My 6th gen Suspension Upgrade

Being 220lbs no gear I felt the need to upgrade my suspension. I have increased the spring rate front and back by 28% via a new shock for the rear and springs and valves for the front. I believe Honda balanced the bike properly, they just did it for a 160lbs person that's all. So I made sure that I kept that balance intact by increasing the spring rates equally by 28% to the original rates.

Here are some pics of my Elka 3-Way shock that arrived today. It has a remote reservoir with high and low compression adjusters and a hydraulic preload adjuster. The shock is also adjustable for height and has a rebound adjuster on the bottom. They normally build the shock to suit the rider but in my case I told them what spring I wanted and they built the shock around that. In the end after talking with their tech guys my requested spring rate is bang on to what they would have recommended, at least that's what I was told.

Specs, I used BailyRock's (VFRD) numbers as he has tested and proven the configuration. Were close to the same weight, I'm 20+ so my setup should be slightly less firm which is what I wanted.

Rear spring rate - 1100lb or 19.6kg (STOCK 15.3kg)
Fork springs - .95kg from RaceTech (STOCK .74kg) with valving to compensate for the increased spring rate.

This post will be about the shock, the next post will be all fork stuff.



















I'll try and put up some install pics when I get around to sticking it in.

EDIT 11:50am - Stock shock is out!! Holy mother, the abs preload adjuster sure complicates things. What a pain the azz. I had to undo a clamp that was holding some hoses for the rear brake and such, I have a feeling it's gonna take me all day to put that clamp back together :suspicious: If it wasn't for the external preload adjuster I could have left the exhaust, rear fender and rear cowl on. Would have saved a good hour easy. 2.5 hrs to remove the stock, lets see what it takes to put the new one in. I gotta take a break though, clear my head.

EDIT 2:23pm - New shock is in :biggrin: It was a battle to get the preload and remote reservoir through while suspending the shock while going up and down with the swingarm to get it all to go. It was a tough to make sure that the remote reservoir doesn't come into contact with the swingarm. Elka position for the thing is a bit hairy. It's okay now, just hope it stays in one spot. I got the pesky clamp back together. Thank goodness it was there otherwise I think the entire ABS system may have had to come out. Just have to install the exhaust, cowl and fender now.

EDIT 4:30pm - All done, she's in, it's all back together and I think everything works. Yeah!!! Feels like a CBR rear end now. I use to be able to really work the shock up and down by just moving around on the bike while static. Now it gives as it should but supports at the same time.

Total Re and Re time = 6hrs. Next time, 3-4hrs I think.

I had to take her down to look like this.


Here's a pic of the disassembled stock preload adjuster waiting to be snaked through


The triangle and link.



Top shock nut.


Here's a pic of the shock almost out, hung up by the preload adjuster up top.


Here's a pic of the clamp that was lucky enough to be there other wise the preload adjuster was going no where.


Here it is on the way out.


And it's out, here's a side by side. One is pretty and one is not.


BEFORE


AFTER


Looks WAYYYY better with red.


Here's the remote reservoir with the high and low speed compression knobs.


Here's the preload adjuster. I'm impressed with the bracket that Elka supplied.

 

Spot reserved for more info.... (FORKS)

Parts in the mail...

G2-R Gold Valve Kit - G2-R Next Generation Compression Kit
FMGV S2040G

Fork Rebound HFR Gold Valve Kit-Racing (Hi-Frequency Response Race Rebound Gold Valve)
FRGV SR2001

FRSP S3732095 RT Front Fork Spring 36.7x34.5x315 .95kg

If anyone is considering using the same valves for a 6th gen, they need to have a #55 (1.3mm) bleed hole drilled in them. In case you didn't see it that's 1.3mm. Not the easiest drill to find never mind actually drilling it. Thankfully the good guys at RaceTech will pre-drill the holes for ya. :wink:

EDIT:

Well looky what arrived today...

