# 888 oil levels



## Lelandjt (Feb 22, 2008)

How much oil do I put in the damper (left) leg of a 2008 888 RC3? Marzocchi says 310mm, but measured how?

Edit: It only says 310 but now I''m thinking that's ml, not mm like I assumed at first.


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## essenmeinstuff (Sep 4, 2007)

hmmm 310ml sounds like a lot, my 07 888 RC2x takes 220ml a side, I'd be surprised if your's needed 1.5X the oil...


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## sodpoodle (Sep 20, 2007)

I recently went through this too. I started out putting 310ml in and found I only got about 6 inches of travel. I ended up removing removing oil in 30ml increments until I got full travel again.. Which was around 220ml left in the tube. I'm on a 08 888 RC3 btw.


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## Guest (Jun 22, 2010)

its 310ml per leg with a fully empty damper.


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## sodpoodle (Sep 20, 2007)

Ah that's probably what I did wrong then. I just pushed the tube stanchion down and poured out what would come out, then refilled. I guess I should have taken the whole thing apart and cycled it or something?


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## essenmeinstuff (Sep 4, 2007)

sixsixtysix said:


> its 310ml per leg with a fully empty damper.


heh call me surprised then :thumbsup:


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## keen (Jan 13, 2004)

I ALWAYS call Marz. for oil level spec's. Publised spec's are rubbish.


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## Pau11y (Oct 15, 2004)

FYI, when I had my '08 back to Marz for lowers/bushing replacement to '10, one of their techs told me the new ('10) 888 takes something REALLY small... like 80cc? This was a part of the response I got back when I asked about only getting 6" of travel, same situation as sodpoodle. He told me you can safely run as little as something like 150cc per side to get the fork more linear. So, we settled on 200cc a side to get more usable travel. At this level, with a white spring (K=6.5) and my weight of ~ 195 w/ armor, I'm able to get full travel at high speed g-outs.
For terrain reference, my home resort is Trestle.


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## Guest (Jun 22, 2010)

sodpoodle said:


> Ah that's probably what I did wrong then. I just pushed the tube stanchion down and poured out what would come out, then refilled. I guess I should have taken the whole thing apart and cycled it or something?


Yeah, always need to cycle the damper to get all the oil out.

I did at least a dozen oil changes on my 08 888 when I had it (Mostly every time I had to replace the lowers...) so I am sure its 310ml per leg. I used to get full travel with no problem.


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## Lelandjt (Feb 22, 2008)

Thanks for all the suggestions. I added 300-310ml and the legs was completely empty. If I don't get full travel I'll take some out.
As for the comment about the 2010 taking much less oil, is that a closed cartridge damper so the 80ml is just for lubing the bushings?


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## Pau11y (Oct 15, 2004)

Lelandjt said:


> Thanks for all the suggestions. I added 300-310ml and the legs was completely empty. If I don't get full travel I'll take some out.
> As for the comment about the 2010 taking much less oil, is that a closed cartridge damper so the 80ml is just for lubing the bushings?


The 888s are all open bath. I'm not sure how the fork works w/ so little oil. I don't think that's even enough to fill the damper cartridge. Anyway, the 200cc in my legs... the fork is behaving great! Can't wait till Avy gets the 888 cart. into production!


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## blender (Oct 28, 2005)

i routinely refresh the oil in my 888 RC3
after carefully emptying the damper of all oil, i use 300cc's of Motorex 7.5wt

the results have been stellar.


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## Lelandjt (Feb 22, 2008)

I also removed the o-ring from the RC3 volume adjuster, thereby increasing the air volume of the damper leg and simplifying damper "burping"

This all came about because I was swapping in 2010 EVO butted stanchions. My 2008 888 ATA now weighs 6.5lbs with axle, crowns, and star nut. That's .1lbs better than the EVO Ti's claimed weight.


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## SHIVER ME TIMBERS (Jan 12, 2004)

I think the best way to do a fork is this

take everything apart and pull springs out....measure how far down oil is with a zip tie...mark it....dump out all oil and cycle fork a few times to get extra oil out....put a little oil in and cycle through and then drain that oil out while cycling...put in about half the oil and cycle out all air bubbles in cartridge....fill to zip tie and all done....I don't measure oil any other way....also add a cap full of oil if you are bottoming out a lot or take a capfull away if you want it more plush and you are not bottoming out stuff


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## watermoccasin (Jan 28, 2004)

08+ 66 and 888 forks have the open bath damper in one leg and spring in the other. The damper side needs the full amount of oil (888 185mm from the top, 66 65mm, fork and damper rod fully compressed), and the spring side only needs a small amount of oil to keep the bushings and seals lubricated.


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## roku (Sep 24, 2007)

I measure my oil as distance in mm from the top of the stanchion to the surface of the oil with the fork fully compressed. I think the factory level in an 08 888 RC3 is 210mm from the top. I rode this for a long time before switching to the soft spring. I eventually bumped the level to 175mm from the top to combat excessive bottoming and it seems to work nicely, though I've thought about adding more as I have clanged the fork recently landing to flat.


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## beaupre716 (May 22, 2009)

watermoccasin said:


> 08+ 66 and 888 forks have the open bath damper in one leg and spring in the other. The damper side needs the full amount of oil (888 185mm from the top, 66 65mm, fork and damper rod fully compressed), and the spring side only needs a small amount of oil to keep the bushings and seals lubricated.


Which side is the damper side on the 888?


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## roku (Sep 24, 2007)

If you're sitting on the bike, it'd be the left one with the rebound and compression adjustments on it.


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## BIGHaroHucker (Sep 9, 2008)

essenmeinstuff said:


> heh call me surprised then :thumbsup:


Ummm...you shouldn't be surprised, cuz I am pretty sure he is wrong...I just called marzocchi last week cuz I was doing an oil change on my 888RC, they said 210-220cc/ml. CC or mL are the same. He said for a heavier rider you want the 220cc because it ramps up faster and is more progressive, where the lower 210cc is more linear in the way it ramps up.


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## beaupre716 (May 22, 2009)

roku said:


> If you're sitting on the bike, it'd be the left one with the rebound and compression adjustments on it.


Thanks for the reply, but mine is an '09 RCV, which has compression on the right and rebound on the left. I ask because my compression adjuster has always had a very slight leak and I figured it'd be useful to know roughly how much oil is in there to begin with.


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## Lelandjt (Feb 22, 2008)

Totally different damper than the RC3 this thread is about. Marzocchi's site says 310ml in both legs of your fork. From my experience I'd recommend 290ml though to get full travel.


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## BIGHaroHucker (Sep 9, 2008)

Ok my bad. I didnt see that it was an RC3 rather than an RC.


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## beaupre716 (May 22, 2009)

Lelandjt said:


> Totally different damper than the RC3 this thread is about. Marzocchi's site says 310ml in both legs of your fork. From my experience I'd recommend 290ml though to get full travel.


Thanks. I tried hunting around the Marz site and came up with very little info, so that's good to know.


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## Pedal Shop (Dec 14, 2006)

I like the topic...makes me chuckle

for years we'd get 888's both "after market" and "OE" -- a good estimate, at least 80% of them had not enough or no oil in them right out of the box. Quality control on them was dreadful. Soooo many of them has issues right from the get go. far too often when we had to send them back to Marzocchi, they were returned (weeks later) in the same or worse condition. It got to the point, I didn't even want to sell them anymore. Fox and Rock Shox didn't have a perfect record either but Zoke took the cake for being the most often and the slowest turn around when it came to warranty.


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