1981 Motorcycle Suspension Guide - 8-Page Vintage Article

Description

1981 Motorcycle Suspension Guide - 8-Page Vintage Article
Original, vintage magazine article
Page Size: Approx 8" x 11" (21 cm x 28 cm) each page
Condition: Good
Cycle Guide
SPECIAL EDITION
SUSPENSION
The most complete collection of aftermarket
suspension components ever assembled.
Suspensions, someone once noted, are
like money: Nobody is ever happy with
what he’s got. With today’s new motorcy-
cles, though, there's not much for anyone
to get unhappy about. The manufacturers
seem, with rare exception, committed to
equipping their motorcycles with front
forks and rear shocks that are at least com-
petent, even on the low-buck, entry-level
models; and in many cases, such as with
certain motocross bikes and high-perfor-
mance street machines, the suspensions
are just short of phenomenal.
Despite that, motorcycles in dire need of
suspension first-aid still exist in great
numbers. And because they do, the sus-
pension aftermarket remains a lucrative
place in which to do business for a large
number of manufacturers and suppliers.
What’s more, since OEM suspensions have
become so spectacularly efficient, the af-
termarket people have had to stay on their
technological toes just to be able to offer
something that’s as good as, let alone bet-
ter than, what comes bolted onto a new
motorcycle. And it’s to their credit that
they’ve generally been quite successful,
both in terms of sales and in the quality of
their products.
Nevertheless, the sophistication of
OEM suspensionry surely must prompt a
lot of people to wonder why, if the stock
stuff is so great, anyone would bother re-
placing it. There are plenty of good rea-
sons, such as: Not everyone owns a new or
late-model motorcycle; in fact, most own
older machines. Or, perhaps the OEM
equipment has, like most mechanical
things over a period of time, simply worn
out. Or some or all of the existing suspen-
sion pieces on your motorcycle may not be
up to the particular task you’re subjecting
them to, such as if you were to load up a
general-purpose bike for serious long-dis-
tance touring, or convert a stone-stock
street bike into a peg-dragging canyon
racer, or attempt to bring a year-old moto-
cross bike up to current specifications. It
matters not why, however; the point is that
for one reason or another, you can find
yourself in the market for anything rang-
ing from a new set of shock springs to an
entire suspension-system transplant.
Yep. That’s the point, all right. But the
problem is what to do about it. Because
there is, as you are about to see, an incredi-
bly wide variety of aftermarket suspension
gear available, each brand claiming to be
the best or to have the most. And unless
you’re already a suspension engineer or
have a degree in fluid dynamics, it's
damned tough to figure out what model of
which fork or shock will give your bike
what you think it should have. Thankfully,
most aftermarket suspension outfits have
ways of helping you make those kinds of
decisions, ranging from impressively de-
tailed catalogs and step-by-step suspen-
sion-tuning guides to personalized service
that’s just as close as your mailbox. What-
ever the options offered by any of the man-
ufacturers, though, the point is to use
them. The more you know about suspen-
sions before you buy into them, the better
chance you have of achieving the suspen-
sion of your dreams.
Don’t, however, let your fantasies out-
strip reality. Which is a polite way of sug-
gesting that you design your suspension
modifications within the parameters dic-
tated by your budget and your abilit ies, as
well as by the recommendations of the
component manufacturers. You’re dab-
bling in an exacting science when you start
messing around with forks and shocks, and
the effects of many seemingly insignificant
changes can have serious, often detrimen-
tal, unplanned effects on the motorcycle's
entire behavior. This is one area where the
process of trial and error usually ends up
with the emphasis on “error” if the “trial”
is not conducted by someone with reason-
able knowledge of the subject. So to avoid
spending a lot of money to achieve little in
the way of positive results, make sure that
either you or your advisor in any suspen-
sion experiments have at least some basic
qualifications for the job.
You can, of course, help avoid costly mis-
takes simply by using some common sense.
Don’t, for instance, try to improve the sus-
pension on a motorcycle that already han-
dles above-average by shopping for bar-
gains. Chances are that any low-dollar
items you could bolt in place would not
yield enough significant improvements to
justify even their economical price. Face it:
On a good machine, big improvements are
going to cost big bucks. Further, don’t try
to make an exceptionally good-handling
model handle even better, regardless of
cost, unless you have concrete evidence
that the modifications in question actually
work. If you’ve read about such changes in
a reputable magazine or have heard about
them from a good dealership, or if a
friend’s bike responded favorably to some
specific suspension fiddling, you’re proba-
bly on pretty safe ground.
It’s also good advice to properly match
the components to their intended usage
and not to over- or under-engineer any
part of the suspension. Bargain-basement
shocks, for example, won’t improve much
of anything on a serious, long-travel moto-
cross racer. Indeed, motocross is one area
where the quality of result is almost di-
rectly proportional to the cost of the com-
ponent. On the other hand, you don’t need
high-tech, nitrogen-charged, remote-reser-
voir racing-only shocks on your street
bike—unless you’re either trying for some...
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