive, hence the small adjustments. I wanted to get the front end riding a bit higher and to put a little more weight through the feet to get the shock moving. I could have brought back the compression damping instead but I didn’t want to risk choking the fork up (something the stock Charger 3 damper suffers from).
Decreased fork’s HSC to full open and LSC to 12. This was to get the fork cycling more freely through it’s travel. I ride on top of the bars a lot, so I don’t want it feeling overly damp here.
Slowed fork rebound down from 14 to 11 to 8 clicks. This was in an effort to settle the front end, but my gut feel was that the HSR stack was a bit light given the peak velocities I was seeing. The places I still felt the excessive rebound speeds most was when the bike was loaded up in turns and having to smash through braking bumps. It felt quite ‘spiky’ with a lot of handlebar feedback. When the front wheel fell away from me over ledges, particularly those that I had braked hard into, it felt quite pushy & uncontrolled.
Dropped shock spring rate from 525 to 500 to 475lb. This was to get it using more of its travel, and, I was hoping to get the damper to play more of a part in dealing with bump forces - LSC/HSC were nearly wide open with the 525lb spring.
Increased shock compression damping - LSC from 14 to 11 clicks, HSC from ‘soft’ to ‘mid’. With the lighter spring, I was able to bring the damper into play a bit more.
Sped up shock rebound - from 5 to 6 clicks (full open). With the lighter spring, the amount of energy being stored in the spring decreased, so the return force drops and thus can open the door for less rebound damping. For better bump recovery and ride height, I wanted this wide open. I like a lively back end.
Shock mount changed back to mid progression/mid BB. I did a few runs with the high progression mount and 475lb, but my feet started to get a lot of feedback and unsettledness. I think this combination had the shock riding a little too deep and progression was too sudden. Either way, it felt a bit erratic and unpredictable.
After Telemetry Tuning - Ride Impressions:
Now we were talking. I was feeling the bike’s chassis was much more stable and the front to rear balance was really starting to shine. Being able to get my eyes up and looking down the trail more often was the feeling I connect with this improved chassis stability.
The ride height (dynamic sag) and bottom out resistance (travel usage) of the fork and shock were starting to match much more closely across a wide variety of track features - big G-outs, high frequency chatter and bigger bumps.
In corners I felt the fork engage into the turn nicely, giving good front wheel grip and confident initiation to steering or leaning movements. In high load turns my weight loaded up the bike evenly The release out of turns was good - the rebound wasn’t overwhelming or pushy here, no doubt helped by the equal amount of travel being used at the peak load area in the turns.
Traction felt good through both wheels and the bike was tracking lines very well. It felt like all lines were ‘on’, which is an amazing feeling. The bike still had plenty of support and didn’t feel mushy or doughy. I would say I ended up on the softer side of things, using the compression damping to control hits and the fast rebound to keep the bike riding high.
That mid progression/mid BB mount worked really well with the 475lb spring. The back end lost a bit of the responsiveness but it made up for it with a more predictable feeling throughout its stroke, especially when combined with more compression damping. My feet felt much better connected to the bike. It’s common to go down spring rates for less progressive settings, so this was no surprise.
After Telemetry Tuning - Areas of Improvement
The fork’s rebound was still returning very fast in the first 1/3 of its extension from deep compression events. It still felt spiky and unsettled at times, but there wasn’t much I could do about it as this needs a visit to CJ Suspension - I tried running the rebound fairly closed but it felt like it choked it up too much in other places. The damper has a fluid focus valve kit in it, which completely transforms these Charger 3 dampers. I’m pretty confident once we get an extra face shim in the stack it will take care of these high speed peaks.
Conclusion & Next Steps
I felt pretty bloody good about the rig after two days of data driven set up. It ended up being pretty far away from my starting point after having set it up by feel. If I’m honest, a few of the changes I made were on my mind before starting this process and I’m not surprised that they worked out to be the right ones (I would say that eh haha).
RAAW’s set up guide proved to be a very good baseline. Their literature around the bike is excellent in that they acknowledge all the variables that can influence how the bike rides and that, ultimately, it’s up to the rider to experiment and find their own preference. I ended up pretty close to their recommended settings, except for a faster rebound and slightly lighter spring for my own preferences and steep nature of Queenstown. The best thing with the shock mounts is they take about 2 minutes to change. I’m a big fan of this feature and all of the options it can bring a rider.
I can see the 500lb spring as a good firmer & responsive option, for flatter tracks like Coronet DH. As a flat pedal rider, I tend to push into the bike a lot more than pull, so this will remain a good supportive option to have. For the steeper tracks though, the mid progression and the 475lb spring achieved what I wanted - predictable support, good traction and control. I was tempted to try a 450lb spring but didn’t have time - I have a low progression shock mount to try, so the 450lb might go good with that…
Being wound fully open in the shock isn’t ideal, but it’ll do for now. Ideally I’d want to have the option to adjust in both directions so I might look at this in the future.
Of course, this is all just how things worked out for me - how I ride, where I ride, my equipment and what I want the bike to feel like. Set up is very personal, so don’t take any of this as gospel or be under the impression it will work really well for you, too.
This is just the beginning too - from here, I’ll be exploring different set ups and using my own intuition to judge what suits me best.
I’ll get this fork damper tickled up and with a bit of luck the trails will remain in good shape for the remaining few weeks of the season. I’ll try acquire some more data but otherwise, I’ll go back to the ‘old fashioned way’ for a while.
Cheers.
About this blog:
As a MTB coach, my gear gets used. A lot. Over the years I have used a huge amount of gear from different brands and have put them through their paces. Some have triumphed, some have been been average, and many have failed. This blog series aims to give you an honest insight into the stuff we rate and trust to use in our daily work as mountain bike coaches in Queenstown. While we do get some support from brands, the majority of our gear is purchased through stores, just like any other customer. In the cases where we have pricing privileges, we’ll make it clear. Ultimately, we choose everything we use.