Rebound Gold Valve (HFR)


Close up


G2-R Compression Gold Valve (Supplied DVD not shown)


Boingers


All came exactly as it should, all bleed holes pre-drilled (Thanks RaceTech). Tomorrow I go buy a proper pipe cutter tool and some oil and then take her apart again arty2: :guitar:



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EDIT: 2010-01-16 The forks internals are rebuilt, I left the fork tubes and body alone as they only have 9000km on them. All went well, it took about 12hrs or so with 80% of the time doing the first fork. It will go way faster now but none the less a lot has to come off the front end. There's a lot a tedious valve building and checking and double checking. The RaceTech valves require some pieces from your stock setups but their instructions don't mention what since the valves are generic to any bike.

This pic shows the bolt that holds the guts in the forks. It bolts through the oil lock into the bottom of the compression valve body which is held into the cartridge tube by a cir-clip. The fork pinch bolts need to come off as does the axle. I eventually needed to pull the right brake caliper, fender and pull the wheel right off so just do it now.


Next I needed to undo the fork cap. It only gets torqued to 17ft lbs but holy mother was it tight. It's also aluminum so taking it off without marring it was impossible.


Once that was off the fork cartridge rod was visible. The fork cap screws onto that and that is what moves up and down when you adjust your pre-load.


Time to take the rod off.


Once the fork cap was off, I lifted the fork rod and pulled it up. That pulled the cartridge off of the oil lock down below and low and behold the oil drained out.


Removed the spring collar off the spacer.


Remove the spacer.


Keep lifting the fork tube and expose the spring.


Now you can see the cartridge tube area where the valves are located. As you can see in this pic the tapered part of the spring was facing DOWN. The manual however tell you to place the taper UP... :crazy:


Here are all the bits laid out on my bench.


Spring length difference, RaceTech on the bottom, stock on top. I needed to cut the spacer tube that RaceTech supplied. I just made sure that both packages were the same total length, so the new spacer was longer.


This pic shows the bottom pf the cartridge tube and the cir-clip that holds stops everything from falling out the bottom.


Once the cir-clip is removed the compression valve comes out the bottom and fork tube slide out the bottom revealing the rebound valve. You can just see a little bit of thread protruding past the nuts. The threads there have been peened over onto the nuts. The exposed threads need to be ground off before undoing the nuts.


The compression valve taken apart.


The new compression valve built minus the required o-ring. The black washer at the bottom (right side) and the black looking cupped washer along with a washer under that (left side) were required from my stock valving. RaceTech provides a cupped washer and spring setup which doesn't work with our forks.


The new rebound valve built minus the oil seal.


Oil, The forks took just slightly over 1000ml so I had to buy 2.


When taking the valves assembly's apart and off, the shaft end threads are peened onto the nuts. The threads need to be ground down with a file or grinder. Remember when putting your valves back together use loctite on the nut and torque it to 30in lbs.

Putting it back together was simple. The only glitch was that the oil lock piece remained in the forks and the cartridge wouldn't seat when placed down. That meant that the bottom fork bolt that I first undone wouldn't engage to lock it all down. I had to pull the forks out and tip them upside down to get the oil locks out, once they were out I just installed the cartridges with the while forks assembly's horizontal on my bench and torqued up the bolts. I should mention that there is a copper sealing washer under the bolt head that I didn't change. If it leaks it will be easy enough to change later. There's also a big o-ring on the fork cap that you should get if you like to always put new stuff on.

The beauty of the Gold Valves is that the are infinitely adjustable for any spring and weight combination. The rebound valve setup is mostly determined by the spring that you're are installing. The compression valve setup is determined by everything, your weight, the bikes weight, your type of riding. I picked a setup that would fall into a huge variable of combinations, so it's not super specific and critically dialed in (yet) but will offer great performance over a broader range of circumstances. So if I loose weight and or change my riding style I won't need to go in and fix it. My only wish is that they made something that added the ability to adjust the compression and rebound on the fly. Oh well, at least it can be down now.

