Suspended Animation

[chickenstrip]

TL;DR in bold

I wonder how many people are riding around on bikes that just aren't delivering what they're really capable of because the manufacturer put second-rate suspension on in an attempt to put them within the financial reach of a larger customer base, and/or they don't think the cost would be worth the returns gained?

The MT09 has had me thinking much about this lately. From what I have read (and admittedly, I have no personal experience of them), this bike has a very good, punchy engine, and despite needing a remap to reduce throttle snatch (don't they all these days ), makes the basis for something with some real potential, but let down by the seemingly usual practice of skimping on the standard suspension components in order to get them into the showrooms at a price that won't have punters running straight to the competition next door.

Reading through gr666's thread about his "spacker" (snort!), a couple of replies have found me wanting to post my own thoughts, but I haven't because I just seemed to be tying myself in knots when I attempted to put those thoughts into words. So I'm going to have a little ramble here (please forgive me, and make allowances for an old fool!), to see if I can't make a bit of sense of one or two points that bug me about this complex subject.

Two posts in that thread seem to really warrant some discussion:

[Beehive Bedlam]

No ones going to sit and read all that waffle even if it is Saturday in the middle of November.

Tldr required.

[chickenstrip]

[Azoth]

There are 2 different issues: 1) knackered suspension wallowing out that needs to be replaced, 2) making adjustments to suspension in good condition, to improve performance.
With regard to (2), if someone doesn't make a corner, I would question what they did before I wondered about their suspension being poorly designed. Bike technology has advanced much faster than rider ability has improved. Getting the most performance out of your suspension around corners and over bumps is about how you distribute the weight of the bike, using the forces acting on the bike. Your options for distributing weight depend on the type of bike and the type of terrain.
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Safety in numbers

[Old Git Racing]

I agree entirely with what you say. Suspension is a deal maker or breaker for me and personally can't see how you can have unadjustable sussies that cover all size and styles of riders and road conditions.
I know how I want a bike to behave and know how to change it suspension -wise so I would buy something with high quality suspension rather than electronic gizmos. If marketing data and the bike media are to be believed I am in a minority.
These days the biking press would rather praise the electronics and say the suspension is adequate for everyday riding than tell the truth because they know they won't get bikes to test if they slag it off.
Unless you are spending big bucks decent suspension on new budget to mid price bikes is a thing of the past in my opinion and we have been mentally massaged into accepting it.
Probably one of the best standard suspension bikes I've owned was a K7 gixxer 750. Showa multi adjustable front and rear with 2 speed damping. It could be set up for most things but no matter what you did with it it started to get scary over 150mph. So even this is not fit for purpose really.
I had a new STR and sold it after less than a year mainly due to the appalling quality of the suspension.
Bizarrely my current old mans BMW is unadjustable and is far better than many modern bikes I have ridden. It's an 02 model and maybe it came from an era when quality was important rather than cheap throw away shit we get today.

OGR
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2022 Tiger Sport 660 2019 Street Twin 2003 K3 gixxer 1000 1998 Srad 600 track hack

[asta1]

It's interesting you mention Yamaha's MT range. I have an MT-07 and whilst I'm not arrogant enough to believe that I get all available performance out of it, already, after 4 months of ownership, I am beginning to feel that the stock suspension is now not as good as it could and perhaps even should be.

Yamaha, being as also mentioned, pretty on top of this consumer trends stuff, have picked up on this as well and now do a 'factory upgrade' big name suspension kit for the MT-07 and presumably the rest of the range as well. The price is almost insultingly high at this point, but I suspect that if enough people do upgrade, and they probably will, an MT-07 R, with the suspension upgrade and a few cosmetic pieces such as a belly pan, will be hitting showrooms pretty soon. If it's in 2018, remember, you heard it here first...
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CBT Acquired: 09/07/2015
A2 Licence Passed: 12/02/16
Current Bike: Yamaha MT-07 bought 02/07/16

[Enduro Numpty]

Interesting post.

I never really paid that much attention to suspension set up or quality of parts till my son started racing moto-cross. With standard off the shelf springs and settings he did ok but was obviously losing time in places. Replacing the spring with the correct one for his weight and simply setting up the static and dynamic sags correctly and starting off on base damping settings transformed his lap times. Watching how the suspension reacted where he still felt he was losing time helped a great deal. A few clicks here or there on compression or rebound damping could knock seconds off his lap times.

Most of us don't need this level of performance from our road bikes but setting up the suspension to achieve the recommended static and dynamic sag is simple assuming our bikes have suspension adjustment.

I did 20,000 miles, most of it fully loaded touring on my FJR1300 before I decided that the standard suspension or the lack of adjustability that it offered wasn't good enough. I required suspension that, at base settings would be suitable for solo riding and have enough adjustment to cater for carrying a pillion plus all the luggage as required.

I looked at premium brands and while they looked the part none (at the time) offered to supply what I was looking for. They would happily sell me a £1500 shock then charge me another few hundred to get the correct spring fitted. No advice was offered on base settings.

I eventually came across Wilbers Suspension and their UK agent Revs Racing. I spoke to them on the phone and they told me the information they needed: solo weight, pillion weight, approximate luggage weight etc.. I got back to them with the info and they fitted the correct spring to their shock. Zero pre-load on the spring for solo riding was their recommendation and this achieved optimal sags with no fiddling. They recommended 20-25 clicks preload on spring for pillion work and 25-30 for fully loaded. I found the higher figures for both settings worked best. I also fitted Wilbers progressive front springs and their recommended weight and level of fork oil. Spring pre-load was left at standard Yamaha settings and compression damping was set at minus 2 clicks. Good for both solo and pillion.

It all may sound complicated but it's actually very simple and at around £800 it was in my view a bargain as it transformed the bike particularly when 2 up.

Spending money on a suspension upgrade on an expensive new bike is hard to swallow but it may make the bike so much better.

My new T120 Bonneville has basic suspension with only spring pre load adjustment on the rear. Given it's modest performance, it is good enough (just about), but I can see a time in the not too distant future where I'll change to higher quality units.

[stevo as b4]

I like the fact that you've found something that really suits you and appeals in the FZS1000. Four of them is commitment to the model and it's virtues I would say.

Having found what you might say is your ideal general Base machine for most situations and riding, then spending money on suspension and handling mods to tailor it to your needs and preferences is a sensible and worthwhile thing to do I would say. No matter how hard/soft or adjustable a manufacturer makes a bike, they will never be able to get an off the peg factory machine to suit every rider perfectly, as we all like different things.

As for spending money on your own bike to replace suspension, yeah I've done that too. I took off a clean and good condition pattern budget shock on my KMX because it didn't have enough damping, and used up too much travel as sag. I put a fully adjustable £470 Wilbers shock on with a ride height adjuster, and it's made my 125 ride and feel so much better. You wouldn't expect any manufacturer to put a shock of that quality and cost on a new 125 as std though, so I don't think there's a need to moan about the std kit on such bikes really.

[chickenstrip]

[thepuma]

Suspended Animation...

Great album by a great guitarist.
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YBR125 (SOLD) - CBR250R(SOLD) - CBR650F(SOLD) Current - Street Triple
765 RS

[ThatDippyTwat]

I can ride most things with whatever settings they come with. It's not often I can get a proper hustle on without a fiddle. Depends entirely on the bike if I want to start pissing around with stuff.

The scariest thing I have ridden, probably, is a ZZR1100 with a fucked back shock. Apparently they are notorious for it. Actually thought I was going to kick the bucket when it bottomed out at 120+ on the Autobahn. Truly terrifying.

[M.C]

Maybe I'm missing the point of this, but if you want a higher spec bike buy a higher spec bike?

[grr666]

There's a place near me that will set it up as well as it can be done with the standard kit, allowing for my weight and
whatnot. That will cost me under 40 quid. https://www.jhsracing.co.uk/suspension_services.htm I've used them before and only heard good things.
They know what they are doing better than I do. For that kind of money why would I even bother sodding
about with it myself. I don't take too many chances and ride with the primary aim of arriving home unscathed.

My thrill seeking days are over and I'm kidding myself if I think I'm anything approaching a good enough rider
to get 100% out of this machine anyway. It gives me a little fright every time I ride it. After being set up
properly which is very soon on my to do checklist. I reckon I'll still be having plenty to get on with. As for snatchy
throttle, Throttle mode B is pretty easy round town with plenty of poke. No TCS on my bike so it will misbehave in
any of the three modes. But B mode makes it nice in urban environment riding, with no nasty surprises.
I can have warranty friendly approved Yamaha Ohlins front internals and back shock for around a grand.
This was a 6 grand bike brand new on the road price. I was gong to lob at least 6500 on a circa 14 plate low miles
striple-R that would have been about to have its first MOT now or thereabouts.

And it's nice having fettling to keep myself occupied when the weather is crappy. I've spent a good part of today out
in the shed tinkering with my spacker. Tail tidy next and wire in powered mount for my Garmin.
The tinkering is as much a part of biking for me as riding the thing is.
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Currently enjoying products from Ford, Mazda and Yamaha
Ste wrote: Avatars are fine, it's signatures that need turning off.

[Polarbear]

As I said in another thread, until I had my STR suspension set up by a professional firm I could never get it right, however once it was set up properly it was superb.

