Review: Fox Float X2 - Shock Week 2023
Fox Float X2
The Float X2 has been a staple of downhill-oriented mountain biking for the past few years, setting a high bar of performance and adjustability in a premium package. Fox has a massive catalog of tunes, fitments, and spec levels to suit a wide variety of riders and bikes, with the X2 sitting at the top of their stack when it comes to downhill prowess in an air shock. But with a colored history when it comes to reliability, and with the new crop of high-end air shocks hitting the market, can the X2 defend its position?
Float X2 Details
• 2-position Open/Firm lever
• High-speed compression - 8 clicks
• Low-speed compression - 16 clicks
• High-speed rebound (w/VVC) - 8 clicks
• Low-speed rebound - 16 clicks
• Weight: 730 grams
• Price: $699 USD
• ridefox.com
• 2-position Open/Firm lever
• High-speed compression - 8 clicks
• Low-speed compression - 16 clicks
• High-speed rebound (w/VVC) - 8 clicks
• Low-speed rebound - 16 clicks
• Weight: 730 grams
• Price: $699 USD
• ridefox.com
Setup
The Float X2's colorful dials and numerous clicks can be a bit daunting for users with limited experience setting up a shock, but then again maybe those infinite combinations of settings are what you need to eke out that last bit of performance gain. Like any suspension item you can get things honed in fairly quickly by bracketing your settings on a repeatable track, which is what we did on the Nomad in order to get our shock feeling dialed.
We were aiming for about 18-20mm of sag on the Nomad, which for my riding weight of about 180 lb resulted in 210 psi in the air can. Counting from closed, my clicker positions were as follows: LSC: 13, HSC: 7, LSR: 11, HSR: 5. These are all either the same or very close to the Santa Cruz recommended settings for my weight, which speaks to their ability to hone in on a solid baseline for most riders. I ran the rebound a little bit faster on our test tracks for better grip on the chattery roots and loose corners.
Climbing
I rarely found myself reaching for the Firm switch on the X2, one because the Nomad pedals quite nicely with the shock open, and two because the Firm switch doesn't provide a drastic change over the Open mode. Essentially the switch firms up your low-speed compression, making the shock move a bit less under shifts in weight and smooth undulations. You can feel the difference, but for me it's easier to forget it's there and cope with the perhaps slightly bobbier-feeling suspension with things open. Little bumps are absorbed well, and the grip the X2 provides makes steeper, looser sections that much easier.
Descending
This is what the X2 is meant for, and boy does it do it well. The feel of the shock is quite fluttery, without feeling like you're using too much of the travel to gain that ease of movement. That sensitivity is what shock designers are after when trying to rival the performance of coil springs, though just about any air shock is going to have a slight bit more breakaway force than a coil, due to the inherent stiction in an air spring. The X2 has the widest and most finely-positioned range of adjustment of all the shocks on test, to the degree that it might be daunting to some less experienced owners.
That said, the control that range of adjustment offers is part of what makes the X2 shine - particularly the high-speed rebound control. As an external adjustment, this is unique to Fox's shocks, and can be key to controlling the shock's movement deep in travel and on sequential square-edged hits. When the HSR is dialed in, it feels like the shock can recover perfectly from a series of hits, without getting packed in or pushing you up in the travel.
No one adjustment or feature is going to make or break your ride, but if you're after one of the most adjustable shocks on the market, the X2 remains a strong contender. The smooth and sensitive action provides excellent traction, while the support and damping range can be set to suit your frame and ride preference.
Durability
This is going to be a standalone category for the X2, simply because it's an endemic issue worth touching on. The Float X2 has been plagued by frequent durability issues that don't seem to affect other shocks quite as often. Fox has made a host of changes for the 2024 product, most of which are focused on longevity, so hopefully that mixed past can be left in the rearview. I reached out to Fox for comment on this issue, and received this response:
 | With Float X2, and all of our products, we are constantly progressing and updating them. These efforts aren’t model year specific, but we’ve been working diligently and have rolled out improvements over the last year. Our racers have been on the updated X2 all season and we’ve been winning on them. Furthermore, feedback from riders who have received the updated shocks aligns with these positive results, and that has resonated in the forums. |
Pros
+ Very sensitive stroke
+ Highly adjustable compression and rebound, many clicks
+ Smooth and composed when set up well
Cons
- Poor durability, frame-depending
- Perhaps too many clicker positions for noobs
- Firm lever is a subtle change
Stay tuned for more Shock Week content, including a roundtable discussion of all the air shocks we tested.
Author Info:
Member since Dec 25, 2016
Must Read This Week
This fact alone is a huge factor when choosing any brand... After sales support. Unfortunately this is driven by the people who rub the area, so I'm certain some people may have not had the greatest experience when dealing with a brand.
