Rix wrote on 01/15/14 at 08:26:09:The thought of a hardtail makes my kidneys hurt.
Why? Run the rear tire at 25-30 psi and it is fine. But it will still handle better at 35-40 psi. Rigid frames handle better, you can feel when you are pushing the machine beyond is design limits. Shocks and swingarms (not to mention those god awful hydraulic forks) mask handling issues. A rigid frame doesn't give you any side to side chassis oscillation, or in layman's terms, corner wobble, that you get with a swingarm. There is zero inherent play, a set of shocks gives you four points of movement, that compound on each other when the bushings start to wear a bit (because most riders are too lazy/uneducated to lube the pivot points).
I'll take a rigid frame with a springer any day of the week, and twice on the weekends, over a hydraulic fork equipped squishy frame. And I'll take a pickup truck with an I-beam/leaf spring front end over an IFS for the same reason, fewer points of movement that wear and need attention to maintain proper geometry and road feel.
I'm so disgusted with the swingarm frame, hydraulic forks, electronic ignition and electric only start on the Savage that I'm just about ready to load it into the burn pile and wash my hands of it. Yes, my 98 looks 1000x better than a stock version. Yes, it works a lot better than a stock version. It is still a pile of modern poor design thinly disguised as a motorcycle.