Leaking Air Fork

[someguy518]

Hey all, thanks in advance for the info.

I've got a 2005 Marzocchi Marathon Race fork (all air). I've been riding it for about 15 months without problems. Until yesterday when I noticed oil on the right stanchion after my ride. I checked out the air pressures, to find that the positive air chamber leaks and holds 0 psi.

Is this something that will be fixed by simply replacing the seals? I know everyone raves about the Enduro Fork Seals, and I was planning to buy those, but before I do I want to make sure that they will actually address the issue. I'm mechanically inclined, so I'm not afraid to do the work, but I just don't want to go through all the hassle to find out it doesn't fix it.

Also, anyone know the deal on warranty with this stuff? My biggest concern is that I bought the fork (brand new) off Ebay in June '06. The warranty is 2 years, but it's only applicable to the "orginal purchaser" - not sure if the ebay seller would be the original purchaser, or if it'd be me . . .

Thanks!
Nick

[BikerMiker]

Call Marzocchi and ask... They'll fix it for you even out of warranty.

mike

[pbayne]

That sounds like the main fork seals. I have used enduro seals on my Marathon fork and they are better than the OEM. Enduro has very detailed instructions.

You can really extend your seal life and fork performance by changing the oil often. I usually do it twice a year.

There are also lots of little o-rings all over the place on the fork. If you're so inclined, open the whole thing up and find all those rings then get replacements from the hardwear store. You can also buy them from Marzocchi and just tell them to give you a full kit for your fork. It will cost more that way, but will save you some time finding all the right sizes.

[someguy518]

That sounds like the main fork seals. I have used enduro seals on my Marathon fork and they are better than the OEM. Enduro has very detailed instructions.

You can really extend your seal life and fork performance by changing the oil often. I usually do it twice a year.

There are also lots of little o-rings all over the place on the fork. If you're so inclined, open the whole thing up and find all those rings then get replacements from the hardwear store. You can also buy them from Marzocchi and just tell them to give you a full kit for your fork. It will cost more that way, but will save you some time finding all the right sizes.

Cool, thanks for the info, guys.

Question - to change the oil, don't you need to open everything up anyways? If so, I'd be inclined to spend the $18 for the extra fork seals and not worry about it . . . Although maybe I'm mistaken because I don't really understand the process since I haven't opened it up yet . . .

Another question - does it really only take 60 ccs of fork oil - 20 in the right leg and 40 in the left (as suggested at http://www.marzocchi.com/spa/mtb/products/oillevel.asp?LN=UK&Sito=usa-mtb&Y=2005)?
It just sounds low . . .

And a 3rd question - Where do you get the oil for it? The manual says 7.5-wt oil, but doesn't specify what type or where to get it. Plus I've heard that you can customize the fork to the rider weight & style by changing the weight of the oil. I'm 185lb, ride typical XC with a touch on the aggressive side - is 7.5 oil a good fit or do you recommend I try something different?

The fork is my last great frontier with my bike (I've torn apart literally everything else), so I really appreciate any helpful info you may have.

Thanks again!
Nick

[jmblur]

A great place to get oil is an motorbike/atv store. They should have the fork oil, which is EXACTLY the same stuff as you'll pay a ton more for at a bike shop.

Spectro is a great name if you can find it. I still have a lot of 5wt left over from an earlier fork rebuild (when I was about 25 lbs lighter... doh!)

[jed]

If you are near College Park, the Motorcycle Shop on Route 1 just south of the Beltway has Spectro oils. You need the 125/150 Golden Spectro, that is equivalent to 7wt I think. I have been using it in all kinds of forks and it works great.

[pbayne]

You can even mix 10wt with 5wt and get roughly 7.5wt out of any brand oil. And it is alot cheaper than using the Marzocchi oil. That being said, after years of experimenting with oil quantity and viscosity, I use the Marzocchi factory oil at factory specified levels and that seems to work best for me. The cheaper oil seems to form bubbles too easily and loses some feel on longer downhills. Changing the seals is more complicated than an oil job which isn't bad at all.

[someguy518]

Hey all, thanks for the feedback. I dropped by Coleman Powersports and picked up some 7.5wt fork fluid, so that was easy enough. And I got the Enduro seal kit.

So last night I opened up the fork ('05 Marzocchi Marathon Race) to replace the oil & seals. It was a frustrating process. Even when following the picture-tutorial on the Enduro site, there were some differences between by fork and theirs, and some of their methods just didn't work very well (such as using channel-lock pliers padded with a towel to grip and unscrew the air cartridge - either the towel was too thin to protect the cartridge and the pliers scratched the surface of the cartridge, or the towel was too thick and I couldn't grip tightly enough). A much better method was to use vice-grips, padded with an old inner tube.

Anyhow, I broke the schrader valve on the top cap of the fork (right leg) - anyone know where I can get a replacement? I've emailed Marzocchi USA, but from what I've heard about their customer service, I'm not optimistic. I can find the top caps for other forks (see photo - this is the 32mm instead of the 30mm I need).

Also, anyone familiar w/ the Rebound Damping control on the bottom of the TST cartridge? I did some bad things there, too, such as unscrewing it past it's limit trying to remove the TST cartridge from the lowers. Nothing actually broke here, though, so I think I just need to futz with it.

[philvw]

I have an '02 Marathon that I bought used, had it serviced once years ago at the shop and had problems with the schreader valves, the shop was able to get replacements quickly and easily from 'zoke USA, so maybe you want to order through a shop if you have trouble getting through yourself.

That being said, this past spring I did exactly what you are doing now, complete overhaul, using the enduro seals and their instructions. I didnt have any issues at all and was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was, and how well the fork worked after. I didnt take apart the rebound cartridge tho, so I cant help you there. BUT the other thing I was thinking about was those shreader valves that I had issue with years before. They are a regular schreader valve, the valve part anyway. The part that goes on top of the fork leg is just a machined piece of aluminum which houses it. You can take the valve insert out with a valve tool, which you can get at any auto parts store, and replace with new (or take one out of a shreader tube even) as long as it's the valve mechanism that's cheesed, and not something with the cap itself. As others have said in this thread, you can get the o rings at a hardware store, etc, etc.

[someguy518]

I didnt have any issues at all and was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was

Thanks for rubbing it in! :rolleyes:

It wasn't difficult, per se, but just frustrating. Basically all it required was unbolting things, but without an exploded picture of how it all fit together, I made some critical mistakes (such as w/ the rebound damping knob).

Others may find these useful in avoiding my mistakes: I found a bunch of Marz Service Manuals at: http://www.birota.ru/manuals/marzocchi/
The site is all in Russian, but the Manuals appear to be english. I really really wish I'd found this 24 hours ago!! They have nice exploded views of all of the internals, top to bottom.