Too little too late IMO, they've been shitty for way too long for me to touch one again.
Just curious, is your X2 trunnion?
I have never had it leak air or oil .
So I count my self very fortunate and would not hesitate to purchase again.
This guy who thinks that he rides so much harder than anyone else, this guy who feels the need to lift himself up by standing on others?
Be better, dont be this guy!
Seemed like an appropriate comment to me
"we are constantly looking at our products, and making changes as we feel are necessary, not year specific, meaning we are making mid year changes to address issues that we might be having."
That really seems like the best way to deal with what be considered a failure prone item
What does "admitting to fault" do that providing warranty, and making improvements doesnt cover?
In reality, the vast majority prolly dont have any issue with the current X2. I have one, from 2020, has been faultless. I understand its a "premium" product, and I treat it as such (it gets regular services, and rebuilt annually).
I'm not insinuating that others havent had issues, and those issues arent valid, but I'm willing to bet its a vocal minority, and other people just want to jump on the complain train with them
This is customer service/retention 101. If I f*ck up at my work I explain what went wrong, how it went wrong, why it went wrong, and where fault lies. We are then able to fix the issue when we fully understand it. This almost comes off as Fox having no idea and just doing a bunch of stuff until it's miraculously resolved. It does not come off as a competent solution.
The problems have been wide spread to the point where float x2 shocks hold almost half the value of a dhx2 second hand. I got mine in mid 2021 and it lasted 3 rides before having problems. Then about the same amount of time again after the first warranty fix. It has sat un used and is in for warranty again now for the proper 'fix'.
They could have come out with a statement early on saying there have been problems and they are working on a solution. Ohlins did that when there were quality issues with their product a few years ago.
The fact that issues weren't identified in the fox shocks and sorted before going to the public really surprises me. Especially considering issues start showing so quickly.
And that is has taken them 2+ years to come up with a fix is not great.
www.mtbr.com/threads/fox-x2-dhx2-base-valves.1190514/page-3#post-15475486
This guy isn't speculating, he measured it with a shock dyno.
Bottom line, the valving in these shocks is so bizarrely off the charts of anything you could possibly want them to do, they produce enough hydraulic pressure on bumps to blow their own seals.
In total I’ve probably had at least a dozen fox shocks and maybe the same number of fox forks in the last 10 years and the 2022/23 batch were the only ones that failed before seeing some significant abuse, and the 2019-21 era forks had some csu creaks. My rockshox experience has been very similar with the early vivids failing and just as many creaky csu’s. So big picture, I’m still a happy fox customer.
Haven't had my 2024 for long, but it does feel nice. And no gurgle so far, fingers crossed.
Right in my omment I state that I have a 2020 X2, its right there, third line.
second, I acknoledged that their are clearly some issues with some of the most recent X2's, 5th line of my comment.
its this kind of commenting that leads to viral rumours, and such regarding qc and problems with products.
I have several riding buddies on current X2's, no warranty issues at all, both trunion and regular, on bikes with shock extenders, some with short links, etc.
Now, my experiences are anecdotal, as are yours, but I sympathize with the struggles you had with your shock.
Fox could have done a lot of things, and ultimately, their might be several issues, that are out of their hands (partially manufacturing, design, engineering, etc) Fox doesnt do everything. They could have been working on multiple fronts to find solutions, and as appears with the 24 model year, theyre likely going to let the customer test it out (no amount of in house testing can find faults like 200lb gorillas ignoring maintenance, poor setup, riding with 50% sag, etc)
Theres so many other great shocks out there, I just find the bitching all a bit dull already. Go buy a RS SDU, youll be just fine
I'm sure you read the the "shock week" article where they just asked the manufacturers what is the biggest trap in shock set up, I think all noted "sag", and alluded to a lack of proper setup.
I have worked in the industry for about 25ish years now, and I can confidently say over half of the bikes that I've worked on, are incorrectly set up suspension wise for the riders.
Now, youre gonna cry out that not you, never you!
And sure maybe not, but theres a good possibility youre among those who likely isnt riding around with a properly set up bike.
How does a manufacturer "test:" for that? How do they provide a "fix" for that? How do they provide a premium product, that was initially designed for race bikes, and teams to perform at the highest level, and put it in the hands of 200lb gorillas with all the dexterity of wooden hammers?
I'm willing to bet that there were several problems that needed to be addressed, some of which were likely out of their hands, or they thought the issues was in assembly, but turned out to be shitty tolerances, or poor setup, or too much grease, or not enough grease, or any myriad of problems that could have gone wrong.
Feel free to sit on that high horse, no one can stop you. Fox doesnt owe anyone anything, they will continue to sell their premium products, and people will continue to buy em. Theyre prolly not fussed too much if you dont buy a shock from them again.
