Pay Attention to your Suspension Air Pressure!

[Guest KitCarson]

Hey Goose.....one beer, I will say maybe......two okay.....three I will agree with anything you say. :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::sign20: You are right......so many variables.........no one correct answer. Kit

[hipshot]

Hey Goose.....one beer, I will say maybe......two okay.....three I will agree with anything you say. :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::sign20: You are right......so many variables.........no one correct answer. Kit

 

 

kit.

the way that you flip flop around, you should change your screen name to "flounder"!!!

just kidding!

just jt

[Guest KitCarson]

kit.

the way that you flip flop around, you should change your screen name to "flounder"!!!

just kidding!

just jt

I am in a mellow mood tonight.........stopped and got a bottle of brandy, rare for me.........so I will agree with anything today:sign20: Looke out tomorrow..........but there is some merit in adding air to the shocks.....I just do not overload my bike........all motels now have laundry machines........I use energy conserving oil in my bike........so I am always rested.......I ride a yamaha so do not fear breakdown much............and I love to laugh......Kit

[hipshot]

I am in a mellow mood tonight.........stopped and got a bottle of brandy, rare for me.........so I will agree with anything today:sign20: Looke out tomorrow..........but there is some merit in adding air to the shocks.....I just do not overload my bike........all motels now have laundry machines........I use energy conserving oil in my bike........so I am always rested.......I ride a yamaha so do not fear breakdown much............and I love to laugh......Kit

 

yessir! you are "one to ride the river with"!!!

my kind of person!

just jt

[LetHimRide]

Sorry, but I have to disagree with the crossover kit. A good idea but not built well. plastic barbs with plastic hose and a plastic sleave that slides over the hose to hold it onto the barb... I could not keep it from leaking! fluid seeping around the fitting would build up and end up on my gas tank and lower farings. I took it off and went back to trying to balance them out with the HD hand pump. My 2cents ... plastic is not the way to go when sealing up folk fluid under pressure.

[Guest KitCarson]

You know I looked at that cross-over kit.......I am a plumber by trade, and instantly saw problems with that plastic junk!! Not only that it most likely does not look too good.......if someone knew the metric size of the threads where the snifter valves are ........would be simple to install two threaded by compression ice-maker line size fittings......bend the copper neatly with a tubing bender and install a tee with a single snifter valve......could even carry the whole thing down to a chrome shop and have it chromed......no I saw that plastic line........instantly saw problems with that thing. Kit

[AZSpyder]

So far I haven’t tried air in the forks. I did find it could be important in the back. The lack of air I think is the reason I dropped it the first time with only 7 miles on the clock. No air is like to opposite of leveling links. Most of us know how raising the back with the links improves low speed handling. With no air and a load like the first time I had a passenger the back sags and it gets sluggish at low speeds, thus my first drop. I now have it down a ½ inch in the front and no air in the back for riding solo. With no air I get a little settle with my weight on it and an easier reach to the ground but have never bottomed it. Add a little settle and the ½ inch the front and it is still light enough slow and tracks good at high speed, for my taste anyway. With a passenger and light bags I have been running 25 to 35 pounds in the back. Just enough so I get a little settle when the passenger gets on but not enough to bottom.

 

With the front stock height and leveling links I found air in the back could really vary the handling. Normally I ran no air but with 25 or 30 pounds it was very light at low speeds. I didn’t care for the high speed tracking but it could really rip into a corner.

 

A second area to watch the pressure that I don’t see mentioned much is the back tire. The first coupe of times I had a passenger I couldn’t get the thing to stay on any line through a corner. Took me a bit to figure out it was the tire flexing. Set the pressure up for a passenger and no problem. Just the other day I tried a few extra pounds with a passenger then accidentally left it up and headed off to work. Had a chance to survive discovering the back didn’t have as much traction with too much pressure for one up. I locked it up a slid right through a red light. Luckily the cages with the green turn light saw me coming. Also accidentally did a burn out leaving one light and even had trouble getting it to hook up. That was pretty cool but I let some air out before heading home for sure.

 

Jerry

[TEW47]

Back in '80 I had a mechanic at work make a balance kit for my XS850G. It had compression fittings with a tee in the middle with a air valve in the tee. It had plastic tubing and never had a problem the 40k.

 

tew47

[Guest longtrain59]

Progressive Suspension Air Fork Balance Kit

 

I have used this kit on my 99 RSV since it was new. It has never failed and is the simplest way to maintain even pressure on the forks. Its fairly easy to install. 2-3 lbs in the front shocks improve rebound and make the tire stick to the pavement better therefore making the twisties much easier to navigate.

[Rick Butler]

Kent,

 

You are absolutely right that this discussion might be better suited on your patio over a beer. But then the rest of our friends on this forum would not be privy to any concrete results that would come out of it?

