White Brothers Rock Solid 29: Final
March 28th, 2007 by Tim GrahlI’m a little behind in getting my final review done but in this report on the White Brother Rock Solid 29 carbon forks I’ll discuss a couple things I’ve found since my First Impressions post including getting used to riding carbon, more precision steering tests and steel vs. carbon on smoothing out the trail.
With a few more weeks of heavy riding on the Rock Solids I feel completely acclimated to riding carbon and am taking full advantage of the benefits. The lite frontend makes such a huge difference. When I switched back to a steel fork for a ride (discussed below) I could tell a big difference. Popping over logs and through deep ditches takes more effort than I realized when riding with heavier forks. Not to mention the overall effects on climbing a lighter bike.
As mentioned before, I felt like I have more control than ever while riding the Rock Solid forks. This was made apparent on a particular section of switchback trail. There are two tight turns, both steep, off-camber and muddy/rooty. I’ve never been able to successfully clear both of these until riding the White Brothers forks. Two rides in a row I rode them clean and then when I switched back to a steel fork I had trouble making it up that section of track. Again, I feel like I am steering with a set of forks that go exactly where I want them to.
The feature of carbon I wanted to test was the dampening of the trail. I’ve read that carbon forks will do a better job of smoothing out the trail over steel forks so I switched out the Rock Solids for a set of Zion steel forks. I paid careful attention on both sets of forks and rode sections of singletrack I have a lot of experience with and wasn’t able to tell any big difference between the two forks. As of now, my opinion is this “feature” of carbon doesn’t really shine through.
I have adequately tested the tagged features of these forks and I highly recommend the White Brothers Rock Solid 29 forks if you are looking to save a lot of weight on your bike and are looking for a big increase in stiffness and accurate handling. The retail price tag of $360 is steep, but well worth it for those of you looking for the two benefits I mentioned.
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Thx for that review - I just installed the Origin 8 on my K Monkey. First ride tomorrow night (trails are finally firming up around here). Should be interesting as the only other fork I’ve ridden with on the KM is the stock fork.
I’ve always wanted a fork that would moisten the trail. Thanks!
After a race on my KM fork, swapping to a very similar bike with identical handlebars (Jones) with the On-One carbon fork, the claimed smoothness just didn’t seem to be there.
My lightweight steel Walt fork (849g non-disc) to me feels smoother, and I ride that with a harsher handlebar (Salsa alu).
I have this fork on my Orbea ALMA Carbon 29er.
Your first impression that you reported was exactly what I experienced. The bike is so light I was wildly out of control.
I now know my limits and love this fork and it looks great on the Alma!