for those who knows ds suspensions

[andiboy123]

Today I was trying to set the height of my ride like some people said 7" on rear 8" on front, for my weight. I’m a 155 so rear went all good, now on front, with no load on the wheels when I was lowering the spring I noticed that the spring was getting loose on the floor the proper height was the ring near the end of the shock tread but if you rise the front of the quad the spring will get loose. Why the shock brings that entire treat any way if it gets loose, so you won’t be able to lower the ride or there is something on the shock to prevent that it’s open all the way down?

[TNT]

Angel, I’m having a hard time understanding your English lol but I’m going to try and help you out although I am not a racer nor do we run the stock shocks. My son is 10 lbs heavier than you 165 and I remember setting up his stock ride height. It really doesn’t matter what other people say or think when it comes to setting up your suspension it’s entirely up to you so forget the numbers and rules. There are some basic things to understand more importantly then you dial it in to your liking. I do remember seeing something about loose springs others had a problem with getting their ride height but can’t remember where, we had no problems.

When it comes to ride height to your weight all you are really doing when your turn the spring tensioned is changing the tension and/or raising/lowering the center of gravity of the quad. Theres a 30% sag rule you can use if you want where it you lift the back of the quad it should sag about 30% of the shock travel. So if you tighten it up a lot you will have a stiff ride and if it’s too loose a bouncy one. If you raise the quad up too high then it will not corner as well and will be tippier then if lower. We run about 7 inches in back and about 7 ¼ up front on the DS. I take the back measurement with the rider on the quad after bouncing it up and down a few times while on a level surface at the rear engine bolt and the front nurf peg, or it really doesn’t matter as long as you take it at a place on the frame that is flat and has no rake. Rake is the up slope of the bottom frame that starts about at the front peg to avoid ground obstacles. Now that you’re racing MX you really want to keep the quad low and at your weight you can get a low ride height without bottoming the frame out too often. Seem as though we can’t away from bottoming the frame due to some jumps like step ups there’s no getting around it.

Once you got your ride height set it’s a good time to get your front end aligned, camber then caster since they all relate and affect one another. There are good tips out there most arm companies have find one that fits you. I use an angle finder any cheap one will do. Start with about 2-3 caster and camber on the DS from there go out to the track and experiment with the setting’s. Having more caster makes the ATV handle better on straight sections, less caster makes the ATV handle better in turns. Once you have all that dialed into your liking a good steering stabilizer like a Precision is a must to help with arm pump.

From there on the track try different shock compression settings, it's good to have a freind watch your suspension and give you feed back. I shoot for a slight bottoming out the shock 1-2 times on big jumps for high speed compression and look at the whoops to make sure the swing arm and a-arms are moving freely and do not bounce too much landing jumps to adjust the rebound. Whoops are good to get the rebound set up, just go over them slow little by little add more rebound from the soft so the shock returns to the travel fully and does not "pack up". Low speed compression on small bumps and dives in corners, low speed and rebound you can play with to get the quad to dive or shift different directions like in corners to dive or starts backwards to get more traction. Just depends on where you are needing shock help on the track.

There are all kinds of ways to set the quad up once you understand each component of the system and what it does to your ride. It’s an balancing act most racers have not mastered it takes a lot of time and experience, but I’d say it’s as or even more important the all than HP/TQ numbers and graphs you hear everyone raving about on the forums.

Hope that helps now go kick some Puerto Rico MX Butt!

PS: Your PC-3 is on the way.

[andiboy123]

Hey my friend thanks, I know my English is kind of hard but just try to say all that in Spanish heheheheeh
For many months you and this forum are the only support I get to fix or set my ride. And as you can see I follow your word every step, you seem to be a person who like to talk too much, but with facts that back you up, so you are my internet mechanic hehehe , now I also do a lot of reading before been asking too much I read something like that about the 30% sag but, SAG is a term is not on my dictionary hehee I have seen people explaining and I got my back shock working fine for me but the front end is still the 08 xc stock one, now finally this week I will be getting 09 a arms to wide my ride, like I said I follow your recommendations, once you told me ride stock wide and once you get to feel your ride then wide your ride ..

[xrxmxcx]

On a lighter note I believe you are running into problems with the stock spring pack. You are trying to get too much sag out of the single rate front shock because you do not have a "ZPS". In simple terms it is a light spring rate that is used to keep the main spring in place during full suspension drop. Looking into more complex front shocks like PEP you will notice this, as well as with the MX DS450 shocks as they use a zero preload spring as well.

Zero preload means that you are allowing "sag" without affecting the true spring rate supplied by your main spring. If it wasn't for the ZPS on shocks with tremendous amounts of shaft travel adjusting ride hieght would he a doozy!

For now I would run it as soft as possible spring wise and fiddle with some compression, and look into having the MX shocks done by somebody like PEP down the road...

[TNT]

Originally posted by andiboy123
you seem to be a person who like to talk too much,

Ya think? lol! XRX you agree with this? lol! :devious:

Na I just like helping people out when I can and learning about the quad. :D

XRX that was a good post but one small thing about spring rate incase you don't know, technically preload does not change the spring rate. The rate of a spring is the change in the force it exerts, divided by the change in deflection of the spring. That is, it is the gradient of the force versus deflection curve. You change the spring to change the rate, preload is a ride height adjustment only.

Angel put you gear on and make sure the tires are properly inflated before you take measurements. If you can't get the ride height of 6 3/4 - 6 7/8 or low 7 ish max then your shocks are not set up wrong for your weight. I know most companies set stock shocks up for 170-175 lb riders. You want this right it's worth investing a little money in if needed, not a good idea to use compression to offset the wrong springs or ride height or run extreme settings.

[PArider]

where could i find the information on suspension set up for my height and weight? Is there some sort of chart or something?

[TNT]

Na no chart really…. It’s based on a lot of things beginning with setting up the shock properly. IMO PEP is the best at this, he takes into account rider weight, peg location, shock travel, arm travel, etc, it’s actually pretty complicated! Theres a sticky in “Steering and Suspension” , 400EXRIDER707 is a Mechanical Engineer if you want a good read on it but be fore warned, it gets deep and it’s long. If your interested in the physics (loads) behind it there’s a good read on LT vs ST travel suspension here I contributed too.
http://www.exriders.com/vbb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=410537&perpage=13&pagenumber=1


From there read above for the basic set up and key characteristics.

[PArider]

Alright thanks alot, ive never really messed with suspension all that much so figured id try and dial it in soon enough..