Here's an excellent right up I found for more confidence building, if this is your right up, thank you. about: Fitting Aftermarket Forks Springs and Valve Kits

I hope someone can benefit from this info and that I didn't waste my time posting it... If I can convince anyone or motivate anyone to undertake the same project feel free to pm me with questions.


EDIT: 2010-10-16 - After riding for a while and putting on about 1000kmh I noticed that the front end wasn't behaving quite like I wanted. After thinking and doing some math I realized that the recommended valving numbers by RaceTech for my set up were a little low. About 2stops low (soft) to be exact. I changed out the oil and mixed some 5wt with 10wt to make 7.5wt. The change was night and day considering I was still in the "feel everything" mode. I have now gone the whole season with this setup and I think I'm done. I don't think there is anything else I can do and the bike is behaving exactly as I want it. Why have I come to this conclusion now you ask... After the Kootenay trip my tires were toast. I put on a set of PR2's replacing the stock Dunlops and they completed the transformation. Totally new ride now and IMO the way it should be for my weight.

 

EDIT: 2010-01-16

I took it out for a quick spin (20min) to see what was what and let me say HOLY SH^T it felt good. This is before I checked any numbers or anything, maybe I should have checked them first to be on he safe side but I was too impatient with a clear blue sky. This is the first time I have intentionally aimed for bumps and minor potholes. The suspension is stiffer but it handled all the bumps and holes with smooth control. Hitting the bumps felt identical to how they felt before the upgrade which is a great thing. I guess the valves and shock are doing there thing. I'm going to play with the oil height and oil weight after I dial in all the numbers and get some more ride time.

So I guess after installing everything next comes the numbers. From what I hear, sag for "street" bikes is good around 30mm-35mm. Race bikes even tighter. Before my setup, for my 220lbs I was unable to apply any preload on the rear becuase the fronts were too soft. I had the front pre-loaded to the max and slightly beyond and nothing on the back. The best I could get was too around 42mm but with a hugely mushy Cadillac kinda ride. Good for the long haul but not good for playing. My goal was to find the suitable compromise. I was going to go stiffer springs but ensure that my valving was correct so I could get a smooth comfy ride while giving the bikes the spring rates to handle my weight.


I 've noticed that my new rear shock has increased my ride height slightly which I think is loading the bikes weights onto the forks some. The initial quick measurements anyway gave me:

Front:

Sag - 35mm (3 lines exposed on the pre-load adjuster)
Free Sag - 22mm (High due to the rear unloading onto the front... I think...:suspicious(edit - I was right) Correct me if I'm wrong but too much free sag means that I would have too stiff of a spring which I know for sure is not the case.

Rear:

Sag - 35mm (15/52 clicks in on the pre-load)
Free Sag - 11mm

EDIT: 2010-01-17

I've adjusted the rear height to the most that the new shock will allow, I think it's still about 1/4 higher than stock but not sure. Need to measure another bike. So after doing another quick measure here are the new numbers after the height adjustment. I went down in height (shortened the shock) with a result of about 1/2" at the rear wheel hub center.

Front:

Sag - 35 mm (3 lines exposed on the pre-load adjuster)
Free Sag - 15mm

Rear:

Sag - 35 mm (23/52 clicks in on the pre-load)
Free Sag - 7mm

I can live with these numbers.

As you can see it decreased the front free sag by about 7mm and also decreased the rear free sag about 3mm. It's amazing how doing simple adjustments changes the bikes geometry all over the place, it must be a PITA to set up a race bike... one to many hot dogs for lunch and things change:tongue:

EDIT: 2010-10-16

Front:

Sag - 35 mm (3 lines exposed on the pre-load adjuster)
Free Sag - 20mm
Fork Oil - 7.5wt with 100mm of air space per fork.

Rear:

Sag - 35 mm (28/52 clicks in on the pre-load)
Free Sag - 7mm

 

Post more pics so I can drool more.

