How to adjust the suspension of the motorbike or motorcycle
79
Introduction
The adjustment of the suspension of a motorcycle is a very complex and
requires great experience. This article will try to illustrate the
principles and once assimilated everything we can make simple
adjustments, including what we are doing and why, even though this may
seem like a triviality, is a good step forward, considering the
complexity of it.
If you want to tune the suspension for use on the track or because
you need to overhaul the structure of the bike, you should contact an
experienced professional: it is about your safety!
The setup of the suspension takes a long time because it is
appropriate to test in detail the outcome of the adjustment for any
change. Moreover, except for small changes, when we adjust a parameter
(example: the preload of a spring), we should also adjust all the other
(example: brakes in expansion and compression) to adjust the behavior
of the suspension.
It 'also of fundamental importance, before you adjust the various
parameters recorded on a sheet the positions of all the records and the
conduct of any motion to change, so you can always go back. Remember to
always make small changes at a time and test the result, during the
test try to isolate mentally behavior of the front and rear of the
bike.
Remember also that during the tests tires must be in excellent
condition and have a good grip, otherwise the motion will have
unexpected behavior, and thus will mislead the regulation of the suspensions.
Last premise that there is not the perfect setting that we can
adapt to all as, the behavior of the bike, so the ideal setup, depends
among other things including the style of driving of the pilot.
What are the suspensions
The suspension of a motorcycle are formed by the two forks, which
are the front and mono shock, or just mono, which is
the rear . There are also bikes that instead of the two forks have a
system with shock leverage the front (BIMOTA TESI) as there are bikes with double
rear shock absorber instead of mono at the rear.
The suspension, in its most simplified form, consists of a spring
that supports a weight system and a hydraulic dampening the
oscillations produced in response to a change (sudden) the position of
the spring.
We have the opportunity to speak on the suspension by increasing
the "rigidity" of the spring (or rather, its elastic constant) called
preload of the spring, we can make it slower or faster than the brake
hydraulic rebound, which we will call and brake extension, where
possible, we can also adjust a hydraulic brake which occurs during
compression of the spring, which they called compression brake.
The suspensions of racing motorcycle, but also those of the
most advanced sports motorcycle, also allow you to adjust the slow
fluid and fast fluid: it has been talked much about it in articles
that are on the net that speak of suspension settings, then we
see a moment about this matter.
When entering the curve, the front of the bike sinks, forks and
shock are crushed to earth, this movement is not abrupt and the fluid
that circulates in the suspension movements will be slow, hence the name
fluid slow. But if we carry out the braking suddenly, or open the gas
at the stroke of the curve, or trajectory of change so quickly., The
fluid will make travel very fast, hence the middle name. The setting
fluid separate slow and fast, we can allow for example to sink a little
with the suspension when detached (by checking the fluid speed) and
thus have a greater excursion during the curve (by checking the fluid
lens).
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Fluency of the fork and maintenance
Before starting to work on suspensions because maybe we have
noticed strange behavior, you need to check their efficiency, to make
sure that problems do not reside elsewhere.
If the smoothness of the fork is not perfect, the behavior of the
bike suffers significant imbalances, the fluidity may be compromised by
certain factors such as poor maintenance, accidents have occurred or
incorrect installation.
For example, if we disassembled the front wheel to change the
tire, when the back some precautions should be followed an incorrect
penalty parallel ranges that would just flow. Therefore, before you
tighten the bolt of the front wheel, it is necessary to give strong
push on the handlebar (possibly by operating the front brake lever) in
order to make a sinking of the forks as wide as possible, which means
that the forks are placed in position ideal, and only at this point we
can tighten the bolt.
We recall also that the proper maintenance of the suspension is
responsible for their efficiency and it is therefore necessary to
replace the oil every 10-15000 miles.
Note on the meaning of the regulations:
usually increase the settings in clockwise and counterclockwise
lower. Normally, the adjustment screws is written the effect
corresponding to the direction of rotation, if that is not reported, we
present the standard just mentioned.
What is the Preload and it's effect
A preload spring means compress a little before applying a weight. The figure below shows where the records in preload forks (external lives - especially A) and mono shock (ring - notably B):
To adjust the preload of the fork is necessary to rotate with an
external screw, while in mono you need to loosen the top ring which
acts as "nut" for the lower, then adjust the preload of the spring
acting on the ring below.
It should be noted that the suspensions are preloaded, even if the
records are at zero, as opposed to a force greater than zero at the
initial thrust, and if a spring is not preloaded, enough for a small
force can move, even if little.
The adjustment of the preload does not change the elastic constant
of the spring but only its initial impetus, and therefore normally not
upset the trim of the bike and we could act on this without going to
touch the other settings. This is not entirely true as a penalty when
you increase the preload should be increased a little extension of the
brake and vice versa. Moreover, this is absolutely true in our
mountains half a variable pitch spring ", ie a spring in which the
helix has a variable pitch and therefore the elastic constant (thus the
behavior of the suspension) varies depending on the position spring.
The variable pitch springs are installed on certain types of scooter.
Preload of mono can be increased when, for example, often carry
the passenger or luggage, and some bikes have a lever with two
convenient locations (with a passenger - without passenger) through
which adjust very quickly, in this case we have the need for
compromises between when we travel or discharge loads.
Another thing to note is that the adjustment of the preload will
vary little, let the ground motorcycle since the spring, with the
weight added to the motion to strike is not. This, as will be seen
below, will also cause a different handling in the curves
Adjusting the brake with the fork in extension
The screw of C in particular can make this adjustment.
Let's see how it should be given the exact adjustment of the brake-up:
* Compress the handlebars a few times taking curbed the front;
* Compress more time with the decision;
* At the maximum compression reached, stop pushing the handlebars but continuing to hold pulled of the front brake lever
* The forks shall return and after get down a little
* If the forks come back and get down and then they rise again, it means that we have curbed not much the extension, even if for a motorcycle with a touring attitude
that could still be good.
* If after leaving the stem does not rise at all, means that we have slowed the expansion too.
The brakes in expansion and the problems of structure
We will see the following behaviors of the bike in a more organic way, but
we can anticipate the most common problems caused by improper brake
extension:
* If the front and rear are just holding back the motorcycle waves on the fast going
* If the front and rear are too restrained the motorcycle fails to copy the
depressions, springs do not recharge, suspensions are totally compressed and
the bike becomes rigid.
Adjusting of the brake in extension of mono
Is carried out through the screw which is located at the bottom of the mono (particularly in figure D).
The correct adjustment is made in extending compressing down the mono
(obviously with the help of several people) and timing the time of
delivery, which must be between 1 and 1.5 seconds.
Chris Cranias CEC 2 months ago
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