With all the talk about fork re-springing/valving--I thought I would do a little experiment to quantify how "bad" they reallt are--I put a zip tie around the fork and slammed on the brakes at about 10mph--interesting--the things are bouncing off the bump stops from this little manuever, I weigh about 220lbs.

I have noticed the XX front end "skipping around a little on hard cornering" --now I know why-its bouncing off the bump stops--Yikes---revalving/springing the forks has now gone to priority 1. The only road crash(vs 4 track crashes in the last 18 mos) I have had for a while was on my 929, prior to fork/spring work---when I bottomed out, bent rim in a pothole in the apex of a corner---No need to repeat this.

Just thought others might want to check it out

Pretty well known, they suck. I always list it as the #1 mod to make to the bike immediately. Springs most of all, and then the revalve is a close second. You will love the improvements not only in handling hard riding, but in smoothness on rough pavement.

Alpha, you should try the same thing on a stock VTR to see just how bad the Honda setup is and why everyone claims the valving is so horrible. If you don't get thrown over the handlebars with the front dive due to lack of front spring then you end up like a hot-rod when the front hydraulic locks at the bottom of its travel.

All I've done is shim the stock fork springs with a PVC pipe piece. I set static sag at 1 1/2" front and rear. big improvement. I'm sure spending some money on the susp. would improve it but I have to go the cheap route. You know Pampers fund etc.

I agree. I did the Race Tech valves and springs. The difference is noticeable instantly. Along w/ VFR bars, and a Givi windscreen, it feels like a new bike. I think it is well worth the cash.

Lance

Doesnt have that much to do with valving, mostly too soft-springs---my 929 had similar issues--stock valves were re-worked, new springs, etc---it can now handle just about anything I can throw at it---

Carlos,

This is one job I have never tackled, but I am experiencing the same thing with the Bird. What is the approx. cost of a revalve and springs? Approx. effort? I am pretty mechanical, but am a suspension amateur

Help???

-Rick

THat has to be one of the most brain-dead comments I've read on suspension in a long time. You are honestly trying to tell people that hydraulic lock is caused by springs? You really have zero clue what you are talking about.

Please, before you spout any more "wisdom" on suspension, go jump on a stock VTR and pull up moderately fast on a slightly bumpy piece of road. Say some inner-city road would be sufficient to demonstrate. When you stop, you should be able to stare at the position of the front suspension without getting off the bike. The forks will be fully compressed. It will only very slowly return to full extension after about 5 seconds. Why? well as the front compresses, it cannot rebound fast enough. The standard valve holes, coupled with the stock shimstack, are too small to permit any fluid travel required for fast action required to handle any sort of bumps in the road even with rebound set to the softest setting. Even placing a heavier spring on there is not going to help matters at all because the heavier spring will attempt to push it back to full extension faster than the stock spring, and because oil cannot be drawn through the valves fast enough it will lock the fork at the current position. A heavier spring only makes the problem worse. The only way to solve this problem is to modify quite drastically the shimstack and use bigger ports on the pistons.

Speed99, The work is not that hard to do. It is mainly a time thing, particularly for someone that has not done it before. Almost all the tools you will already have in a standard toolkit. My valves and springs are turning up hopefully later in the week, so I'll fully document everything. Plenty of photos etc.

Cost. Depends on where you get stuff from :) I just bought a heap of stuff in Oz because with the exchange rate it is about half the cost of buying the same kit here in the US. If you're doing it yourself, figure on spending about $300 in round numbers - $160 for valves, $110 for springs, rest on new fork oil, tools if you're missing anything, etc.

Mith,

Thanks for the reply. I look forward to your post after you complete the work.

-Rick

I've ridden my bike (quite a bit) and Howard's bike (XRDracer) and i'll put it in articulate terms: I WANT TO UPGRADE ARRRRRRRGHHHH DON'T GET BETWEEN ME AND MY FUCKING UPGRADE .

Now, is it because of the fluid thingy or the springy - other - thingy in the forks, dunno :grin: .

Hugo

Hugo---why dont you go ask Howard--what Lindemann did to his valving ---and share that with all of us, especially Mirth---I think he might be a tad surprised :roll:

I did the poormans mod. :oops: , when I changed my forkoil I went to the next heavier grade (I will dig up my receite tomorrow to find which grade) and did notice a slight Improvement :cool:

Harry

I would have to side with Mith on this one. The Valves let the forks move at a certain speed, up and down. The spring alone only pushes the forks up to hold your/our/my fat ass on the bike! :grin:

I have done racetech valves and springs in mine and it rides like a champ! I had them professionally installed and dont think "I" would undertake a project like this, and I am a fairly good wrench .

