Harsh Cer Forks.

Nor tried yet - bike is still some months off. Frame work in progress at the mo. Change of springs is no drama. With slow and fast rebound plus comp damping adjustability, there's a bit to get right.
 
Yes i have it feels good when you bounce it no test ride yet it needs another 1/2 turn off the emulator spring preload
 
No the emulators in the forks i know i shouldnt change 2 things st once but its taking 2 long between tests
 
As I said previously "All Ceriani front ends are Harsh".

What might help is fill the triple tree with 5 weight hydraulic oil rather then 10 or 15 weight - Depends on what you're doing with your ride.
 
The whole point of cartridge forks is there ability to work at absorbing all kinds of bumps i have had emulators work great right out of the box on another bike they just need the right settings mine hopefully are very close
 
Finally got my laptop back, it only took  8hrs after that to log on to the net. Seems my modem forgot who it was and didn't appear on available wifi. Frustrating when computer says no. So I have been gradually winding back the preload on the emulators down now to the minimum of approx 1 1/2 to 2 turns on the blue spring and its now very compliant. I now can hit those square-edged expansion joints on bridges with no jarring in the bars. I did the last weeks breakfast ride with no memorable fork action on a pretty testing bit of road, pushed it a bit during this. I also fitted the new straight rate shock springs, 2.7kg/mm, to the Icon shocks. I pushed the bump stop down to test travel.  I had a look at how much travel I used by the meeting point, about 60ks of smooth expressway and new dual carriageway and it had used 70mm out of the 90mm available. I then pushed it back down and did the next more testing rougher bit with the same result, that was a bit disappointing so it seems the spring rate was still a bit hard.  New springs do tend to sack out after some use so maybe  I will get this missing 20mm after some time. It will help with luggage on the Tassie ride coming up, although it's still on minimum preload. What I didn't like was the impressively BAD pounding this produced, BANG BANG BANG. Constant and painful. Later I was thinking this feels all spring action, it needed the action slowed, I should have tried dialing up the damping and that's what I did a week later heading to where I got the missing 1st gear issue fixed. Way way better with damping on 2 instead of 1. That's not a full test but at least it looks like an easy fix. The last couple of rides have had the bike steering like it had a hing in the middle, vague wandering steering. I have a well used Bridgestone BT016 on the front, that's a proper sports tire so I expected heaps of grip and no good milage. Approx 3 to 4000ks The grip was ok, not fabulous in the wet though. I had a big front slide once but that was down to me mostly. I pushed it hard into a bend on a ride and the road was wet with me not noticing. This road was made from really black bitumen and there must have been a shower just before we arrived, and the road looked the same as when it was dry. So this tyre had warn in an odd way and I think that's got this instability happening. It had a 20mm flat section in the middle with the sides splayed away in a triangular section. Looked like those triangular race tyres they made in the 70s. So its now got new T31 Bridgestone sports touring front tyre to match the same on the rear. That's the first set of matched tyres its had in 10 years since the old BT090 tyres. Be interesting to see if this fixes the hing effect. Hope to have a well handling comfortable bike for the coming Tassie ride. BTW I went dow to Eibach spring with a spare set of Icon springs off my Laverda and a set of Mazoki springs off my Pantah as he said he might have springs to suit on the shelf, no way. But he did measure the Maz spring off my Pantah. Makes me laugh, the first bit has a good section of spring rate but it then goes to 5.3kg/mm. That's twice as hard as what works, how often do you pillion someone who weights 18 stone.

















 
I reckon 70mm out of an available 90mm travel is about right. You don't wanna be using all the travel all the time, or you'd be bottoming out and jarring shit out of your wrists and arms. It might get to 90mm on extreme bumps.
 
It was a full test, I was jumping big speed humps with that 70mm. It should have bottomed on that. Those springs cost $220 so it's staying there for now. Just being picky, it's way nicer than before.
 
Vince said:
It was a full test, I was jumping big speed humps with that 70mm. It should have bottomed on that. Those springs cost $220 so it's staying there for now. Just being picky, it's way nicer than before.
Click to expand...

Vince, have you checked that those new springs aren't coil binding, preventing full compression?
 
No I haven't, you might expect as they came from Icon themselves they should bottom the shock before coil binding. But if you don't check you cannot be sure. So I will pull one of them off and see what happens with me sitting on it.
 
Couldn't check if the vague feeling was gone with the new front tyre, the trip out to breakfast and Eastern Creek was through suburbia so didn't get close to 100kph
and it was fine going slow and the trip home was via the faster expressways but the wind was blowing a gale, the bike was moving about a lot but I couldn't tell if it was a handing issue or it being blown about in the gusty winds.
 
I was trying to think of the correct term, I was being Buffeted on the expressway heading home. Ducking down behind the fairing stopped my helmet bouncing around but the bike was still moving about.
 
I have now a matched set of tyres for the first time in years. That's Bridgestone T31,110x90 radial front and a 140x70 radial rear on my 3-inch rim Last ride with said tyres at my usual pressures, F37  R40 the bike was tiping in uncomfortably fast. It felt like it needed a correcting to not go over to far. So yesterday I thought I would try less pressure in the front tyre so I tried 34. For the first 5 minutes that included the Sydney Harbour Bridge, it was weaving quite a lot. Maybe that was the old tram lane on the Carl Expressway. After that, it became nicely stable. So we did some really crap surfaces and the bike was fantastic. Held a line and had plenty of grip and absorbed the bumps great and was very damed comfortable to boot. I will probably need some rear preload with luggage on the Tassie ride but  I am really pleased with the outcome of all this work over the years. Pantah next.
 
Does that mean a set of tyres which should have been the first thing to do was the last and the one thing that makes your bike ride better.  (congrats) (clever)
 
So let's start with do you ever pillion, how does your bike go with an 18 stone bloke on the back, not so good. That's how my bike was with my 18 plus stone on it. Do you think a set of TT100s would help? Probably not ha. At the risk of repeating myself, I am no expert at bike setup but I do like trying stuff and documenting the results. If you dont like what I do don't read it or make a comment that makes some sense in this instead of the usual troll stuff. This place is a virtual ghost town because every time someone posts an opinion the attempts at humiliation start.
I have had some great rubber over the years, it pissed me off being told by some bike shop idiot that I couldn't use Radial tyres as there grip would brake my frame, Engineer he was not, so I did  including Bridgestone BT92 rear that had amazing grip but was to low a profile and the latest BT 016 Supersports front that for some reason I didnt like to much, don't have a reason though. Not too scientific. But by far the biggest  I have learnt is starting with correct springs front and rear especially if you're outside the usual weight, eg much under or over 80kgs. And by that I mean to check your using all the travel and not bottoming harshly. And then adjust the damping. After my last biggish unexplained crash years ago, I was riding aggressively but not too crazy and low-sided. I promised myself I would always use the absolute best rubber I could find. No crashes touching wood since then. I now have a grippy comfortable safer bike that suits my riding style and where I ride, rough as guts backroads. My version of an old Italian Adventure Bike.
 
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