 

However I just remembered a good tech article I saw on the Sonic Springs site. In fact I used to think like you do about springs and preload until I started reading articles like this.

 

http://www.sonicsprings.com/catalog/preload_tech_article.php

 

Another good place to get information on topics like this is the Race-Tech site. I got involved with Race-Tech when a friend convinced me to install Cartridge Emulators in my 93 (which I'm running also in my 02).

 

http://www.racetech.com/SubMenu.asp?cMenu=4&c=Yes&cSubMenu=9&showPage=

 

Anyway you will see that spring rate is just what it is, the rate that a spring will compress (of which nothing will change that rate). And that the issue of Preload is nothing more than a technique of setting ride height. And this distance is the height of the bike with the bike's wet weight, you, your gear and anything else that is placed forward of you on the bike like a loaded tank bag. The procedure of properly setting this height is also called "setting the sag", which is nothing more than setting the attitude of the loaded bike so that it doesn't do anything unexpected while we are riding.

 

And most of us realize that we need to change something when the passenger starts complaining that the bike is bottoming out and it hurts. So now we stop and add some air in the rear shock so the bike doesn't settle as much and there is still some spring left to take up any bumps. The same in the front, where we notice that the front end is diving too much, bottoming out, or causing the bike to wallow in the turns. Adding air to the forks is less effective because of the volume, but it also causes the bike to settle less under these conditions.

 

And if you think about what is going on, you will realize that if we did the optimum change to our bikes, that each of us would have different spring rate on both the rear shock and the front springs (because of our varying weights). This is done more with racing bikes than street bikes like ours, but the principles are the same. That is if we want to get the same effect so that the bike handles better than it does off the show room floor.

 

Now it all boils down to economics as to how much we want to spend to effect this change, where most of us are probably satisfied with the bike as it is. But in my case I've never been satisfied with the characteristics of a stock bike, which is whey I tinker with changing these features (yeah brakes included) and learning as much as I can from others. This is why I'm running Race-Tech Cartridge Emulators and heavier (constant rate) springs in my forks and a rear Works Performance shock set for my weight and riding style. But I paid a premium for all of this, on top of the price of the bike. A friend decided to change out to an Olins rear shock (set for his weight) and a set of fork springs (set for his weight) on his 04 FJR and it cost him over $1,500. And that was after he did his homework on finding the best deal and doing all the work himself.

 

The bottom line with large touring bikes like what we ride, is that the manufactures cannot build a bike for each of us to accomodate all of our varying weights. So they come up with a compromise....air adjustable suspensions, so we can adjust for these different weights. It's not the best solution, but it's the best and most economical under the circumstances.

 

And Kent, no further than we live from each other, we need to get together, (I'd say more often, but we have never met once ) since we seem to share the same riding style and both like to tinker. And we seem to have partners that also like to ride (or passenger in my case). I also have a group of guys I ride with that is pretty diverse, where we have both touring and sport touring riders. (They are also the reason I bought a Ninja 650R for a play and track bike to learn more) And when it comes to riding, we spend alot of time in Arkansas and the Hill Country as well as all of the back FM roads up NE of Dallas (also the route to Oklahoma and Arakansas). In fact Stoutman came down to Kerrville year before last to hang with us. But that weekend was a little wet so he came back early.

 

I'd better stop here before I run Don out of server space. But in closing, I always remember what Oprah said once, "Knowledge is Power" and she's right for the most part.

 

Rick

[Rick Butler]

Gosh,

 

I'm really surprised that no one has replied to my last response on this issue. Maybe it was too confusing? But I wouldn't think so.

 

Rick

[Guest KitCarson]

The bottom line with large touring bikes like what we ride, is that the manufactures cannot build a bike for each of us to accomodate all of our varying weights. So they come up with a compromise....air adjustable suspensions, so we can adjust for these different weights. It's not the best solution, but it's the best and most economical under the circumstances

 

Okay Rick......I will talk to you!! Your above statement just about sums it up.

I am happy with the Ventures suspension, and use no air anywhere, but I do not overload the bike, I stay within the 400 pound payload it was designed to carry.......I love the low center of gravity......lower than a Harley with no air in the shocks.........I think you blew our minds!! We is Bikers not engineers!!

Good posts though.......lot of information........for the heavyweights....now did I just say that:rotfl::rotfl:Kit

[V7Goose]

You are right Rick, we do need to get together. I really don't know why it has not happened before. And sorry about not replying here soner - I just got out of the hospital after having an old plate removed from my leg (no internet access in there). It will be a while before I can ride, but I'll be around here.

Goose

[fishinjer]

Rick,

I don't totally understand everything, but alot of the stuff you have told me about my own bike, like the leveling links, and the smaller front tire have really made a difference in the handling of my bike. What I would really like is to have a maintenance day with you. I would even supply the AMSOIL gear lube for all of the bikes. Hope to see you soon.