Advice please

[itsatdm]

I have asked this question before, so hope you know. Have you ever zip tied the fork to see how much travel you are using with the Race tech springs?

The spring weight they recommend is so much higher than what is used on comparable weight bikes, such as a KTM 950. There are other aftermarket springs offered for the F800 that are much lighter.

[Hayate]

Originally Posted by deguoren

I have the Sidi Adventure but I use them for road riding. For longer offroad use they seems not to be stiff enough + sole not hard enough. For that I use ONEAL Element 3 boots, which you can get for around 150 Euros or less. For that price they do a very good job. Since more than 2 years in my case.

Thanks, finally someone suggests something that doesn't cost $500. That's the thing I wasn't prepared for... the crazy costs of everything, and how many bits and pieces there are.

Originally Posted by deguoren

I love them ! Used TKCs before but the back tire lasted only like 2500 km, and I get 10.000 km out of a K 60 Scout. Its always a compromise but this tire does street & offroad riding reasonable good.

Geez, seriously? Burning a rear TKC-80 in 1500 miles? What are you doing to them? I know I run my tires all the way out just to be cost effective and they are worthless in muck at the end, but... This rear I put BACK ON after it had 6k miles and ran it another 1k before this past weekend where I will now admit it is past useless.

[greenthumb]

Originally Posted by itsatdm

I have asked this question before, so hope you know. Have you ever zip tied the fork to see how much travel you are using with the Race tech springs?

The spring weight they recommend is so much higher than what is used on comparable weight bikes, such as a KTM 950. There are other aftermarket springs offered for the F800 that are much lighter.

Yes. Reasonably aggressive riding on rough deactivated foresty roads leaves me ~30mm of unused travel. Big hits take it to the last mm.

I cut the stock 30mm plastic spacer in half to 15mm. 120mm air gap. I'm 210 without gear. This nets me ~67mm (29%) static sag.
I also have an 1100lb/in (19.6kg/mm) spring in the rear. Race tech claims stock is 15.7-16.7kg/mm. I run ~1/3 preload and ~1/4 turn from full hard. (Without luggage)

Race tech also offers a .95 front spring. Their rate calculator suggests I should have a .91 for my weight. I went with the .75 at the recommendation of my local dealer. He had concerns about the stock cartridge having enough rebound damping. I suspect the .95 spring is geared for the TT fuel tank.

[greenthumb]

Geez, seriously? Burning a rear TKC-80 in 1500 miles? What are you doing to them? I know I run my tires all the way out just to be cost effective and they are worthless in muck at the end, but... This rear I put BACK ON after it had 6k miles and ran it another 1k before this past weekend where I will now admit it is past useless.

It all about your right wrist. I have had tkc's last from 2500km to 9000km depending on what I was doing with them. I ate an E-09 in 1500km once, but the current one has around 7500km on it, and still a little life left. It has been almost exclusively pavement though.

[deguoren]

Originally Posted by Hayate

Geez, seriously? Burning a rear TKC-80 in 1500 miles? What are you doing to them? I know I run my tires all the way out just to be cost effective and they are worthless in muck at the end, but... This rear I put BACK ON after it had 6k miles and ran it another 1k before this past weekend where I will now admit it is past useless.

I live in a big city and need to drive 1 hour motorway to get into the dirt.
+ in the land of the free there is no speed limit on most motorways.

[slowpoke]

http://www.advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=415604

[Hayate]

Wow, thanks, that's very helpful as a navigation tool, but still going to keep me up til 3am. At least I won't get as easily sidetracked into reading ride reports and such. Thanks!

I'll probably still keep updating my initial post in this thread as a place to keep my notes on personal experience and research. Got to keep this stuff all organized in my brain somehow and might as well do it publicly.