[mocoloco]

blew every last penny on setting up my engine and New a arms and New spaghetti and what have you. now all i need is shocks. before i I'm that far, how can i tune my stock shocks to give me a little more bounce? they are sluggish! my buddy has a kfx also and his stocks feel way better than mine. i don't know about rebound or dampening or any of the terminology, but would love if someone can break it down for me and school me on the subject. also, fox float r front shocks- good or bad? not looking to get evol or stage 5 elka or anything else fancy. i am not gonna race. just need a more comfortable ride. unless someone has a killer deal on here. thanks

 

[mr.bigwheel]

It is the valving which is controlled by the shim stack. You can adjust your rebound but my experience was that it could not be adjusted near enough without re-stacking the shims. When i opened mine up I thought the stack was insanely stiff so I texted a pic of it to a suspension guy who said it was one of the stiffest he had seen. Since i bought my bike second hand we don't know whether it was stock or not though.

 

[mocoloco]

Thank you for your input. The job sounds a little time consuming, so maybe it will have to wait until after my dune trip at the end of the moth. I just wish I found some money laying out on the road or something like that haha. Thanks!

 

[kawirider33]

fox float r shocks arent very good from what i hear if you where looking to get your stock shocks done get them re valved and re sprung im sure that would proboly be better then those fox shocks

 

[mitch15]

Monster performance will revavle the stockers for your weight for $216 plus shipping
Spring kits are more but he'll tell you if you need them or not

 

[mr.bigwheel]

Our local guy is $200 to revalve a pair of fronts I believe. I think the crazy valving is most of the problem and since changing springs is easily done yourself, I think you should start with the revalve and then decide if you will still need springs. The stock springs are progressive and are pretty soft so they should work good for trail or cross country.

 

[tscracing]

The adjuster at the bottom of the shock is rebound. Turn it counter clockwise, to soften it up. Which will make it rebound quicker.

 

[Duster]

How the springs do or don't work depends on your weight. So does the valving.

Most folks think both the springs and valving sucks.

It lands a jump pretty good but everything else is horrible.

 

[shaggyman660]

I'm not trying to sound like an a$$ here but if your not decent at adjusting coil over shocks you will hate fox shocks, they are harder to tune.

Stock shocks badly need resprung and revalved. I got mine "OK" by turning the compression all the way down and then adding clicks after I rode it . I ended up slowing the rebound and adding, and I'm guessing here, 3-6 clicks compression from all the way down (set at 11 from factory if I remember right)

Compression is top adjustment, rebound is the bottom.

 

[mr.bigwheel]

It lands a jump pretty good but everything else is horrible.

I Agree with that

 

[Duster]

When you are heavier than OEM spring rate like I am, then you also get to add pogo bounce to that. Probably at a rate of around 2 per second in addition to all the rest.

Respringing helps a ton, but you are right... one of the stiffest valving stacks out there, yet has little body roll resistance. This is because it is valved in a way that the slower the compression speed the less resistance it has and the faster, the more it has. Works OK for landings but sucks at everything else. They pretty much got the valving opposite of what it should be.

As far as adjustments... lol... some people have been able to find a sweet spot. But I never could find it. They have to much cross effect to get them right. Adjust the rebound, effects compression. Adjust compression, effects rebound.

 

[prityboy69]

I was plying with one of my stock shocks the other day w/o springs. I would crank the compression all the way down and it would lock the shock completely up. It wouldn't compress or rebound.

 

[kfxrider45]

Go on eBay an grab a set of race tech springs, it'll take you 30min to install an you'll be happy with them. I just sold a set to my buddy an he LOVES them.

 

[mocoloco]

Yea... I will just mess with the adjustment before I buy anything. Thank you all for the input. So what I plan to do is turn the compression up a little, then the rebound down a lot, tighten the springs up and just keep messing with it until I get a good feel for it. Now when I comes to riding, I just grip it and rip it. Where I notice it being sluggish is actually when I literally push down on the bike via bumper, or grab bar. Just doesn't feel smooth. Knowing that, tells me that the bike can be run way smoother than it is.

 

[mocoloco]

I'm not trying to sound like an a$$ here but if your not decent at adjusting coil over shocks you will hate fox shocks, they are harder to tune.

Stock shocks badly need resprung and revalved. I got mine "OK" by turning the compression all the way down and then adding clicks after I rode it . I ended up slowing the rebound and adding, and I'm guessing here, 3-6 clicks compression from all the way down (set at 11 from factory if I remember right)

Compression is top adjustment, rebound is the bottom.

It's alright if I'm not decent at it, that's what I have all of you guys here for, right?!!

 

[Duster]

Hygear also usually has nice spring kits on ebay also.

 

[neverstopwheelie]

So i can replace the springs without tearing the whole shock apart? Does the bottom come apart

 

[Duster]

Yes.

You loosen the preload rings up, then figure out how to get the lower spring collars off.

Some situations require a spring compressing tool to compress the spring enough to get things apart. Not sure on this with the KFX. I opted to just spend the extra for the revalve and respring which included this work.

 

[knaffie]

I sent my stock shocks out to GT Thunder and they are night and day better. Different valving and different springs makes a world of difference. Unless you're into hardcore racing, I don't see the need for different shocks if you're keeping the factory a-arms.

 

[RaginRoyal]

Not trying to hijack the thread or anything... But I have adjusted my shocks to the point where they are almost tollerable for the fast trail riding that I do, but like everyone else seems to feel its just not enough. Would swapping out my stock springs for double or tripple rate springs be worth the money and effort without the revalve?