Ebonite

Technology

Why not upsidedown?

To be honest, in my eyes the upsidedown-principle has advantages over the rightsideup. But it also have disadvantages, like every construction.

So the whole Blackline is made to meet the wishes of the costumer. You are scared of torsional stiffness or no guarded lowers ? The Blackline forks will meet your demand, as it is a construction which you know from other brands. No thoughts about torsional stiffness and no thoughts about damaged lowers.

What is special about the Ebonite fork?

There is one thing I learned during making suspension fork. The weak point is the joint of the crown and steerertube. It is flexible, can creak and cause problems wherever you look. The steerer tube of the Ebonite is the same of the heavy Intend Flash fork, made with doubled wall thickness, so 6mm insteaf of 3mm of a normal forks steerer. And the upper 1 1/8″ side has 3mm instead of 2mm wall tickness. This is made to increase stiffness everywhere it is necessary.

Damping:

The damping of the Ebonite (and also all other Intend forks) is done with a shimstack based architecture. There is a compression piston and a rebound piston which provides the highspeed circuits, and there are lowspeed ports with external adjusters to get the setup done from outside.

There is a long rubber bladder on the inside of the stanchion. This makes it easy to assemble and disassemble the unit for service or tuning.

Air spring:

The air spring of the Intend forks are made with a special mechanism to fill both chambers, negative and positive in the same time. There are 2 valves, which gets connected when you mount a shock pump and gets seperated when you dismount the shock pump.

There is a special pneumatic air lip-seal to provide a friction-reduced air system. There is no second positive chamber. With the large negative chamber, the Intend forks have a super supple beginning stroke without a hanging curve in the middle. With this construction it is not necessary to go the way with third chambers. It is easier to set up, it has lower friction (just imagine a normal quadring instead of my pneumatic air seal, and then imagine you have TWO of this quadrings inside, this is the opposite of what you want…) and is easy to manage with volume spacers to avoid bottom out.

And you can add the travel by simply add or remove 10mm spacers, the black ones in the picture.

Upper stanchions with Royal Flush Coating

The upper legs of the Ebonite are double butted. This means they have bigger wall thickness at the area of high stress (on the crown side), and lower wall thickness at the area of lower stress to reduce weight.

What is the Royal Flush Coating?

It is a special treatment of the surfaces of the stanchions. It should not be too flattened, but not to rough, just a perfect balance.

And the difference is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7LkYRM510E

FAQ

Can I have black upper tubes for the fork ?

The upper tubes are only offered with the shown Royal Flush Coating, which stands for low friction, great hardness and low wear

How often do I need to service the fork ?

Depending on your riding style and time on your bike, it is recommended to make a small lower leg service every 3-5 month to achieve a perfect function, if you ride 2-3 rides a week or more. You can run it also without servicing it and it will work, but the best function is provided with fresh oil from time to time

Can I change the travel afterwards ?

Yes, you can. The manual for this is attached at “Service” on the top of this site

Do you offer different offset, axle diameter, steerer diameter ?

The Intend Blackline Ebonite is only available in 44mm offset, 110×15 boost axle, tapered steerer. There is no other option available

Can I ride a 27,5″ wheel in this fork ?

Yes, the Ebonite is designed to fit to 29″ wheels, so this means it is approx. 20mm longer that a 27,5″ fork. I can highly recommend taking a 29″ fork although you have an 27,5″. In this case I would choose 10mm less travel as you wanted to have, this means your fork is only 10mm higher than it should. This is acceptable – but – it the fork will fit in your future bike and this will be a 29″ for sure. And then you already have the right fork

There is a possibiliy for a testride of the Ebonite for everyone.

You get a brand new Ebonite at home for your own bike, to ride it on your hometrails – for 2 weekends.

This service costs 50 Euro for you. Your benefit of paying this 50 Euro service fee is, that you do not need to have a bad conscience if you testride it and send it back – don’t worry about that!

There are some requirements for this deal:

• Testing time: 2 weekends. Shipping in one week (e.g. monday, reaching you out tuesday – thursday), sending back after the second weekend
• No shortened steerer (215mm long, so it will fit without shortening)
• no starnuts pressed in – a Intend blackline Smarty is provided for the testing
• no pressed on headset-cones to avoid scratches from removal. a slutted cone is provided
• no mounted fender to avoid marks from zip ties, you will be able to testride without fender

The procedures works like this:

I need to take a deposit of the fork 1659 €+ 50 €, so in total 1709€.

After receiving the deposit, you get a brand new Ebonite fork, and run it for 2 weekends at home, afterwards you easily send it back to me and I pay back 1659€ – without problems and questions. It is ment for a tryout, you do not need to buy it. you can just try it out.

If you like to keep it, you can of course let it stay in your bike and thats it.

Don’t be gentle it’s a rental

No please not. Of course the fork will have some wear afterwards, and that is ok. I just want to avoid unnecessary marks, that is why I provide the Smarty wedge with the fork and a slutted cone that there will be no marks and so on.

Please also avoid cable rub, contact to stones and scratches in the fork.

The aim is to make a testride possible on your hometrails, and it is not ment to go to a 2 weeks holiday in Whistler with the rented fork – thanks for understanding.

What you need:

• 1709€ on your bank account
• 110×15 wheel
• 29″ or 27,5″, both work
• some spacers to be able to ride with the 215mm steerer
• a suitable brake adapter for the Ebonites 180mm brakemount

You can purchase the fork for testing here: www.intend-bc.com/product-category/forks

This service is only available within EU and not for Intend usd forks