Girder fork top spring mount

[alan.moore]

Paul,
Maybe its a case that when new the taper is a nice tight fit in the upper yoke and this, in addition to the fact that the spring is always in compression, and therefore pushing the taper tighter, means that the bolt does not have to do much work. However, I have noticed that when you view the spring from the side the top mount (and the top few coils of the spring) are at a slight fore and aft angle to the longitudinal axis of the spring. You can see this if you try and fit the spring without first fitting the top taper mounting into the top yoke as the two are at different angles and the taper just will not enter squarely. This means that the spring is always exerting a fore and aft force on the taper joint, which is OK if it is tight but if the bolt does slacken off and you get slight play in the taper this force, over time, may well make the taper slightly elongated. Once this happens the bolt needs to do a lot more work in maintaining the security of the mounting. It might be that my additional spacer was made up to compensate for wear that had taken place.

As the weight of the bike, and the spring pressure, is always forcing the taper into the yoke it 'should' not come out as you have evidenced.

[Vincent.vanGinneke]

Would this extra bit have to do with increasing the pre load on the spring thus get more fork travel on out stroke, and by doing so improving road contact ?