Bdog wrote: 750 R1, I have found that when someone prefaces any statement with “I’m not trying to be an ass” they are about to be an ass.
Not at all, I am not great at getting my point across by typing, {I'm getting old, typing was for secretaries when I went to school} ,the biggest problem I find with written word is that it {or emotion} can be interpreted any way the reader likes, and people get offended far to easily these days, again, I meant no offense, I can tend to make things sound a bit blunt at times, but as I said, no offense intended. I had a look at your bike and it has a stock length gsxr swingarm, which is longer than stock kawasaki , your front end has the Zx clamps and forks, you have a 17 inch front wheel. I based my observations on these. I've been doing conversions like this for some time now . I have a friend who, apart from being a National race champion, is a mechanical engineer, makes his own racing frames and exhaust systems, is brilliant at setting up both race bikes, and sidecar race outfit suspensions , His twin brother also races vintage Japanese bikes, he's currently racing a 1100cc 1972 CB750 with a ceriani front end, I'm lucky to have access to a lot of very good gear and knowledge, I'm actually using his shop to modify my 750 R1 suspension and frame at the moment, I need his lathe to make up spring and axle spacers . lengthen the damper rods in the forks to match the longer fork tubes, and fit the swingarm . Motorcycle suspension is a bit of a pet project of mine, I've always been around racing , my father even raced jaguars in the 1960's. Don't get me wrong, your bike looks great, your suspension, after sorting out spring rates and adjustment would ride better than new easily, my point was you could definitely make changes to the geometry to make it more corner friendly, I'm not trying to bash it at all, I've seen some absolutely ridiculous bikes with bits and pieces from half a dozen different bikes bolted on and they all think they handle just great, in all reality, most wouldn't have a clue what a good handling motorcycle is like to ride. If you would like to know what your trail is, I'd need the fork length, from centre of the front axle to the top of the fork, the rake of the stock Kawasaki frame, the triple clamp offset , the diameter of the front tire fitted to the rim and the wheelbase, if I also had the equivalent stock dimensions of the 650, I could give a good comparison to the stock bike. I just finished reading another book on motorcycle suspension written in the mid 90's, It was kind of boring because it just went over everything I'd already read and understood, it was full of formulas that are no longer needed thanks to computers and rake and trail calculators, that use the very same formulas.. Suspension hasn't changed much in the last 30 odd years , it just been refined....
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