Ohlins candyland on ebay...

[signit98]

...this guy has 420 original coil over springs for ohlins shocks and he is selling them for $20!!! each...

I ordered some for my sport shocks... and, even if it does not work... so what, I spent $20 for a spring that I will use eventually!

I just talked to him, he seems nice and ligit... and he's looking for stuff that will fit my bikes...

go and search for number 170124701742

It was worth it to me...

[lightfighter]

is there really any benifit to putting an ohlins spring on factory shock? can this even be done?

[signit98]

...I will let yoou know, as I have ordered the shocks needed to "spice up" my sport suspension.

The ohlins internals are different with different valving, flow ratings and such, but the springs are different as well... harder with different progression rates.

I look at it this way: "if it works, I have a $40 upgrade that I will enjoy... if not, I have some cool ohlins springs to take of space on my crowded desk and collect dust"

[throttlemeister]

I replaced the original (way too soft) sports springs on mine with HyperPro springs and the difference is night and day. $40 is an excellent deal and possibly the best and cheapest upgrade possible.

[signit98]

...Thank you, Sir... even more reason to look forward to the outcome of that experiment... the guy also said that - should it be needed - he will gladly exchange the springs to springs with different ratings (a step up or down if neccesary).

[roger albert]

> is there really any benifit to putting an ohlins spring on factory shock?


Depends on the required rate. The O springs are no better or worse than any other brandname spring. Just a way of getting the right rate for the rider. In many cases, a heavier spring can work worse when you run into a lack of rebound damping, but it can sometimes work.

> can this even be done?

Just a matter of matching ID, OD, Freelength, and rate.
Case by case basis.

[lightfighter]

i went ahead and ordered one for the rear. he says the front springs he has would be too stiff for my app. that he would say this tends to make me believe he is credible. the rear will make a nice weekend tinker project...

[Rapid Dog]

...um, Roger, aren't you going to do the safety talk?...

[lightfighter]

safety talk??? am i about to kill myself?

[roger albert]

Probably not kill yourself, but if you're not careful, you can remove your finger, or, as in my case, despite many years of experience, nearly remove your finger. I'm sure there are some gruesome photos here somewhere, as well as examples of very bad typing, which I blame equally on the pain, the drugs, and the external fixating pins sticking out of my middle finger.

Do be careful. After 6 months and lots of PT and $$, I'm up to 75% motion

[lightfighter]

oh, ok... my ase cert expired a decade ago, but ive been around struts a bit.. a wise warning though. compressed springs are nothin to messwith if you dont know what you are doing.

[SergioK]

So this begs the question, on a motorcycle, is it better to have the shock do most of the work or the spring do most of the work?

I know that my personal opinion on my other BMW (3'er) is for the spring to do the majority of the work and to have the shocks dol less work. My current coilovers (Bilstein PSS9) are sprung way too soft and the shock is overloaded by my style of driving. Anyway, suspension tuning on a bike isn't exactly the same thus my question.

[roger albert]

The spring should always do most of the 'work' Car, Motorcycle, bicycle. True of any nonactive system.

[JonyRR]

I put bilsteins and H&R springs on my 530I last year.
I had two GOOD quality screw-type spring compressers and still I had them bent a bit to get the spring compressed enough to attach the upper strut mount.
be veeeewwwwy caweful wid dis. Get GOOD quality spring compressers and work like a member of the bomb squad...cause that compressed spring IS a bomb waiting to go off in a linear direction.
I screwed this up once on a GM pickup adding some rancho springs and I had a spring go thru the fender sheetmetal. at that, I felt lucky.

[lightfighter]

a center yoke fixed strut compressor is a much better deal... those side mountedspring compressors are not really designed to deal with coil over shock setups at all.

[roger albert]

True, but try to find the good pro-grade stuff dimensioned for bike size springs. Plus, older bike shock designs have a lot of issues with spring/bumper-cup clearance (exactly the situation that bit me) The auto experience is worlds better than none, but tool availability (lack thereof) prevents all the practices from crossing over.

[lightfighter]

dang. until i read that, i hadnt looked. i justfigured one of the 20 or so adapters on my buddy's strut compressor would work. well, ill figure something out. maybe just takes my chances with side clamps. maybe i can fab up a mini strut compressor. that'd be what the tool man would do!

[bradzdotcom]

kinda, sorta off topic, but i have friends getting into stock car racing and on a nascar set-up, one pound of air pressure in a single tire is the equivalent of a 60 pound spring increase on that same tire.

useless info, but i found it fascinating.

[lightfighter]

i wonder if the relativly small volume of air in a cycle tire would change that ratio... im not that mathmatically inclined.... i assume youd be using air pressure to adjust for traction on the track though (i doubt i'll ever see a track, even though i'd like to)

[roger albert]

Hey, if an adapter works well, let me know what it is.
I'd be glad for the education.

Brad, I'm sure there is some super rough equivalent, but those rules only work over a narrow (linear) range for a car, and much less so for a bike with the relatively poor sprung to unsprung mass ratios. In any event, a far smaller value for a bike.

The equivalent manifestation on a bike is lowering tire pressure when a light rider cant' get a tire to heat up enough to stick well and/or the spring is stupid-heavy for them. Then we just drop the pressure.