Gonna Showa You Howta Fork Upside Down Your S2R! The saga begins...

[Meerkat]

In the CAM forum, there has been much chatter over the last few months about putting together a garage night to do something none of us know how to do fun. Here are some snippets pulled from a recent thread that has put this in motion: (note to moderators: if this needs moved, just say so)

I have a small garage here in Silly String (right by DC / Tacky Park border), tools and a compressor, so if people want to do a garage night that'd be cool. ...
So if people want to do a garage night let's do it. I know this has come up before.

Knowing that you at least know how to take a fork apart, I'd like a reservation for respringing my forks to haul my fat ass around. If you're down, we could make it a suspension clinic. I'll help you set your sag if you help me set my sag. I'm taking the total control class next weekend (4/3) but can do it either day of the following weekend (4/9-4/10).

Anybody know what else I need to have to do this right?

My dance card is free that weekend. I've never changed springs on upside-down forks but me and my hammer will try anything once!

I watched a youtube video, so we should be pros! I figure the worst case scenario involves throwing it on your trailer and paying you gas money to haul it to the suspension guys at MRP (Lars recommends them regularly). I'll throw a post up in tech to try and figure out what we need besides springs.

Racetech says, "It's easy. Buy our Gold Valve Kits, High Performance Springs, and Ultra Slick Suspension Fluids and install them yourself. (If you get stuck call your Tech Support 951.279.6655.)" I figure I can give them a call since I'm stuck before I'm started.

Trailering will not be necessary, I think we can figure it out. Plus I have a friend who's done USD forks before so we'll wrangle him if needed. Did you plan on revalving? Springs and fluid should only take an hour. Revalving usually is only changing the shim stack, but we'll have to watch the YouTube video just to be sure

I found your next bike:
http://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/mcy/2285290532.html

What are these words?!?  Just kidding. I've got a call into Racetech Tech Support and called MRP for a quote as well. I think you just swap the gold valves in place of your old valves since the mechanism is different. If the price is right, I'm gonna grab a shock spring too so we can treat her like a dirty catholic girl and do it front and rear!

So this is the beginning of the story that will unfold over the next couple of weeks.

[Meerkat]

Heard back from MRP: Just over a grand and they wouldn't be able to do it for 6-8 weeks because their suspension guy is out with back surgery. They guy on the phone said, "I can do it but I'm not really comfortable with it." Really?!? How is this any different than me and Tocino doing it?

The springs look to be in the $110-125 range and the gold valve kit is in the $160-180 range. Fork oil is $60. Topped off with $10 worth of PBR to keep Tocino's DTs under control and I'll be riding a new bike for under $400.

[EEL]

Not to rain on anyone's parade but there are plenty of good sites that show you how to strip down an entire fork. With a little bit of reading this isnt that hard.

As for racetech tech support. Those guys are useless. I called them 2 days ago. They say anything and everything that keeps them from admitting that their kits and instructions are so cookie cutter and generalized across all showa forks that you're really just on your own.

Also they give you online access to a compression shim stack setup generator with every gold valve kit. The code is only good once and for 5 minutes after your input your info. So get it right the first time and print your info cuz you'll be locked out from accessing it again.

Racetech valve installation magic word of the day:

DEBURRING - Understand it and how it applies or you're screwed.

[Meerkat]

Also they give you online access to a compression shim stack setup generator with every gold valve kit. The code is only good once and for 5 minutes after your input your info. So get it right the first time and print your info cuz you'll be locked out from accessing it again.

I've seen several posts around other boards that report this problem.

Have you had your bike done? I'm interested in someone with FHE of the improvement provided by springs only vs springs and valves. (Yeah, I'm a cheap lard ass and don't want to pay for stuff that isn't going to improve my riding experience.)

[bikepilot]

I've stripped and put back together about a zillion MX bike forks (realistically more like 25 I'd guess) and a few showa 43mm street bike forks.  The street bikes can be a bit of a pita as you've often gotta compress the spring quite a lot to get the fork cap off (easy with a special tool, tricky without, I've only done without). The showa street forks are the same as 1990s era showa mx forks except they are shorter and have the annoying preload adjuster sleeve.

