RockShox Super Deluxe Coil RCT Rear Shock: Rider Review

If your thinking about switching to a coil rear shock, the Rockshox Super Delux Coil RCT is definitely worth looking at. With the ability to fine-tune your compression and rebound settings, riders can dial in their bike with ease. In this review, our customer swaps out his air shock for a coil and shares his thoughts on the process. Check it out!

Overview:

There’s no doubt that the RockShox Super Deluxe RC3 air is one of the best air sprung shocks on the market. With that being the spec’d shock on my 2017 Rocky Mountain Slayer, it’s arguable that an upgrade might not be necessary. The air version comes with 3 compression settings, enough clicks of rebound to make any rider happy, and the ability to adjust air volume via spacers. After finding this video by suspension whiz Andrextr, I got the idea that a coil shock on this very progressive bike (53%) might be the golden ticket. The issue: at the time, an aftermarket coil shock wasn’t readily available for the Slayer. Worldwide Cyclery had a Super Deluxe Coil RCT tuned for a Transition Patrol, which happened to share eye to eye and stroke measurements. The next step was hunting down the defacto tune for the Patrol vs Slayer, in which the Patrol is tuned with a bit more compression than Slayer, but well within the realm of what I’d be comfortable running. I went ahead and ordered up the Super Deluxe Coil RCT from Worldwide Cyclery.

Set Up:

Being 5’ 11” and 175lbs, I initially ran a 450lb spring on my size large Slayer. Soon after I switched to a 400lb spring which seemed to hit the sweet spot for gnarlier and more tech trails around Moab. Around Jackson, WY I switched back to the 450 which seemed to be advantageous on the jump lines. Also, to actually run the shock on the Slayer, you will need a couple pieces of custom hardware which were pretty easy to come by. Currently, we are running the shock with 1 click of rebound, and 4 clicks low-speed compression. I also keep the Slayer in slackest of its four modes.

Performance:

As mentioned, the Super Deluxe Air RC3 is a great shock to begin with. After switching to the coil, the immediate gain is predictability and traction of the rear end. To follow, I installed a Vorsprung Luftkappe in our Lyrik up front which matches the personality of the coil perfectly. The lockout switch is a huge bonus on the coil as well, as the Slayer isn’t exactly a mountain goat on the climbs to start. The coil handles jumps great, but the biggest gains were found after a few days in Moab. The steeper and gnarlier the trail, the more confidence I had in my suspension.

Photo by Katie Lozancich

Final Thoughts:

The Super Deluxe Coil is the icing on the cake. Yeah, the air version is amazing, but the coil took the Slayer to the next level. The combination of progressive design, slack geometry, and metric sizing led me to the Super Deluxe Coil, and it’s been worth its weight in gold. Yeah, you can spend your $$ on lighter drivetrain parts or more powerful brakes, but this upgrade directly reflected in the amount of fun I had on the bike.