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SuzukiSavage.com
/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl General Category >> Rubber Side Down! >> Suzuki savage lowering front fork /cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1580916751 Message started by Meeks on 02/05/20 at 07:32:30 |
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Title: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by Meeks on 02/05/20 at 07:32:30 Hi, Has anyone have any insight to converting a 2009 suzuki savage to a cafe racer? I am looking at kits online but I would rather just lower the front fork so it has more of a cafe racer look. The attached pic is my bike and I circled the areas ( on the front fork) that I want lowered. I am wondering if this would be a more affordable route then buying a complete cafe racer kit. Could I purchase a new (shorter) front fork? If so does anyone have any recommendations? |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by Mavigogun on 02/05/20 at 09:29:46 The forks run from the front wheel hub up through the "triple tree"- the bracket that bridges between forks and the steering head welded to the front of the frame. What you've circled are the handle bar risers. You could install shorter risers; you could forsake them altogether and install clip on handle bars directly to the forks; however, doing either of those things wont change important aspects of your steering geometry that account for sought after other-than-straight-line race-character steering- particularly rake -and the later will dispense with a modicum of mechanical advantage offered by the modest tiller introduced by the risers. The angle of the Savage front end makes for heavy, predictable, un-cafe like handling; to summons some race agility, you'll need to lower the front end a bit- by lowering the triple tree down the forks, shortening the forks, swapping out for a smaller front wheel, lowering the back wheel, or swapping out the back wheel for a larger wheel. Or a combination of those things. That's my understanding. Searching this forum for words like "stance" and "shorten forks" will yield ample how-to's and how-not-to's. |
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Title: Stance Impact Post by Mavigogun on 02/05/20 at 09:53:01 The stock Savage lacks agility that prevents navigating traffic opportunistically- predictability for and of new riders seems the intent. I wonder, just how much of an impact will making those typical stance changes have on Savage handling? Will handling just be lightened up a very minor amount, or remarkably? |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by srinath on 02/05/20 at 10:34:00 Savage has too high an offset and too high of a positive trail. Rake 35 deg, trail 147 mm (5.8 in) The axle is ahead of the neck through line. High offset = higher handlebar effort. High positive trail = stability to the point of not wanting to turn at all, low or high speed. Small positive trail makes for good maneuverability while staying stable - I can absolutely vouch for the improvement in agility and steering effort of a savage by changing the offset of the triples, which will get trail to a small positive one. So, I raked a savage 9 degrees via triple trees. Not cutting the frame. Wheel base went up almost 12", and the trail was so far negative that it was unrideable because the dirt bike forks had an axle offset, I had the same offset at the triples due to having to use the savage tank. So wheelbase increased, triples offset same (high handlebar effort), axle offset increased, resulting in a huge increase in trail, something of the order of 18" probably. The rotational kinetic energy was cut in about 1/2 at the same road speed due to fitting a 21" wheel 90 wide tire and aluminum rim. Slower spinning lighter wheel at the same speed. Didn't even matter, unrideable. Then I flipped the fork legs left to right. So the leading front axle became trailing front axle, and the rake at the neck increased but wheel base decreased. Instant improvement, both in stability and maneuverability. Hard to explain but a long time modifier I knew told me to flip it and it worked. Anyway that steering effort and lack of maneuverability are huge and Suzuki should have set it up with a Front end more like a GS500 than the one it had, and seriously the tank is the biggest reason why. They had to have the gauge pod in the tank, so its super wide in the front, else it would be even more stupid so that's where its ended up. If they had to have that triple clamp offset due to the tank, the least they could have done is to fit a 21' aluminum wheel and put the axle behind the fork legs. I guess in 1986 they didn't know trail was so important and 5+" are a miserable number which really only reason it even is useable is the fact its 350lb and super low to the ground. Then there are those buckhorn bars. Absolutely terrible for your wrist. Its almost as if they're trying to create carpal tunnel for their customers. Somebody oughta tell them, hey try not to kill your customers. Then you cant sell them sheiite. PS - I get what I did now, OK Savage has a huge positive trail. 