Rear Shock Travel 400ex?

[Tofu.Man]

I'm in the process of reading and learning all I can about setting up suspension. When setting up your preload or sag in the rear the general rule of thumb is 30% of your shock travel with the rider on and 10% between neutral and the bike off the ground. So how do you determine how much shock travel the rear has If you dont know?

[Tofu.Man]

is rear shock travel directly porportional to ride height? or not because in some instances the shock will bottom out before the bike's frame hits the ground?

[number52]

Your shocks extended length and spring rate are directly related to ride height. Not the travel of the shock! Most people don't know much about these measurements, but it is the easiest way to tell if your spring is the too heavy or too light. I'd recommend between 4" and 5" of race sag if you have the correct up and down travel of the rear shock already.

[dustin_j]

number52, what range do you consider acceptable for static sag? It seems that quads need a lot more static sag than bikes, hence the popularity of multiple springs and ZPS setups. I have read GT Thunder's recommendations of up to 5 turns of spring preload (if I remember correctly).

Also, do you happen to know the shock body thread pitch for stock honda and Elka shocks?

Thanks,
Dustin

[number52]

Don't even mess with static sag. Just pay attention to the race sag and as long as you have no preload to 3 turns of preload on the spring your static sag will be just fine.

The thread pitch on the outside of an elka is 1.5, not sure about the stockers.