Cutting Edge: ATV Technology Profile- Fox Cactus Cooler

ATV’s have cooling systems to keep engine temperatures in check, and we have cooling systems to keep our body temperatures in check. Fox Racing Shox thinks its about time for our suspension to get some additional cooling too.

Calling it the “ECS” (External Cooling System), Fox has created the codename Cactus Cooler as an option on all new and existing FOX bypass shocks. The technology works on a very simple premise: Pounding through rough terrain creates loads of friction within the moving parts of your suspension. Friction creates heat, which in turn thins out shock oil and compromises damping.

What the ECS does, in its simplest form, is it channels the hot and hard working fluid out of the enclosed shock body and through an air-cooled coil before sending it back into the shock; cool and refreshed as it were.

It works too: shock fluid temperatures  were up to 100 degrees cooler. What makes the system additionally attractive is the fact that the cactus cooler doesn’t reply upon pumps, fans or any mechanical complexity that could potentially fail in the heat of battle; it wisely reaps the benefits of the normal motion of the shock piston as it cycles up and down through the shock body to pump the fluid through bypass check valves and into the billet aluminum and stainless steel heat sink.

After excessive heat is allowed to escape into the atmosphere, the cooled fluid continues back to the shock completing the cycle thanks to the natural vacuum said piston creates. The faster the shock works, the more fluid is pumped through the cooling system.

So far the Cactus Cooler has been proving its worth in Trophy Truck competition but there is little doubt that Fox Racing Shox is developing scaled down variations of the hardware for ATV/ UTV use and we’re eagerly anticipating its arrival.