Soldato
Took the trip up to Maxton suspension today, its being booked in for a while. What with the TT then my holiday I've had to wait for quite a while for them to be able to fit me in. Found it with the aid of my newly fitted sat nav, good job as well as its in the middle of nowhere, no way I would have found it otherwise. The aim was to try and get them to setup my bikes standard equipment as best they can before I go down what I know is a pretty expensive upgrade path. I felt the bike wasn't steering quick enough and it was kicking me out of the saddle at the slightest bump.
Richard spent the best part of 2 hours measuring all the current settings then making tweaks here and there. Couldn't make all the changes he wanted because the rose joints on the rear suspension ride height linkage were rusted solid (the thing has never seen a wet day in its life) so could only up the ride height a few mm. He did point out before he started that they don't normally do this kind of work because standard suspension pretty much is what it is. And more often than not you are just improving one issue but making something else worse. It's all a game of compromise. There was far too much static sag and the forks were far too stiff.
Initial impressions on the ride home are that the bike seems a lot more balanced and composed. it's still firm but handles the bumps a lot better, braking also seems improved now the front forks are working better. I will take it out for a better test over the next few days but it seems like a noticeable improvement over how it was. I still think that I am going to have to through some money at it to get all my gripes with the bike fixed.
They can do a rebuild of the forks with new springs and re-valve them for around £300. For the rear I have a couple of choices, new spring and re-valve the standard shock for around £170 or whole new rear shock which theirs starts around £550. Will prob get them to do the forks around October and look around the bay for a nice WP or Ohlin's rear shock in the meantime.
Richard spent the best part of 2 hours measuring all the current settings then making tweaks here and there. Couldn't make all the changes he wanted because the rose joints on the rear suspension ride height linkage were rusted solid (the thing has never seen a wet day in its life) so could only up the ride height a few mm. He did point out before he started that they don't normally do this kind of work because standard suspension pretty much is what it is. And more often than not you are just improving one issue but making something else worse. It's all a game of compromise. There was far too much static sag and the forks were far too stiff.
Initial impressions on the ride home are that the bike seems a lot more balanced and composed. it's still firm but handles the bumps a lot better, braking also seems improved now the front forks are working better. I will take it out for a better test over the next few days but it seems like a noticeable improvement over how it was. I still think that I am going to have to through some money at it to get all my gripes with the bike fixed.
They can do a rebuild of the forks with new springs and re-valve them for around £300. For the rear I have a couple of choices, new spring and re-valve the standard shock for around £170 or whole new rear shock which theirs starts around £550. Will prob get them to do the forks around October and look around the bay for a nice WP or Ohlin's rear shock in the meantime.
