roadbuzz

Mostly interested in trail-riding, dealing with roots, rocks, and such. Front and rear I usually just seems like the fastest setting works the best. Rear has climbing, trail, and downhill settings. I rarely use climbing except on pavement. Am I missing something? Maybe too much or not enough pressure in the shocks? Just curious on others experiences.

Kapusta

The climbing/trail/DH setting is for compression damping, not rebound damping.

With that cleared up: no, your experience is not that unusual.

roadbuzz

Understood, mentioned it for context. For example, rebound seems largely irrelevant in climbing.
I guess my take is that slower rebound only feels like it stiffens the suspension rather than actually slowing the rebound. Essentially not much different than pumping the shocks to a higher pressure.

Kapusta

Sounds to me like you are talking about compression damping, not rebound.

But assuming you ARE talking about the rebound...

There should be a pretty noticable difference just pushing down on the suspension and letting it go between full fast (least damping) and full slow (most damping) on the rebound setting.

Unlike compression damping, which many people feel the need to have on-the-fly adjustability (and which manufacturers accomodate with things like that 3 position lever you describe and lockouts), rebound is generally a set-and-forget thing. You don't change it for climbing.

The purpose of rebound damping is to keep the bike suspension under control. Without it, you would bounce like a rubber ball when landing a drop or going over a large object. If you have ever ridden a bike with a blown rebound circuit on the fork or shock (no rebound damping) you would know what I mean. It is really sketchy.

Too much rebound damping can cause a lack of suspension performance over repeated fast hits, because the suspension is not able to fully extend between hits. Thus the suspension is working deeper in its travel where the spring rate is higher (stiffer), so the ride is harsher. This is what is known as a fork or rear suspension "packing up" and is a sign that the rebound is set too slow.

Kapusta

Also, asking someone how much rebound they use is a really hard thing to answer.

They can tell you how many "clicks" from full fast or full slow they are using, but unless they are using the exact same fork or shock (and in the case of rear shock the exact same suspension frame) and weigh about the same as you, these adjustments are not going to mean anything for you.

One fork/shock might have the adjustment divided int to 8 clicks of adjustment, another might have 25. One might have a wide range of damping, another fairly narrow. One may be overall faster or slower over the entire range of adjustment than another.

And finally, the type of rebound damper (simple port orafice vs dual flow) has a big influence in how much rebound damping they run.