Am I missing something, because it seems you are referring to yourself?
you see its more than likely a separate contractor that manufactures, based on drawings from Fox. Theyd be looking for a certain set of QC results, and be expecting their contractor to deliver. The manufacturer has its own challenges as well, assuming that the raw materials they are getting are what is spec'd, but sometimes that can all go wrong, whether on purpose (a company providing a lesser material in an attempt to increase profits) or simply a mistake.
As far as design and engineering, maybe youll be surprised to know that its not always all done in house, sometimes theres many different people involved, from different companies, who are working on a project collaboratively.
I feel like theres more than one issue surrounding the X2, so theres a lot of work to do to rectify all those issues. Then by "solving" one, then might have just gone and created another.
the trunion shocks that were hairline cracking for instance, they could have produced tens of thousands of those units (again, Fox isnt casting these in house) but theyre paid for, and delivered to an assembly plant (again, prolly not Fox themselves) theyd have so many of these built and in the hands of people before youd find problems that it could be catastrophic. It might have just been an impurity in a single batch, or poor materials, or, well lots of reasons.
then the puking oil, easily an out of round on either the casting, on the shaft, or poor seals, or an assembly process thats not quite right, or an assembly process by two individuals, out of twenty that might be doing the actual assembly, those are hard issues to find.
the squelching, and aspirated oil, again, could be manufacturing, could be design, engineering, or assembly, hell it could be all of them.
You ever hear that story about the phantom of Heilbronn, only to find out years later it was contaminated swabs from the factory?
We aint perfect, thats part of our charm
Or it could be value engineering that went wild, and its all frigged up.
I guess my point is, it could be a lot of different things, and sometimes it could be things that are both out of Foxs immediate control, or they arent entirely sure what the problems are. Its real easy for us to sit behind our keyboards and criticize, and relay what we would have done to rectify the situation, but in reality, we have no idea.
I'm willing to bet that Fox didnt account for how popular the X2 was going to become, and designed and tested a shock to meet certain requirements, that the general public just didnt follow through on.
Every coaching session I do, I spend time setting up suspension for people, these are experienced riders, new riders, all sorts of riders, and I'm amazed how many dont know, cant be bothered about it.
When the speeds go up, and the terrain becomes more techy, having a dialed setup becomes more important.
I have buddies that obsess about bikes/tech, and have no idea how to set up the fancy stuff they ride. sorting that out takes time and research, buying it just takes money
Are you legitimately blind or just being a c*nt for the sake of it? I absolutely have tons up on this site...
I probably should have been more to the point, because I didn't really care about your photos anyway - You appear to think people who shred must also be obligated to self promote and narcissistically flood the internet with photos of their riding, and then make assumptions and judge others - There are plenty of people who are very skilled riders that don't have a single photo on PB. I just found your comment to reek of narcissism, and didn't find it relevant or accurate. Thus I went trying to dispute your reputability. Now we can all confirm you ride at least.
That's what they are already doing anyway and it would go a long way in showing people they can be confident in their product.
Every iteration a support rep at Fox would repeat “we fixed it this time”. I don’t believe they care or that the OEM buyers have exerted any pressure on them (the unit cost is so low). I wouldn’t be surprised if Fox runs a 25% fail rate at their scale.
I finally gave up on them and have EXT on every bike.
But keep in mind, seals do not often carry cash.
Ps: I own an arma that has been in their shop already twice.
I let my bud set it up properly with his dyno, now it works really well. But any shock would run as that one after my bud sets it up.
My main reason to use air instead of coil is the progressivity. I might test a superdeluxe coil with those progressive springs.
I have a question for after market shocks.
What about bike specific tunes.
How do I buy an off the shelf shock and make it work for my/any bike?
Which manufactures have enough adjustability that I do not need to get it tuned?
www.sram.com/globalassets/document-hierarchy/tuning-manuals/rockshox-rear-shock-piston-tuning-guide.pdf
You can buy generic Rockshocks shim kits that are shock specific to allow you to build your custom tune or a manufacturers specific tune. If you are able to do your own full Rockshock service at home (including the damper) then you can actually do your own tuning.
I bought an X2 for my old bike, as an aftermarket shock. If the shock has high and low speed compression and dampening ( my X2 did), the simple answer is you don’t need to have it tuned for your bike. The dials will let you adjust( tune it) anyway you like.
On the aftermarket shocks with fewer dials, you can always have it tuned for your bike by a suspension service or by the manufacturer of the shock when you send it in for a rebuild/ service.
That means a High, Medium or Low compression tune and same for rebound. So potentially there are 9 preset tunes that RS/Fox etc offer, but really, 90% come with a Low Compression and Medium Rebound tune.
But it's definitely a bit of a stretch to call it "custom"
The damper service tools would be the sticking point. good to know if exists.
This is absurdly wrong.