 

I wish I could offer you some install advice, unfortunately, I'm the type of dude that has to pay for services of this nature. Other, more discreet services too. I would however, love to get your opinion once you've got some miles on them. Cost as well. It looks to be a good set-up, but I've never known anyone that has used Elka. Good luck with the install.

 

Thanks man, it's gonna be a fairly straight forward install from what I can tell. There's just not a lot of room on the bottom end of these things, lots 'o' stuff in the way to the get the shock out and in. Elka makes some great stuff, this was purchased through a group buy on VFRD, I also posted a link to it here a few weeks back. There's a bunch of dudes over there that took advantage of a group buy last year (2008), they seem quite happy with their setups. Being a CDN company it's also a bonus when it comes to servicing and so on. The price was good enough to make me buy now rather than a few months from now like I had planned. Purchased through MotoWorld, a very smooth transaction and very happy with it all. Messing with the valving in the forks I think will be the challenge. I'll keep ya all in the loop.

 

sweet! nice close up pics jase. what camera/lens do you use?

 

It's a Canon 40D with the standard package lens, 28 to 135 IS. It works nicely but it's big and heavy. The small point and shoots are getting closer and closer to the same quality every day. The pics on the cardboard box were taken with a Sony point and shoot at max zoom with the flash.

 

Stock shock is out!! Holy mother, the abs preload adjuster sure complicates things. What a pain the azz. I had to undo a clamp that was holding some hoses for the rear brake and such, I have a feeling it's gonna take me all day to put that clamp back together :suspicious: If it wasn't for the external preload adjuster I could have left the exhaust, rear fender and rear cowl on. Would have saved a good hour easy. 2.5 hrs to remove the stock, lets see what it takes to put the new one in. I gotta take a break though, clear my head.

 

PM sent...call me

 

Thanks for the help my friend.

 

If anyone is interested I updated my first post with some install pics. So far I'm quite happy. In a holding pattern for the fork parts now.

 

that is really sweet, JS! Good for you, brother.

 

Glad to see you've knocked that out in short order. Photos are great and that red Elka shock is full of awesome. I've been telling myself that I'm through with modifications on this particular ride. You may have convinced me otherwise. Keep me posted after you get everything dialed in and experienced.

Congrats

 

nice pics jase.

 

Looks pretty good but it just isn't right having those ugly hose clamps there like that. You gotta come up with a way to clean that look up a little bit on the passenger pegs somehow.

 

hummm, I hear ya. Those came with the kit but I am open to suggestions. I already thought maybe black ones but not sure what else to to. With the line length the reservoir pretty much has to go there, how it's attached.... idunno.

 

Sounds like you're headed in the right direction. Kevin (BaileyRock) and I have really put a lot of time into figuring out the correct rear springs for the VFR. We have studiously read Andrew Trevitt's Sportbike Suspension Tuning book. If you set it up per Trevitt's guidelines, you'll be surprised how stiff a spring you wind up with. I'm 250# and I run a 1300# spring on a Penske and it's perfect.

G2-R valves are very nice! Make sure and have RaceTech pre-drill the #55 hole for you. There isn't much room where it's drilled and even with a drill press it is still a biatch.

 

I'd say that safety wire might provide a much cleaner look for the current mounting location. More than anything I think that an alternative mounting location would look better. The obvious place is mounted on the subframe between the passenger pegs and the frame, but it looks like your line is too long for that. I dunno. Maybe it is just the hose clamps that make it look off.... and maybe going black with them and the screws on the back side where you cant see them would help out.

 

Thanks for all yours and Kevin's work Red, makes it easier for me, less spring changes I hope. I'm really hoping the sag and free sag numbers come in correctly so I can spend the summer tweaking dials and getting to know it all a little more. Both my rebound and compression valves are coming pre-drilled. The RaceTech guys were/are very nice to deal with although I have asked them 3 times now to send me a shipping tracker number and am yet to receive one. :tsk: