Race techs installed but way to stiff!

[rorycooney]

I just got finished installing the racetechs with my mechanic and something must have gone drastically wrong.

Current setup
Race tech 2 turns in from loose spring

Oil height 165mm (6.5 inches)(race tech in, no spring, no spacers)
****Oil level checked with forks fully extended****

Pre load - spacer comes all the way to the top of the tube when the stanchion is fully extended. The cap then pre-loads the spring.

.90 Racetech springs (i'm 230 pounds)


Oil Weight 15

Drilled two new holes in damper rod (88 model - 4 8.8mm holes already existed) Total now is six 8.8mm holes


Result : So stiff that not even half of the useable suspension range gets used up (As tested by the mechanic who got the back wheel up in the air)

Any ideas what went wrong?
I'm going back to him in about 4 hours to change the oil weight down to 10 as it says in the racetech manual. The mechanic thinks the oil weight is the problem.

Thanks for any help that you can lend.

[Hordpower]

Re: Race techs installed but way to stiff!

Rory-

I also emailed you, but you need to measure with the forks collapsed fully. Ems in, springs out, forks fully bottomed. 115 is correct.

J.D.

[quote="rorycooney"
Oil height 165mm (6.5 inches)(race tech in, no spring, no spacers)
****Oil level checked with forks fully extended****

[/quote]

[rorycooney]

I called racetech and their guy suggested that I check that the tubes move freely in each other with no oil, spring or emulator. Essentially ensuring that bushings are o.k. and the the staunchion isn't bent although seen as the forks worked fine (Stock fine that is) before the installation i'm thinking that will be another dead end for me.

There's still little to no spring action in my forks almost as if there is alot of stiction. If I push it down as far as it will go it almost needs a helping hand coming back up.

Assumin that the fork is not bent, has anyone any ideas what might be causing this.

Thanks

rory

[Hordpower]

What brand and weight of oil did you install?

[rorycooney]

I was talking the mechanic who did the forks and he reassured me that when he checked the forks after installing new bushings and seals that they were perfect. I'm going to disassemble them myself and set up everything myself as per you original instructions. There just seems to be far to much stiction for there not to be some serious mess up albeit recurring after several rebuilds.



I installed Yamaha suspension oil G-15 as it was the only 15 weight oil that was easily available to me. amber in colour (looks more red than amber to me but it says amber on the Japanese written on the tin.

The mechanic largely works on yamaha 2 strokers if that would make any difference to the suspension oil although i'd assume that suspension oil is suspension oil whatever the bike.

Thanks for the help,

I've changed over from panick mode to " it's a challenge mode" so when I get back from holidays i'm gonna get my teeth into it.

[Hordpower]

I can't come up with any ideas really. If you have to pull the forks to extend them, then something is def. wrong. Did you see my other post about axle installation? It has to be tightened in the proper sequence or it could bind up the forks. Tighten the axle bolt first with the pinch bolts loose. Pump the forks a couple times, then tighten the axle pinch bolts. If you do it the reverse way it will draw the forks together (possibly) and cause binding... I've seen this happen. Just an idea anyway.

[rorycooney]

Problem solved, I fired my mechanic!!

It seems in the 7 tries that my mechanic had at setting the oil level and the preload that he couldn't get it right.

The spacer was about 40mm too short and the oil height was god knows what. I rebuilt the fork my self making sure to "fully" collapse and extend the forks when setting preload and oil level. It seems that even though I was watching him work on the forks that I couldn't see that he wasn't getting a full extension or collapse of the fork.

Lesson learned, I'm finished with mechanics. Unless your lucky, they don't care about your bike or your safety just the money in your pocket. Sorry to generalize but that's just once too often that i've found that a bike shop has set my bike up wrong in some way.


Thanks JD for the help, You were right from the start.


For anyone interested heres the setup

24mm preload,
115mm oil height,
15W oil,
.90 spring
2 turns on emulator

22.5mm static sag with me and bike.
108 mm front fork travel under hard braking to the point of a nosie.
(My forks only get 116mm total travel with spring out. I don't know if this is right. I'm assuming that the missing travel is used by the rebound spring.)

[Hordpower]

Glad you got it figured out. I kinda figured that mechanic was a bit clueless, to be totally honest. 116mm total wheel travel is about right. I think it is rated at 120mm, but part of that is the bottoming lock at the very end of the travel that prevents metal on metal bottoming.

If you get bored and want to experiment I would try reducing the spring preload to ~17mm from your current 24mm. That will get sag a little more in the ballpark, it should be ~32mm. This will make initial wheel movement a bit more supple over the little bumps.

[rorycooney]

Changing the static sag is the next thing on my list. The spacers my mechanic cut were way too short for reuse so I used the uncut stock spacers which gave me a total of 24mm pre-load. I`m gonna bring them back to the mechanic so he can cut it for a 17mm preload. I may as well get my moneys worth.
Next on my list is the carbs. Full throttle seems smooth and powerful right through the rev range although 1/4 to 1/2 throttle is very sloppy and completely flat above 4.5K. I`m going to set the float valves to precisely 9mm using my brand ne shiney vernier callipers (9.1 and 9.4 at the moment as measured by a cheap plastic ruler and a bit of guess work). I`m also gonna recheck the jets and blow them through with compressed air. I fear my manual lung pressurized air attempt the last time may not have been too effective (besides, carb cleaner doesn`t taste too good).

I`m assuming after my 10th iteration of changing the carb settings that I will probably end up with quite a different setup than you folk with the M4 exhausts. I`m hoping the difference between m4 and moriwaki exhaust systems isn`t that big though.

Thanks again for the advice


P.S. To anyone thinking of doing any of these modifications. Just do it yourself. Buy the right tools and learn through your own mistakes. It really isn`t that hard and if you follow the shop manual and advice off your peers you can be much more confident of a safe and correct setup than letting some cowboy mechanic do it for you. Overtime you`ll save money and more importantly you`ll know exactly how that thing between your legs and fast moving hard concrete works.

[Hanadad]

When installing an emulater, has anyone here in the Hawk forum done anything different than what is suggested by Race tech? I have done just fine in the past following their direction on a different application. But a friend is looking to do the mod on his S*65*, and that bike's forum has had a very animated(putting it in PC terms) dicussion about it. The short story is that they are closing the smaller upper holes in the damper rod and just enlarging the existing holes. The cylindrical part at the bottom of the fork slider is pointed to as requiring this deviation from the Race Tech insructions. My problem is that the part is called the oil lock, and is in the Hawk's Showa fork also. Looks like Traxxion is on board with this approach as they a selling Max's own damper rod made with the same mods.
Anyone familiar with any of this? Since the forks are similar, I felt the discussion is relavent to the Hawk. I haven't yet taken apart my spare fork to science out the claims myself.