Why change out Propedal valve in the DHX?....The design of the Propedal creates a great position sensitive shock. As the pressure in the shock goes up the propedal valve gets harder to open, this creates more compression damping. The pressure can be increased 3 ways, first my adding more air pressure to the schrader valve, second as the shaft compresses, the displaced oil compresses the reservoir floating piston down, which drives up the pressure in the reservoir, and lastly the chamber compensation bottom out can be dialed in to decrease the reservoir volume and thus cause the pressure to be driven up even faster as the shaft compresses. The Propedal adjuster allows the rider to compensate for the pressure on the valve by applying opposite spring pressure to the valve reducing the force required to overcome this internal pressure and allowing the valve to blow-off more easily.

So this all sounds great but in a real world where courses and terrain are not perfectly smooth and void of square edge holes, this is where the Propedal system fails to allow the valve to blow-off. When the shock hits square edge bumps deep in the stroke the valve becomes harder to blow-off and is actually getting firmer the deeper it gets in the travel (Position sensitive damper).

This is why the Speed Sensitive Damper (SSD) is preferred, as the shaft speed needs to increase the compression adjustment valve needs to blow-off when the bumps become square edged or what we call high speed hits. This creates the need for the conversion and replacement of the propedal system to a shimmed ported valve. Since the shim stiffness is not affected by the build up of pressure in the reservoir, the shims can create damping at low and medium speed compression hits and be valved to blow-off when higher shaft speeds occur thus allowing the damper to smoothly resist the square edged hits. Because the main piston was valved for a very progressive position sensitive Propedal valve we can now revalve the main piston to contribute to the compression circuit and due to the decreased ramp up in the overall spring rate of the damper, the rebound stack can be revalved to be more linear . The main piston can now control it's 70% share of the compression damping giving us many more tuning options for rider set-ups. Rebound can be tuned to be more reactive on small bumps and provide lift where needed while preventing that pogo stick feel. Increased reservoir volume reduces pressure build up deep in the stroke, reducing heat build-up and increased oil and seal life. Optional reservoir volume systems available as shown below: