Race Tech Mods

[brewsy]

Hi all,
I'm in the process of modifying my front end to hopefully improve (its me doing the work!) the feel from the stock front end of my bike.
I havent ridden the Hawk a great deal but I have ridden plenty of more modern bikes and found the front to be pretty useless.
Riding round NYC, especially the BQE, nearly had my fillings fall out and cause me some serious moments as the front is so harsh.
So I have purchased a set of CBR600F3's and RaceTech springs and revalve kit.
I'm sitting here looking at the video they supply and frankly Im a little overwhelmed.
Has anybody done one of these before and/or offer any general advice as I have never pulled apart forks (cartridge or damper rod) before.

Thanks,
Marc

[brewsy]

OK, I went ahead and bit the bullet and started disassembly of one of the forks last night.
All went well and it started to make more sense once I got the pieces out, even managed to get the damper rod cap screw out from the bottom of the forks without needing an impact driver.
As you may have expected the outer teflon bushing was knackered (it gets abused as you are using it to knock out the fork seal) but aside from that the teflon was as thin as a thin thing with several smaller scores. Inner bush was in a similar state and the drained oil had a pretty mettalic look about it.
Have ordered new racetech 'super slippery' ones as the price was pretty near to OEM price's and they are supposed to be better anyway.


Marc[/img]

[brewsy]

OK all, after looking around I finally figured out how to get some piccies up.
Theres gonna be a LOAD... Sorry for quality but its my phone.

Thanks to imageshack.us

Parts as they came out of the forks, starting from top of fork and working down to the bottom arranged from RH to LH.









Inner and outer bushings, Teflon coated which had worn through.



Bottom of stanchion and vlave body sticking out with the bolt that holds it to the fork lower sticking out.



Bottom of valve body. You need to push the comp valving down to release a circlip to allow the comp valving to come out of the bottom.



Compression valving.



Rebound valving.



Comp valving.
Top row is stock shims and valve ass. The gold valve ass. is the Racetech unit and bottom shims are the start of the new stack



Selection of new shims for new valving.



Other bits from the kit. Comp valve 'body' with allen bolt in it is to right



This is perhaps why cartridges are better than damper rods. The compression and rebound vlaving is seperate and Id guess can be tuned seperately. Rebound is on the rod and comp on the right.



A long awaited F'ing tiny drill bit (a #55 which I'd never heard of) came today and allowed me to drill a bypass hole. So fingers crossed the shims will get bolted up tonight and I can start re-assembly.

Marc

[brewsy]

Hooo- F'ing Ray!!!
Finished....
Had to come in to work on the weekend so decided to use my time for something worthwhile!!!
Now I just need to get to the garage (its on Manhattan and I live in Brooklyn) and bolt on the 'new' front end.
Should go together like factory as I have pretty much a complete F3 front end inc. brakes and master cylinder.
Considering these forks were from around 93-96 the amount of shit and dirt that was in the BLACK fork oil makes me think the original Hawk forks must be well shot.
If they werent the best Honda had when new they must be awful now, which my body confirms as Ive never had a crapper front end than whats on the bike now.

Peeps if you havent personally rebuilt your forks (or at least change the oil) I'd say jump in the garage now and get on it. You will be amazed at how different it will make them, let alone if you fit the correct rate springs for your weight and revalve!!

[brewsy]

Wow just looked at the date stamp on my first post!
Hows that for slow work...
Almost a YEAR to rebuild 2 forks...

Ooops

[hawkLer]

good stuff, marc! hopefully it will all bolt right up nice and easy. as soon as i get my license reinstated and start driving the company truck again i am willing to help with the transport of you and the pieces and/the bike or whatever. let me know if i can help. you should have my number.

[hawkLer]

good stuff, marc! hopefully it will all bolt right up nice and easy. as soon as i get my license reinstated and start driving the company truck again i am willing to help with the transport of you and the pieces and/the bike or whatever. let me know if i can help. you should have my number.

[hawkLer]

good stuff, marc! hopefully it will all bolt right up nice and easy. as soon as i get my license reinstated and start driving the company truck again i am willing to help with the transport of you and the pieces and/the bike or whatever. let me know if i can help. you should have my number.

[Tusk]

Very nice Marc. The ADD in my jumped to the pics and found myself saying "wha? those aren't Hawk internals.." Duh! ops:

I put emulators in my stock forks and it made a WORLD of difference.

You'll love the F3s I'm sure!!


Mark

[jaysun0ne]

i got a pair of f2s with progressive springs i need to rebuild but have never done it like carborators im scared of the unknown

did the videos help???

[brewsy]

Cheers guys. I cant wait to get them onto the machine.

The racetech video 'kind of' helped but as the demo units he uses are KYB and USD its not that helpful for a RWU Showa!!
TBH its not actually that hard.
If your going to rebuild the standard forks (or F2's as there isnt much difference between them) then the manual and the 'how to's on the web will be perfectly adequate.
It really is all about being methodical and making sure that everything is spotlessly clean.
I used a combo or 99.9999% alcohol and brake cleaner but boy was there some crap in there.....