XR650LANE, on 08 February 2012 - 10:57 PM, said:

i should have taken more pictures.... too busy drinking beer and asking dumb questions.

Well those things are important too when you get together with buddies in the shop

Just to close the loop for those who may care, my swap turned out great. I am very happy with the resulting product. My bike feels completely different. A little harsher on the street, but way more surefooted on the trail. These 49mm Showa forks are a good candidate for USD swapping on XRL's.

Here are a couple of finished product shots:

nice lane, its christian from over on adv

hey couple of quickies for you

1) have you noticed more sag on your usds? free sag I mean.

2) have you ridden in specific terrain where you rode before with the stock suspension and what are the details, I did and want to compare with others

3) are you planning or respringing or revalving the front or are you content with stock usds?

cheers

love the headlight

christian

Hey Christian,

I read through your swap post today, great looking XR you have there.

1. The sag on the forks is about the same. ≈1". Also, my bike no longer does the big nose dive on braking like it did before.

2. Yes, my bike just feels more stable with the USD's It handles the bumps and ruts better and is just more planted than it was. I am definitely able to go faster on the same sections of trail than before. I am not riding anything at crazy race speeds, I ride for fun. I ride a mixture of street, dirt/gravel road, and single track trails.

3. I cut one coil out of the fork springs and added a spacer to take up the space left by the shorter spring. Shortening a coil spring stiffens it, changing the spring rate, not just increasing the preload like just adding a spacer would have. My springs are approximately about a .46 kg/mm or so. I resprung the shock as well with a 12.0 kg/mm Eibach spring. I rebuilt the forks and shock but no valving changes, just new seals and fluids. For the riding I do I have enough adjustment in my clickers front and rear that I don't think I'll need to revalve anything. I'm loving my new setup. My race sag sets up perfectly front and rear for me with these springs and the bike is performing well for me.

The headlight is awesome, very bright but not offensive to others on the road with the high-low feature.

good stuff lane

well I rechecked my static and race sag up front and I was off

im at 1.5 inches bike standing and over 2.5 with me on or so

I think thats borderline too much so Ill check into my fork specs but yeah so far so good

again sweet bike

cheers

I do however have nose dive...less than stock...I think Im too plush on the fork oil amount as they set it up at 10cc less than minimum, but that was based on trail riding versus motocross in order to get more plush action...

anyways

thanks again

Lane,

Your bike looks great! Did you have issues with the steering stops and if so, how did you resolve them? Got pics? Thanks.

taco250, on 20 April 2012 - 08:38 AM, said:

Same forks here... the stops don't line up quite right. They are close, but not quite right. I ignore it