My Trophy has electronically adjustable active suspension whatever that actually means.

The adjustable bit is easy, you set it for 1, 2 or 2 plus luggage and for comfort, normal or sport. That suits me as that's about as complicated as I want it and it seems to work fine. However after the first couple of days playing with it (just because I could) I set it on normal, 2 people and haven't adjusted it again in the 2 years I've owned it.

In the good old days of adjusting the springs with a C spanner Id set it up once and never bother changing it again.

I suppose my point is 95% of riders make do quite happily with what is standard on their bike. They don't ride it hard enough to upset the handling so don't see a need to upgrade. I'm sure I would have been just as happy with the standard street triple suspension rather than the R.
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Triumph Trophy Launch Edition

[kramdra]

Tldr.

I changed the fork oil once. The fluid that came out looked/smelt like a mixture of rotting vomit and faeces, and just as lumpy. Made no difference.

[M.C]

I've ridden with (badly) leaking fork seals. Also set the forks too low in the triple clamp once so they were bottoming out over bumps I only worked out what was going on when I looked at another bike.

[stinkwheel]

I'm a fairly recent convert.

Havingyour bike sprung well and sprung to suit you is just about the best money you can spend on it. It's between that and the brakes but if you get the brakes sorted, you suddenly find you also need to sort the springs if you don't want to end in tears.

I put 6-pots on my VFR (replacing 2-pot sliders) then proceeded to nearly kill myself by repeatedly bottoming out the front under braking. Had it resprung and it was like waking up from a long sleep. I've now started killing tyres.
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“Rule one: Always stick around for one more drink. That's when things happen. That's when you find out everything you want to know.”
I did the 2010 Round Britain Rally on my 350 Bullet. 89 landmarks, 3 months, 9,500 miles.

[mentalboy]

[kgm]

[lingeringstin...]

I can't say much because I prefer hardtail bikes but something was brought to my attention recently that might be interesting to ponder.

There's a road around here being resurfaced and at the moment it's all buggered up where they've carved off the top layer of tarmac. It doesn't look particularly bad at first glance so there's no warningn that you're about to go from a flat road to a crap one but the moment you get on it with my hardtail you really know about it. You can feel the front wheel trying to track and the back wheel not being particularly obliged to track with it, so it feels like both wheels are trying to go in different directions. It's awkward but I get along well enough.

The other day a mate had me ride his XJ9 to another lockup he'd just rented. The route went along that same bit of crappy road and I noticed that initially it didn't feel any different than a normal road. The suspension seemed to cope well. but some distance into it you could really feel the suspension starting to fight against itself in increasing intensity, like the hops and wobbles were getting increasingly out of sync. It almost felt like a puncture of both tyres. and it frightened the bejesus out of me. It was a lot worse than tackling that same bit of road on my hardtail. I had to slow down considerably.

To me it felt like the sprung suspension was nice enough on normal road surfaces but that it would be a lot more dangerous when encountering a bad road surface like this unexpectedly in the dark. To me the hardtail instantly gives more feedback about the road surface than suspension does and I can suddenly adjust my riding to suit, whereas the soft suspension might sneak up on me and I might be out of my depth before I knew what was going on underneath and had time to slow down.

It's got me wondering if maybe it's good to have stiffer suspension because it will tell you more when something's up underfoot.

[chickenstrip]

[andys675]

My problem is I have experienced a really good set-up in the past, I had a foxeye FZR600, they recalled them and replaced the shock prior to my ownership, the bike came relatively cheap at the time but was predictably average in the handling stakes and everything became a blur at 120+.

After living with it for a year a friend recommended a local suspension guru called Dave Farnell, he was working from home and charged about £100 and you left your bike with him for a couple of days and he would go all over the bike, riding it and adjusting, changing fork oil and level etc. It felt terrible riding it back afterwards, completely alien and through the local villages on a dark wet autumn evening I was wondering what I had done.

I had this done at the end of a season, so the bike went in the shed and winter pressed on until it came out the following easter, after a few days it became apparent the thing was transformed, and you could literally ride it flat out everywhere, it never put a foot wrong and with a tooth less front sprocket it I was nailing it everywhere, all around everyone I came across.

Boredom set in, sounds strange but having no complaints from the suspension always being near perfect the bike just didn't feel fast as it as so smooth and compliant so I chopped it in on a YZF750, same bike shape, more power, it was shit.

And on the subject of R suspension, street triple R's have no better suspension than standard, after 10 k the damping is tired and the screw adjusters make no difference at all, all the way in or out, I bought a newer shock of a crashed bike as it was the cheapest option, but know it's only a matter of time before it's funked again.
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Some people feel the rain, others just get wet.

[chickenstrip]

[Old Git Racing]

[kgm]