PNW Rainier Dropper Issue

I fired off a message to PNW, but with the long weekend I likely won't hear back until Tuesday-Wednesday. I figured I'd ask here in case there was an easy fix and I could use it this weekend.

PNW Rainier Gen 3 dropper. Been used ~3 months. Worked great until today. Wouldn't stay up with weight on it or stay down without weight on it. Cable wasn't tensioned. I made my way down towards the trailhead. At some point the post would extend fully and only lower to 70% height with my weight on it. If I put it all the way down it would raise on its own to full extension. This worked out great as I rode to the trails and wasn't stoked for 15kms of pavement with a slammed dropper! 70% extension was reasonable.

Got home. Took dropper out of bike. Removed cable. Activated trigger mechanism. Lowered dropper fully. Left it on my workbench and it extended fully on its own.

Trigger mechanism looks to be returning to its rest position. Air pressure is whatever was stock when I got it. It didn't go up particularly fast so I assume it's not over pressurized.

Any thoughts?

No thoughts Vik, but PNW has been exceptional to deal with any time I’ve had a chance.

Posted by: mrbrett

No thoughts Vik, but PNW has been exceptional to deal with any time I’ve had a chance.

Thanks. I'm sure they'll help get it fixed. On the brightside now I've got motivation to sort out the brakes on my SS hardtail! I've had the parts for a week and been too lazy to install them.

Necessity is the mother of brake bleeds.

Seems to me like something's sticking inside, Vik, assume that you've at least gone and done a basic tear down to see if anything's sticking and a clean and re-lube, right  PNW basic lube service

No I haven't done anything to the post. I did look at the PNW site under service and FAQs to see if this was a common issue that had rote solution posted. I didn't find anything. I'm not much of a tinkerer. I like riding bikes not tearing stuff down and tweaking it. So I figured I'll wait until PNW gets back to me with some suggestions. If they say my problem is usually caused by X, Y & Z that can be fixed by a tear down & basic clean/lube that's great I'll get on it. If they send me a new cartridge I'll just throw it in and get on with life.

I had a pile of brake parts [new rotors/pads] for my SS HT sitting on the workbench so I used the situation to motivate myself to get those parts installed and my brakes adjusted/bedded in. Took the SS bike out for a ride yesterday and it put a smile on my face so I'm glad I did that.

Bottom line I am lazy and I'll just wait until I have a high probability success plan of attack from PNW before I take action on the dropper. If I only had one MTB and this problem would lead to a week+ off the bike I'd take some more aggressive action.

Well Vik, you're the complete opposite of me, I love to tinker, pretty much as much as I like to ride my bike. Since the tear down and service are such an easy and quick thing, I'd have just done it to see if it worked instead of waiting on a response from PNW, wouldn't have done any harm, hence why I recommended it. Guess maybe I'm that way because unlike you guys in continental America or Europe, we don't have easy or quick access to anything, not without spending a boat load in courier services, so we look to fix/service things ourselves and hence why while companies having great warranty service might be good, having products that don't it are even better.

Like I said if I couldn't ride at all I'd be more motivated to dig into the internals. If I can grab another bike to ride and then do what's actually required once PNW gets back to me vs. what might be a waste of time...that seems like a more optimal path in my mind, but we don't need to agree. This may be my first ever real dropper failure in 13 years so I don't feel hard done by on the reliability front.

I had a fun ride on the SS bike today so switching up machines wasn't a big deal.

Posted by: Vikb

Like I said if I couldn't ride at all I'd be more motivated to dig into the internals. If I can grab another bike to ride and then do what's actually required once PNW gets back to me vs. what might be a waste of time...that seems like a more optimal path in my mind, but we don't need to agree. This may be my first ever real dropper failure in 13 years so I don't feel hard done by on the reliability front.

I had a fun ride on the SS bike today so switching up machines wasn't a big deal.

Hey man, wasn't saying your way isn't right or mine is right, just I enjoy going into stuff, which I'll normally do before seeking help from manufacturers unless it's something way above my knowledge base or possibility of figuring out - tinkering/figuring things out is one of my things as I said.

Glad got the brakes sorted and got the SS out, guess the dropper issue was a blessing in disguise to get you to do that :-D LOL

PNW customer service is exceptional. I asked a service question about my 3 year old dropper, and they shipped a brand new cartridge to me in a couple of days *for free*.  I think you are in good hands Vik.

Posted by: skooks

PNW customer service is exceptional. I asked a service question about my 3 year old dropper, and they shipped a brand new cartridge to me in a couple of days *for free*. I think you are in good hands Vik.

Yes I was sure they would sort it out. I just got an email from PNW. They are shipping me a fresh cartridge and bushing kit. US to Canada shipping being what it is that likely means I'll get the parts early next week. I've been getting soft on the geared HT anyways so some steady SS trail KMs this week will be good for me. ;-)

My previous CS interactions with them have been excellent as well.

Sorry to hijack the thread. I have a fox dropper from around 2020. It is sticky but no slop or extra movement. I think all it needs is to be lubed up. Anyone ever take one of these apart and do a basic clean and lube? Easy job?

Posted by: RAHrider

Sorry to hijack the thread. I have a fox dropper from around 2020. It is sticky but no slop or extra movement. I think all it needs is to be lubed up. Anyone ever take one of these apart and do a basic clean and lube? Easy job?

Well now, I think you're taking the mickey out of us, a Fox post with no slop, that's been used for 2 years :-\ They come fresh out the box with play, as do most all other brands posts, with the exception of 9point8, in my experience. 

Anyways, to answer your question, never taken one fully apart, but did just loosen the collar and give it a wipe out and add new grease to it and it helped some. Make sure you're letting all the air out of the post first before you go removing the collar though, just FYI ;-)