Ikon Shock Springs.

To quote someone, thats a valid point. This does get noticeably worse on crap roads like where we went on Sunday for breakfast. Guess I will whittle away at it till I fix it
 
I fitted the new shock springs today and refitted my rack for the Tassie trip in November. It was quite a wrestle alining it all to fit. I did the bounce test and it feels pretty good. I will see on the next club ride.
 
Here is a little addendum, what I was trying to achieve with the damping adjustments was this painful banging I have been getting from the rear end. What it was before was the front end of the chain guard hitting the frame rail just before the shocks bottomed. I have 15mm longer shocks and have spaced the chainguard over a bit to clear the 140 rear tyre. I sectioned some clearance out of the chain guard so that's fine but it still was banging hard on something else. I like to push the shock bump stop down the shaft and that tells me lots of info, sag and travel use. The sag is good,1/3 of shock travel but I am not using the last 20mm of shock travel so it's not bottoming on the shock so why this hard banging was happening was a mystery to me. Up until 5 minutes ago. I just noticed the right side pillion peg mounting bolt has been hitting the swingarm and leaving a nice clear mark. The left side clears it by a mile. Adding 3 or 4 washers will space it fine. So that's why I am constantly complaining about how uncomfortable my bike is. Be nice to have full rear travel with soft bottoming instead of wack like a cricket bat up the arse.
 
The bolt is an integral part of the passenger peg, welded in place normally.
 
"I just noticed the right side pillion peg mounting bolt has been hitting the swingarm and leaving a nice clear mark. The left side clears it by a mile. "
Interesting, my SFs also have far less clearance from the pillion peg triangle on the right compared to the left.
Is it common?
 
Don't know how symmetrical these frame bits are, looking at the mark on the swingarm I was thinking surely not they don't line up so I measured it and the hight was correct. The gap was 75mm and the shock has 100mm approx of travel. What confused me was vertical alinement but you don't realise how much arc of movement is involved. Applying this arc of movement yep solid contact made.
No wonder my arse gets sore, its been like a hardtail chopper on the typical bumpy roads we ride a lot. I reckon its also destabilising the bike a bit on bumpy bends, kicking the tyre off the road when it runs out of travel so harshly. I would say at stops how bumpy that section of road was and get a look back like I was nuts. Probably didnt help loaded with gear on the Tassie trip either. Really happy to find this and get an easy fix.
 
Thats what the pros say, you need some up movement available as well. So that's approx 30mm on 100mm suspended bikes and 100mm on 300mm suspended dirtbikes. The brain is a wonderful thing, I was at my wits end on Sunday. I was hoping that upping the damping would have the effect I was after. Nope, it was feeling decidedly bad at 3 on the Icons. I hadn't ridden in a while so was rusty but even that didnt explain how loose the bike felt. It wouldn't hold a line on fastish bumpy sweepers. So I went back to 1 and it was heaps better but still banging my arse. I was looking at the gap between the bump stop and the top of the shock so it wasn't bottoming so I was thinking it might be topping out when I got home and then I noticed the paint chip on the swingarm. The brain comment involved my wanting to add preload to stop the banging but all that does is change ride height. It has almost no effect on spring rate obviously but I always want it too. It's counterintuitive and confuses my decisions about the cause and effect of suspension changes. Thats why I like to experiment by doing a change and seeing what happens. Lots of times the effect is the opposite to what I expect.



 
Piranha Brother 2 said:
Is 1/3 of max travel on sag acceptable? Sounds like a lot to lose before you even hit a bump, Vince.
Click to expand...

I generally set mine up for ~25mm at the front and 15-20mm (just by eye..) at the rear. Would have thought much more than that would have it wallowing around a bit.. :o
 
AndyW said:
I generally set mine up for ~25mm at the front and 15-20mm (just by eye..) at the rear. Would have thought much more than that would have it wallowing around a bit.. :o
Click to expand...

Reckon I've generally had about the same - but never had fancy shocks since I had the SF ... Ceri originals, then Konis, then S&W, then those Mexican things that came after or superseded them (forgotten the name). Fancy Nitrons will be innaresting!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top