I am a gradeschool student working on my MBA in the suspension field. :wink: :grin:

I had my trusted service shop do mine because I have trade with them, but you shouldn't let it put you off too much. It's daunting to think about, but once you open them up, it becomes more obvious how it works. Really the only catch is to keep parts clean and in order. The RaceTech instructions are good, and the service manual really helps.

Cost is $100 for springs, $130 for Gold Valve kit, $120 for rebound kit.

Swampy - where'd you get those prices quoted from. For the valves, I've never seen anything within $20 of that quoted on any website. Pretty much everyone stays within $10 or so of RRP.

Howard does not remember what was exactly done (and Lindemannn has memory lapses).

Hugo

That's what my local guy charged me, I thought it was close to retail. Sorry, I usually try to give the retail prices.

Ah, that explains it. Sounds like shops in Oz - if you just buy the parts they charge you full retail, but if you get them to install it, you get a discount because the profit margin is in their labour costs instead. All understood now.

Retail for the springs with both sets of valves is $389, but most mail order places will be 15% lower than that.

I was recently offered the whole kit for $331 directly from Racetech.

Swamp

On your website, you mixed 10w and 15w. If I were to do the quick fluid change with my stock springs, could I just use 15w?

Justin: If you haven’t torn your forks down yet, would you mind a helper to observed and open beers etc., whilst you work? I'd be interested to see the job done (on somebody else’s bike of course) before I do mine.

Keith, I don't think I'd do it. You'd be way too stiff on the rebound for the stock springs, so the forks would pump down and screw up the geometry over a sequence of bumps, possibly bottom out in a turn (which would really fuck you up). I'd keep the stock oil with the stock springs.

Dano - sure. I'm actually going to need a garage to do it in anyway if you have one handy. I'll need to drill a couple of holes in one of the pistons (on each fork) so having a vice and drill would be useful for the task. If you have your own bits there, we can do both at the same time. There's a few differences between the racetech and suspension tech valves, but not anything great. They're actually really simple to pull down, just the instructions seem complex.

Not sure on the timing of when I'll do it. I've got ohlins rear, akra system + PCIII, bunch of carbon stuff and the fork bits turning up within the next week. May do them all at once but may get itchy tool fingers when they turn up :)

Justin: I've got a 4 car garage and only two cars, so there's room to work. I have an 8" bench top drill press and assorted tools.
I'm about 20-25 minute ride east of you.
If the wife sees someone else doing mods to their bike I might have a chance to spend some money on mods myself on the premise of safety issues. :wink: So far my 02 is completely stock.

Hi Guys,

been following the discussion, it seems that RaceTech is virtually without competition out there, though I know of guys who use Ohlins equipment to upgrade their suspension as well.

I'm taking my bike to RaceTech to have it resprung/valved hopefully this week, which'll set me back $AUS1000 ($US620).

On my bike with stock suspension I currently do 2:13 lap times on our local roundabout, hope to reduce to below 2:00 with the new kit.

Phil
---------------
99 SuperBird
98 BMW F650

Phil, that's getting severely ripped off. Where on earth are you taking it??? Stay away from Frank Pons at BikeTek out in Lumeah. Good on the surface, but we've found he's been doing some really shonky stuff in the last year or so. Last I heard Terry Hay was no longer in business. My friends and I are very happy with Nick Dole at Teknik Motorsports out at the base of the mountains. I'm sourcing all my parts through him.

To give you an idea of costs, I bought the full SuspensionTech valves and Eibach springs and it cost me only A$450 in round numbers (add 10% for GST). That grand you are paying is waaaay over the top. At $60/hr, that's 8 hours of labour you're being charged for. For a professional shop it should not cost you any more than 2 hours of labour, 3 if you are dropping the bike in for them to take the forks out of. When I first was looking to do my VTR, the max price quoted to me was $720 and that was everything replaced - pistons, valves, springs, polishing the forks etc.

SwampNut, I just serviced my front forks. (Removed, Disasembled, Cleaned, Inspected) I went to the honda dealer and asked for the correct fork fluid and they gave me 10w fork oil. I ride tomorrow. I found out later that the book calls for SS 8w oil. What should I look out for. Am I going to have problems? Thanks for helping in advance.

H2

Honda SS-8 is 10w, so no worries, Howard :)

Did a Ohlins rear and just ordered race tech springs and gold valves...

Lets see if I have this straight.
The whole kit consists of;
1)Fork Gold Valve Kit
2)Fork Rebound Gold Valve Kit
3)Springs