Gold valves are a bit fiddly to setup but work well.  Racetech includes (or at least used to) a video that detailed how to do it as well as good instructions.  

Just changing oil, seals, springs etc is really easy though and only possibly sticky bit is the spring compressor part.  We can do forks at my place as soon as I have 220v to my garage to run the compressor (or if someone has a 120v compressor they want to bring).

If you are replacing seals I'd strongly suggest that you do bushings and dust wipers too.  For each leg you'll need an inner bushing, outer bushing, 1 oil seal and 1 dust wiper. You'll probably need 3 liters of fork oil too.  The forks don't hold a ton of oil, but you have to fill them all the way up to bleed the cartridge, then you use a syringe to suck out the extra and set the oil level.

I have a few fork seal drivers, but don't remember what sizes.  I'm pretty positive I have a 47mm, but not sure I have anything skinny enough for 43mm forks.  Seal drivers aren't expensive though - Scotts has had them on sale for a while for $35.  I can also borrow some if I have a heads up and fork tube diameter.

$1k to revalve forks is a bit much.  Most places are $200-$300 for a standard re-valve.  Add in the cost of the gold valve if you want that and then springs and you still max out around $600.

Here's an excellent pictorial one of the guys from TLZone.net did. http://imageevent.com/tlsdoug/tlzonestuff/tlrtlsforkdisassemblyreassembly
If duc 43mm showas are put together like these then I know how to do them (or at least have successfully done them in the past ).

[The Mad King Pepe']

I'm game, let me know where you end up doing it. Haven't done forks yet, but I should be able to help with stuff: open beers, hold the camera, might even pop a hernia laughing.

[Meerkat]

I'm game, let me know where you end up doing it. Haven't done forks yet, but I should be able to help with stuff: open beers, hold the camera, might even pop a hernia laughing.

That's how we roll in CAM! [moto]

Was just talking to Tocino and I think we're going to initially scale this back to springs and oil this first weekend. See how it rides afterward and evaluate whether valves are needed. I'm 35 Stone, not Casey Stoner!

[ducatiz]

That's how we roll in CAM! [moto]

Was just talking to Tocino and I think we're going to initially scale this back to springs and oil this first weekend. See how it rides afterward and evaluate whether valves are needed. I'm 35 Stone, not Casey Stoner!

35 stone?

490 lbs??

ride a ducati?

[He Man]

heres my little write up

http://kuixihe.com/node/22

granted if anyone has any comments abuot how i measured fork oil. save it. Looking back at it, it was kinda dumb way to do it. There are better methods out there but i was pressed for time (had a track day coming up)

[EEL]

Hey! i didnt know that was your writeup!

I been using your how to for reference all this time. Yours and this one i found on the net

http://waste.org/~knobs/fork_rebuild1.html

Only one comment on yours that I have..You didnt mention anything about the racetech valve installation magic word (as noted in my previous post) nor did you mention the holes you had to drill out..

[rockaduc]

35 stone?

490 lbs??

ride a ducati?

[Meerkat]

35 stone?

490 lbs??

ride a ducati?

I had a big lunch!

[Meerkat]

On a more serious note: I've been looking all over the interwebz for a calculator to figure out what rear shock spring I ought to have. I found these guys: http://www.ducati-upnorth.com/tech/suspensionspring.php and it seems none of the other places have my bike or have anything at all.

Problem is I'm not sure how much change the shock on the S2R1K can handle before it has to be revalved (or even if it can be revalved-I think it can). Their chart shows that I need a 11.5-12 kg/mm spring which is an increase of 1.5-2 from the stock spring rate quoted.

Anyone know if this is reasonable for the sachs shock on there or am I gonna have to experiment? Also inside diameter of the spring? I should really search more before I ask! The ID is 2.25 in and length is 6.3 in. In case anyone else is looking for this.

edited to change the units on the spring and add the ID.

[ducatiz]

Anyone know if this is reasonable for the sachs shock on there or am I gonna have to experiment?

It's my feeling you might have to experiment a bit.

[Meerkat]

 

That pic always cracks me up!!