The tuning is what gives your adjusters the correct range to be meaningful.
If you don't have the correct shock tune, literally every setting will be useless to you. It can even make your climb switch too firm or too soft. You can't fix a bad base valve tune with your adjusters.
If you bought a second hand or aftermarket shock and didn't have it tuned and didn't have a big issue with it, you just got lucky and didn't know it.
For example, for the X2 which is the shock in question, here is the link:
www.ridefox.com/fox17/help.php?m=bike&id=1071
Check under "damping, rebound, compression" and that would give you around 600 different possible combinations and you still haven't played with volume spacers yet...
I guess you must know more than the manufacturer of the bike, whom I talked to before I did it. It’s not luck, it’s called research…
Option 1 is that I am wrong. I made a fake web page with total nonsense just so I could win a comment thread point against a random stranger. I sent people to look at the fake web page because I thought it would be funny.
Option 2 is that the manufacturer of your bike was giving you bogus information, you would then need to question the legitimacy of your sources. Small manufacturers don't have the pull to get custom valving, so maybe they want you to think that using off the shelf tunes is the only possible standard....so you will buy their product...
Now you claim to know more than the bike companies, and the bike shop staff that agreed with getting the aftermarket shock , even though they don’t even sell it.
For the record you’re wrong again, this small manufacturer even created their own custom tune…
Your mileage may vary…
LOL. I rest my case. Custom tunes do exist.
Tuning isn't just the same exact pyrimidal shim stack damper made heavier and lighter. For future reading you can look up digressive/linear and progressive valving, preloading, valve bleed... And also, you can look into the idea of hysteresis. There are multiple dimensions going on...
Feels amazing when it works. That sensation lasts a very short time.
You need.
1 a spare shock you rotate as warranty service is done.
2. A spare bike for the same reason.
3. Lots of patience to endure 1&2
4. No desire for a problem free life.
No amount of money would make me run one again.
The shock failed out of the box on a brand new frame. Every "fix" didn't work, the replacement didn't work, every fix on the replacement didn't work.
I probably got 3 rides from one tops before losing air and it squelching.
Replaced again and lost patience with it.
How a class action lawsuit hasn't started yet I don't know.
Sure, the 2024 model is to be trusted. Never again.
My 2022 X2 on a Spire blew up randomly one day. I can at least thank Fox for getting me on the Eleven6 with the X2 as my (tenuous) spare when the Push is in for service.
What a joke. The only likely reason Fox won't tell the public WHAT was actually wrong with the X2 is the inevitable class-action lawsuit for continuing to sell a product that is "fixed this time, we pinky promise swear." Meanwhile, they're still forcing unfortunate customers to shell out hefty shipping costs and priceless bike downtime due to their incompetence.
Fox needs to do the right thing and come clean. What was wrong with the X2? And will you replace every defective shock? I won't hold my breath.
So far so good, it’s been stable and reliable a few months in. My only gripe is that I don’t ride as much as others, and Fox would only offer 6 months warranty on the services for the old X2. Which meant that it would always fail just outside of the warranty period.
Every. Damn. Time.
What recent events have done is put may riders off fox for life as a brand. Their reputation is tainted for many many years to come.
Fox +Shimano EP8 e bike must be everyone's dream...
My shop even stipulated on my receipt that the failure is due to the factory’s crap tolerances.
For more details and service booking at the Fox Factory UK service centre in Woking, contact UKService@ridefox.com or call 0204 5863775
Bike biz post
www.google.com/amp/s/bikebiz.com/fox-factory-uk-to-open-service-centre-in-woking
"Providing you are within the 2 year warranty and have the original bike/shock receipt we will replace the shock with a new MY2024 unit. Should you not have the original receipt, or out of warranty then we can offer a service where we will update the internals to MY2024."
I ll never buy a fox product any more, this commercial attitudes are not normal. It a design problem they are suppose to solve it under warranty, it wasn t the case.
I ve moved for an EXT and man this is a shock with perfect reliability.
As-is, it'll be years before the X2 is considered reliable even if their fail rate drops to zero today. Combine that and overgreased air shafts on forks (need a teardown out of the box) and the QC seems pretty dismal for Fox's bike division.
Well I guess we already know Cane Creek doesn't get reviewed this week
It’s surprising that a big company can have design problems and not iton them out during the R & D process.
If I was Fox, I’d think real hard about how to improve their image, the above comments don’t bode well for keeping customers coming back.
But then, perhaps image sells, and who cares about mountain biking anyhow?
There are a lot of difference in behavior.
Maybe you have the fox id or the rock shox series number?
And thanks a lot it’s cool to read these kind of test.
Am I the only one who thinks 7 clicks out from closed at the HSC should be more like 4 and finer steps between what is now 8 clicks and 7 clicks?