Suspension set up

Suspension Setup

Having come to biking relatively late, I tend to be a rather nervous biker and am usually one of the slowest riders in the twisty bits. In fact, on my Suzuki, I actually dreaded them and did not ‘get’ why everyone looked forward to the passes on the rides. Of course, the Suzuki was a big bike (longer than my dad’s K100rs) and I think it was too much of a handful for me. I always got off it with a slight sense of relief. It was a great joy to me then when BMW brought out a mid-size bike and I could return to the brand. I bought my F800s without any hesitation.

The bike gave me more confidence right from the start and I can honestly say that I had never counter-steered before the 800. I went from holding up even the cars in the passes to only holding up other bikes. It was only when I rode my dad’s new Kawasaki ER6-f for the first time that I realised I was even more confident on his bike than on my BM. There is only about 4kg between the two bikes, but on the move, the difference felt more like 30kg. Since I had this confidence on my dad’s bike from the very first ride, it had to be one of two things;

1: It was a better bike (yeah, right), or

2: The bike suited me better.

Since the Kawa’s suspension is no more sophisticated than the BM’s (also no front-end adjustability), I suspected it had more to do with the fact that small-capacity Japanese bikes are usually set up for lighter riders. According to my handbook, the F800s is set up ex-factory for a rider weighing 85kg, which is a good 25kg more than I weigh. However, the manual is extremely vague about how one should go about fiddling with the settings, saying only that one should keep the settings in balance and be careful. Lawyer weasel-speak then. Given that my fooling around with the Suzuki suspension rendered it nearly un-rideable, I was loathe to mess around with the BMW setup and just left things as they were for nearly two years.

After chatting to the always helpful Neil Terry on the Oudtshoorn weekend, I decided to have another go at it. Having moved to the Strand, I visited Donford Motorrad for the first time to book my annual service. John Carr (who I think has raced the F800s) and whom I know from Trefco days kindly offered to help me out. I was loaned a F650gs which was very convenient and confirmed to me that I had made the right decision in choosing the F800s (sorry Hamid :-). When my bike was ready, John took about 20 minutes explaining what he was doing (very important to me) and then changed the settings.

The result has been nothing less than spectacular. I was honestly not expecting such a big improvement. I am in love with my bike all over again. I will never again tell anyone that the Kawa handles better (and now that it has gone up nearly R 30 000 in price, the F800s is a spectacular bargain by comparison.)

This brings me to the following conclusions.

1)  Don’t wait like I did before speaking to someone who has experience in these matters.

2)  I am a great believer of jumping in the deep end, the only ‘real’ way to learn. Thing is, jumping in the deep end means that you learn from your mistakes. The cost of doing so on a bike may be the ultimate price.

3)  The extra confidence I now have is not (yet) translating into greater speed. However, I am now more relaxed and look further ahead, through the bend, rather than at my front wheel, wondering when it will wash away.

4)  The more confidence I have, the less chance there is of me freezing up and sitting up in a bend again. This alone convinces me that correctly set suspension is a safety issue.

5)  John’s changes to the set up seemed counter intuitive until he explained them to me. My back wheel had been skittish over bumps and this worried me because the Parallel Universe Forum carried reports of back wheels bouncing under braking, leading to accidents. (Apparently the ABS kicks in and then it is like braking on gravel with the ABS on.) My solution had been to reduce compression and yet it still felt like I needed a kidney belt. Imagine my surprise when John tightened it up from 5/33 to 20/33! However, by slowing the rebound and slightly lowering the tyre pressures, my bike is more comfortable and planted, yet feels much, much lighter.

A big thank you then to John and if, like me, you are leery about messing with these settings, go and speak to someone who knows; you may just feel like you have a new bike!