5.8". I ended up subtracting almost 12" to that, not adding 12". I ended with a big negative trail. My rake went up compensating for a lot of the 12" increase but I still ended up with the axle ahead of the neck through line aka negative trail. That's why the handling went from bad to worse. However the flip to training axle increased the rake a bit, moved the neck through line a bit more forward, but the trailing axle dropped the axle back behind the neck through line leaving me with a small positive trail, and the lower rotational inertia etc etc made for a bike that handled like a charm. Basically raking the bike at the triples has to be accompanied by a way to put the axle behind the fork legs ,else you end up with negative trail. That's the most important number. You want a small positive number for better handling for both stability and maneuverability to be good. It gets bigger and positive, you start to lose maneuverability for stability. It gets negative and you lose both. How do those seeger kits make the bike handle ? They even make them for a lot bigger bikes, Intruder and Vulcan don't they ? Cool. Srinath. |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by Gary_in_NJ on 02/05/20 at 13:21:43 http://suzukisavage.com/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1421689358 |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by Mavigogun on 02/05/20 at 15:23:17 Great resource, Gary- much thanks. This thread on rake and trail has a few jems: http://suzukisavage.com/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1424120242 As dose portions of this thread which began with steering dampening questions: http://suzukisavage.com/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1488745527/24 |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by zipidachimp on 02/06/20 at 17:42:05 I bought Spammy's DC MOTIVE top tree, lowered the front end 30mm, taller shocks at the rear, steering now has much less understeer, much more enjoyable in the twisties, and I retain full fork travel. https://dcmotive.com/products/suzuki-ls650-s40-savage-flat-pinch-triple-clamp Cheers! 8-) |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by Mavigogun on 02/06/20 at 21:57:12 2C3F263F3237353E3F3B26560 wrote:
Do those come as a pair, or must you order 2? |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by SpamyToo on 02/07/20 at 02:26:50 The top clamp comes in 2 styles, for use with handlebars or use with clipons. If you purchase the handlebar version you also should purchase the risers. The risers come in 3 size varieties, 7/8", 1" and 1-1/8" fatbar styles. The risers come as a pair and include all the hardware needed to attach them. Other risers can be used but keep in mind that the mounting hole is for a 12mm bolt. You go up to 1/2" and you will need to chase the hole with a 1/2" bit. And the top of the triple is inset so some fat risers may need to be trimmed on the bottom to seat properly. |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by Gary_in_NJ on 02/07/20 at 05:32:00 This same company made the upper T-clamp for RYCA. Dave got an early one and was not happy with the finish (machine marks from the CNC process). Hopefully they’ve sorted that all out, because the price is very fair. |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by Armen on 02/07/20 at 05:34:32 I followed Gary's article and modified a lower tree for use as a top one. Not a ton of work, and much cheaper than the aftermarket ones. |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by Gary_in_NJ on 02/07/20 at 06:31:16 10233C343F510 wrote:
Yep, mine cost me $25 and about 20-30 minutes of my time. But the happiness I get knowing that I did it myself will last a lifetime. That is the essence of custom building. |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by srinath on 02/07/20 at 06:35:02 0C3F2028234D0 wrote:
That was a brilliant idea wasn't it. BTW if you drill the riser holes at 3.5" c-c and 1/2" dia, you can simply slap Harley risers which are available by the billion and cheap in ebay etc. Cool. Srinath. |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by Mavigogun on 02/07/20 at 10:19:45 A link to Gary's work on the triple: http://suzukisavage.com/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1426265605/0#0 ...and another thread where he discusses related stuff: http://suzukisavage.com/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1421689358/0 |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by ohiomoto on 02/07/20 at 10:57:38 What the (one post) OP is asking is actually two things. a) How to lower the handlebars, and b) hot to lower/shorten the frontend/forks. To lowered the bar, it has been pointed out that the risers can be swapped out with some that don't rise as much. The simplest way to do that is with OEM risers from earlier model LS650s that came with the buckhorn bars. Other risers could be used with some modifications as pointed out. You can use different bars in either case. Other option is to simply remove the risers all together and use clip-on bars made for 1" controls. To lowered forks, you could replace the top triple clamp as pointed out. This allows you to raise the forks in the clamps to lower the frontend. This nice because you can retain the stock travel. The same results can be achieved by having the fork tubes shortened and keeping the top clamp. The main difference is the fork tubes don't stick out of the top clamp. In either case, you can only lower the forks ~2" before you risk having the front wheel interfering with the lower triple clamp when it bottoms out. Care is required. Another, less expensive way of lowering the fork tubes is with travel reducing spacers. The more you reduce the travel, the lower the frontend is. The advantage here is that it's simple, there is no risk of the front wheel interference, and you can reduce the travel as much as you want. Ride quality suffers a bit, but there are plenty of LS650s out there running with 2" spacers in the legs. It's the Cafe Kit standard |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by batman on 02/09/20 at 08:39:39 It would seem that we all know how to lower the forks from all the that's been stated above. What I don't understand is the logic of doing it as the first mod on a stock bike, dropping the forks doesn't make much sense , lowering the ground clearance , without the use of mid controls? |
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Title: Re: Suzuki savage lowering front fork Post by zipidachimp on 02/09/20 at 12:27:01 It steers nicer ! cheers! 8-) |
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