A few months ago I found out of new cartridge emulators, manufactured by Korean YSS.

http://www.yssusa.com/products_yss_pdforkvalve.html

As the Racetech emulators are quite expensive when shipped to Europe I decided to get a pair of these (72€ incl. shipping), size 310, suitable for Suzuki GS500 and others with same sized fork tubes.

Using the spring calculator at Racetech site I found out that they recommend same springs for Kawasaki Ninja 250 as they do for Savage, and they also told that the stock springs for the Ninja are 0.65 kg/mm. So, these springs should fit the mighty Savage as well

As they're not that expensive ($22) I decided to order a pair: https://www.partzilla.com/product/kawasaki/44026-0126

I got the inspiration to do this from Gary_in_NJ's excellent thread: http://suzukisavage.com/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1498156004/1

YSS instruction manual https://www.yss.co.th/downloads/20161222023100.pdf states that this size of fork tubes requires six 8 mm holes. So, let's drill.

Poured some 15W oil in, measured it so that the oil level is 75mm from top of the fork tube, according to Clymers. YSS manual said to add 2 turns of preload to the fork valve springs, so I did just that.

Upgrade wasn't that hard, took a couple of hours and a few beers with a friend.

The front end feels much better already, much faster response and smoother feel. Have to wait a few weeks before I can take it to a test ride  

justin_o_guy2 wrote on 03/28/18 at 10:04:08:


Too much ice and snow on the roads to do proper testing just yet  
That spring rate should be a decent match for a lightened Savage and a 80 kg rider.

Gary_in_NJ wrote on 03/28/18 at 10:27:38:


Good info. Luckily it should be easy to remove the excess oil with a syringe and some rubber tubing, just have to calculate the volume.

Here is the figures you'll need to adjust the oil height:

For the forks used on the CS-1 Café, each 8.55ml (0.289oz) of oil added or removed equates to a 10mm change in oil height (the forks have an ID of 33mm and solving for this equation gives us the volume of fluid: Volume = Pi x R^2 x Length).

I checked my records and my air gap is actually 140mm. So if the goal air gap is 140mm and you're at 75mm, that's a difference of 65mm. Each 10mm equals 8.55ml so 6.5x8.55 = 55.58ml to be removed.

Matchless G11 wrote on 04/04/18 at 14:47:14:


It's a stainless fender bought from ebay, some greek seller. Still need to make a mounting bracket for it from stainless 115mm tube.

I like those sag values. Spot on.