Kawasaki Sportsbike Riders Club - Australia - Online Forum

There you go Gos.
When the bike you start with is already crappy, I'm more than happy to mix and match parts and do my own spanner work. (plus I'm a tight prick )
Have not ridden it yet. The front end feels a bit mushy. I'll have a play around with settings.
The forks were shipped to me lying down (obviously) - would that cause any problems with the oil running somewhere it shouldn't??
Regards Simon

Don't worry, gravity will take care of the oil! Set your rider sag (@35mm) and go from there!

Strika wrote:Don't worry, gravity will take care of the oil! Set your rider sag (@35mm) and go from there!

WHAT ????

The guy is asking for suspenion tips, and you are going to leave it at THAT ????

I would have thought a reference to smallgoods would have been in order !!!!

Simon - that looks great - you will have to do a bit of tuning on that front end to get it working properly, one step at a time is the best bet, that way its easy to reverse anything that makes it feel worse.....

The oil will be fine, as long as the fork seals are still OK. For short periods, lying forks down isn't going to stuff them. One of the first things I would be doing is a fork oil change (If you haven't already done it). Just go with good quality Motul / Bel Ray etc, in stock amounts and weight for the 7. (They may not vary much in specs from either bike anyway, with a bit of luck).

This will give you a good base-line to work from, before the real tuning starts.....

Gosling1 wrote:

Strika wrote:Don't worry, gravity will take care of the oil! Set your rider sag (@35mm) and go from there!

WHAT ????

The guy is asking for suspenion tips, and you are going to leave it at THAT ????

I would have thought a reference to smallgoods would have been in order !!!!

hehehe! I dropped one in there the other day Gos.......and sure enough it only took a day or so before I had the drag on the reel spinning line off!!!

Now..back to this set of forks. That model 9 had the same issues that the standard J and L model ZXr's had of horrible compression damping. They tend to hydraulic lock on sharp bumps. meaning loads too much high speed comp damping or possibly a shit shim set up. Either way they benefit from lighter weight fork oil. Try a 5wt at a touch more than standard levels. Personally, I reckon it's worth the $300 spend to have them redone. I'm not sure where you are but there are plenty around. Mick Hams knows a guy called neil who says he knows a bit if you're in Qld, if in NSW loads of guys speak highly of Terry Hay at Shock Treatment and if in Vic Trevor Manly at TM performance is a bit good! If in S.A. .....my condolences!

actually if he were here in SA we got Hoey..and hes GOOD...

Neka79 wrote:actually if he were here in SA we got Hoey..and hes GOOD...

I was more referring to the fact that they had to 1. live there and 2. Share the state with you mate!

Thanks for the advice guys.
I'm in Cairns, far north Queensland, so anything that needs doing has to be sent 1800km south to Brisbane
I'll try setting the sag first and then ride it around for a while and see how it feels. In all honesty - for now I'll just be happy not having to replace fork seals every 300km
I'm wondering about the fork oil level. Because the 9R forks have the longer outer/upper tubes (about 50mm) I'm thinking the oil level (air gap) and hence the amount of oil will be different from the ZXR750 legs?
I found a web site a while ago that explains front suspension setup in a fair bit of detail. I'll have to find it and try and learn something
Thanks again for the help
Regards Simon

short n fat wrote:Thanks for the advice guys.
I'm in Cairns, far north Queensland, so anything that needs doing has to be sent 1800km south to Brisbane
I'll try setting the sag first and then ride it around for a while and see how it feels. In all honesty - for now I'll just be happy not having to replace fork seals every 300km
I'm wondering about the fork oil level. Because the 9R forks have the longer outer/upper tubes (about 50mm) I'm thinking the oil level (air gap) and hence the amount of oil will be different from the ZXR750 legs?
I found a web site a while ago that explains front suspension setup in a fair bit of detail. I'll have to find it and try and learn something
Thanks again for the help
Regards Simon

good luck with that fancy book learnin !!