Front end diving badly

guywheatley · February 23, 2012, 03:39:01 PM

Ordered Progressive Springs this morning.
Click for blog.

hootmon · February 23, 2012, 04:49:26 PM

Where did you get them, and if I may ask... What did you pay..

guywheatley · February 24, 2012, 10:22:54 AM

Hoot:

I got them from a local place in Texarkana called Cycle Zone. I paid $92.50. I called the local Honda dealer and got the same price.

LIMagna · February 24, 2012, 12:53:28 PM

They're under $60 at PhatPerformanceParts.com:

http://www.phatperformanceparts.com/Progressive_Suspension_Progressive_Rate_Fork_Sprin_p/prog-fork.htm

Even with shipping they're about $71 ... $20 less than list and no tax outside of CA.

lragan · February 24, 2012, 01:22:39 PM

So now you tell him...

In any case, by the time the springs could arrive from California, Guy will be on down the road with his installed.

LIMagna · February 24, 2012, 01:27:19 PM

There's always a trade off Lawrence but that assumes you can just walk into your local dealer and walk out with them and that they don't also have to order them from somewhere.

guywheatley · February 24, 2012, 06:00:49 PM

OK, the important thing here is that the missus NEVER finds out I could have gotten them $20 cheaper.

Cycle Zone had to order them, but they came in the next day. (Today) My plan is to put them on this weekend. I'm also putting rear brake pads on the Valkyrie. I started that last night and managed to turn that into an adventure too.

I'll probably blog about it next week, so I'll spare you the silly details here.

Ingramml · February 25, 2012, 08:04:12 PM

I finally got my front end fixed as well. My bushing wasn't going all the way into the seal. For those of us who are two cheap to buy a seal piston. used a piece of exhaust pipe to drive the seals into place.

Greg Cothern · February 26, 2012, 09:36:22 AM

PVC! IT is a great seal driver! Easily found!

LIMagna · February 26, 2012, 03:53:49 PM

Exactly ... and you can slap one of these together for only a few bucks:

hootmon · February 26, 2012, 04:50:02 PM

Good to know.. I think one of the seals on the red bike is weeping just a little, and the dust seals are cracking a little

guywheatley · April 08, 2012, 09:33:52 PM

Finally got around to replacing the fork oil and changing to Progressive springs.
I was surprised to see how much longer the stock spacers were than the ones I cut for the progressive springs.

Then I checked the length of the progressive springs compared to the stocks ones. No wonder the new spacers were so much shorter.

With the forks compressed to add oil, the front end sets low. Looks strange.

It's wonderful now, but I can't really compare the progressive shocks with the OEM ones. For some reason, the front end had started diving badly. I guess the old oil wasn't doing much good. There was no leak, and I removed a good amount of old oil. I didn't measure it, but it sure looks to be about the same amount I put back in.
In any case, what ever the problem was, it's gone now.

lragan · April 09, 2012, 11:18:23 AM

The only ill effect I have observed with my installation of Progressive springs is that the stability provided by rake and trail is reduced. When I cross the center line bump after passing a slower vehicle, for example, the steering response is slightly under-damped -- meaning that it "woggles" back and forth about two to three cycles before settling to straight ahead. This was a surprising and slightly unsettling result. It probably depends on tire pressure, too. I run about 35-37 psi in the front tire. It happens on both bikes, so it is not a function of the different rear tires.

When going straight over a bump, the front end seems to be about right meaning there is no perceptible overshoot, so heavier fork oil is probably not a fix.

Has anyone else noticed this anomaly?