Fork set up help

[Ranmore]

I was wondering is anyone would be able to give me some insight into how to improve the forks of my bike. the bike in question is an 03. At the moment they are really soft and very time i go over any substantive kicker they completely compress and then the much stiffer rear shock kicks the rear of the bike up. i don't really want to make the rear shock softer as with the sort of riding i do i don't see that being overly useful but i also have seen that chaining the shocks or replacing the internals is quite pricy. any help would be ace and I am sure i must be missing something.

[Calum]

It's not a motocross bike. It's a road bike.

It's not designed to go over kickers.

You can do what myself and others have done, and fit USD forks on the bikes quite easily.

But it all depends on how much work you're prepared to put in.

Can try thicker oils and stiffer springs. But you are really limited by the fact it's a road bike designed to do light offroading

[oldman]

@ranmore Why don't you refresh the oil with the next grade oil and add a couple of spacers to stiffen the springs. Low cost solution, or do as Calum says if you want to upgrade significantly.

[Arild]

just gonna pop in here and say that ive tried both 10w and 15w oil in my forks and idk if any other people noticed a difference but i barely did myself. Adding spacers is a good solution if ur going down the road commuting with the bike, you lose some travel this way tho, but from what u explained it sounds like ur riding mx tracks with the bike, so u dont wanna lose fork travel. And tbh for it to handle well in that situation would probably to get a pair of forks that are made to go on those tracks, like a pair of usd from a yz or something, just what calum said up above, its alot more work compared to just switching the oil but if ur gonna use it on mx tracks in my eyes there would be no other route to go

[oldman]

Imho if you're going on an mx track you are on the wrong bike, sorry

[Calum]

@oldman No power and not set up to cope with the abuse tbh.

[SpookDog]

Compressing the springs doesn’t stiffen the fork, unfortunately. All it does is ‘remove’ how ever many inches you compress, of the softer travel. You only really pretension the spring to adjust for rider weight I think...

There are good aftermarket progressive springs available. Just search for them and find ones in your price range...

[Ranmore]

thanks for all the advise, i realise that the bike is not suitable but i don't have a tone of cash and am trying to get my full ticket so i don't see much point in selling the DT to buy another bike. To be honest it could probably do with some new fork oil so i will start with that and see where i end up.

[DTR+NSR]

I've fitted longer spacers in my front forks, which has made them stiffer. Much better for road use. With out, the front end used to dive a stupid amount under hard braking, often causing the rear to lock with the weight transfer (road tyres). And that was on freshly rebuilt forks.
Also not all grades of fork oil are equal, one brands 10w might be anothers 15w. Your best looking at the cst rating of the oil to compare them.

[Arild]

@dtr-nsr
What is the length of the spacers u put in the forks??

[DTR+NSR]

@arild I think they were 50mm longer than stock. That was for road use though, but did seem ok green Laning at the weekend.