How Offset Bushings work

Offset Bushings are a specialised type of shock bushing (also known as shock hardware) that can tweak your bike's handling characteristics by lowering the bottom bracket and slackening the head angle. This leads to increased stability and cornering ability. Offset bushings are designed to decrease the effective length of your shock without reducing the stroke, meaning your bike's rear travel is not adjusted. Offsets require more clearance, the amount of which depends on the amount of offset. For most bikes, that'll be 2mm needed around the eyelet.

We machine our Offset Bushings for your specific bike and shock combination. If you are searching for standard shock bushings, we also offer those for sale.

Top riders worldwide, from DH to Enduro and even XC racers, have been using Offset Bushings for years to improve their bike's handling and ride faster. In one test conducted with a top DH World Cup rider, they found a 4-second improvement in lap time at Fort William, Scotland after fitting Offset Bushings. That time equated to a 25 place difference during the World Cup a week later.

We supply Offset Bushings to race teams and niche bike manufacturers worldwide. You'd be surprised how many racers are running them!

Material choice 

 

We take great care in sourcing the best materials for our shock bushings, using both brass and aluminium in our manufacturing process. Our brass rod is machined to extremely high tolerances, ensuring the best possible fit. Brass is an excellent material for bushing applications due to its self-lubricating properties, which are often used for industrial purposes.

Brass offers an optimal balance between performance and longevity for our bushing applications. While other manufacturers may use materials like steel or titanium, we find that brass provides the best mix of qualities for our products. For our spacers, we use aluminium for it's light weight. 

It's crucial to remember that shock bushings are designed to wear before your shock bolts do. If your shock bushing is made of a harder metal than your shock bolt, it could cause premature wear and ultimately result in failure and additional expenses.

To see how our Offset Bushings perform, read our reviews.

 

Adjustment and sizes

The adjustment you'll get when using Offset Bushings can change slightly from one bike to the next. This is down to shock length & leverage ratio along with the shock hardware bolt diameter. On average you should expect the following adjustment.

Pair of Offset Bushings

• 6mm bolt – 3mm offset | 1.5° HA | -15mm BB
• 8mm bolt – 2mm offset | 1.0° HA | -10mm BB
• 10mm bolt – 1mm offset |5° HA | -5mm BB

Single Offset Bushing

• 6mm bolt - 3mm offset | 0.75° | -7.5mm BB
• 8mm bolt -2mm offset | 0.5° | -5mm BB
• 10mm bolt - 1mm offset | 0.25° | -2.5mm BB

Whether you have an Intense or an older Lapierre which use 6mm bolts, or a recent Commencal which use 10mm bolts, you’ll notice a significant improvement to your bikes handling after installation.

Frames with 8mm bolts are the most common - these are commonly used by Specialized, Orange, Santa Cruz & many others. 

We produce hardware for all shock types

Including but not limited to;  RockShox, Fox, Cane Creek, Manitou, DVO, Extreme Shox, X-Fusion, BOS & 5^th Element. We produce shock bushings in 12.7mm diameter (industry standard) only. Please note that older Manitou and BOS shocks use 12mm diameter bushings and are not compatible. Please see our Supported bikes page for more info.

If you have any questions, please do get in touch. We aim to reply within a couple of hours.

Mountain Bike Rider produced a video all about MTB geometry and have a section explaining how Offset Bushings work, you can check it out below from the 2:30 mark.