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A new horse in my stable

5K views 37 replies 8 participants last post by  chronicsmoke 
#1 · (Edited)
I have been discussing with my girlfreind, we were both thinking that I was spending way too much time in the garage to rush my all fab XC racer project and that I have lost the fun of building slowly my stuff to my own specs. But the first race is coming, sooo I have found a good deal on a 06 and I think that two quads is a very good number, one on the table one to ride, insanity starts at four and more depending of the room in your garage.
Note that having one parked in the living room because of a no garage situation is still sane to me, two is crossing the line lol




It came with a trunk full of boxes 3 brand new stock shocks, sniper exhaust, racing tank, flexx bars, precision damper, 3 stadium shocks, all the sprockets ever made, 2 more chains.

It has a GT thunder XC link, first hand down on the single most popular suspension part. I did not even try it, I took it off right away, I had the measurements last winter and put it in an Excel graph. Not what I wanted.

I had drawn a no link swingarm mod intended for poor XC racers last year but never did it...until now !!
I have used my old beaten to death swingarm, I hate bling, but I'll keep the clean swinger for my trail quad later.

So I have made a no link link, huh ?!?







I have made a T out of 4130 tubing, reason is to place the 1/4 inch plates in the best welding spot possible.
Unfortunately I had a spring clearance problem, so I had to make a custom shock spring lock, but I took all the preload adjustment on my final spring, so the 3/4 in spacer came handy.













But from my calculations I needed a stiffer spring, and ... I was right, but my springs did not make it to my door, it require a 8 ish kg/mm spring, I ran a 5,3 last year on my modded CRF shock /link, I had a LTR shock that had a 8,1 spring, but the spacer that I have made won't fit the bigger spring, chopped another chunk of 1 x 4 Al and took another beer cutting a wider spacer...





I'm using the stock shock since the rear stadium had a blown seal, this is a OEM rear shock. Now the quad stands at 3/4 inch free SAG, SAG at 3 1/2 inches with my bacon on it and has still 8 1/2 inches of travel, I have rised my airbox 1 1/4 in and it may still hit it slightly.

Great thing, it require no revalve, OEM valving seem spot on, I get 2 turns on the rebound and a bit high on the comp, but I will see today in my test ride and tomorow I will race it and do whatever is possible to destroy it.

Hope you enjoy my different way of seeing suspension lol

Then late night starter clutch replacement, valves lash, decomp check, decomp was too loose (of course the starter clutch gave way), intakes were set to 0,010, I could hear them, batt relocation and shorai swap, number plates, sticker pulling.

I will try the front end as it is, I'm running out of time. It's 49 inches wide, so I put my rear spacers to match, but I'm afraid to stick between the trees...

My body is not ready, sadly I will be the machine's weak link, but this is another story !
 
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#4 · (Edited)
It's not inside the house, but younger I had a motorcycle in my bedroom during the winter, but how many kids would like to have a toy and have no garage lol.
As long as all the bills are paid mouths fed, butts dressed, the leftover is mine lol and my garage is my own asylium.

Hope to meet you in person Chronic, I will try to race em all, even if I don't care about winning, I'm addicted lol

Fixing the trailer hitch that rusted inside out this winter for now...

We are heading to Ste-Veronique Sat 350+ km, I think franklin was just the training camp, Victoriaville will be mid june, X town beginning August
 
#5 ·
Went for a spin in a deep grooved sand pit, the quad feels good, but I feel the rear may have a bit too much high speed compression, but it works very well, rebound is spot on. I'm able to take the whoops almost as fast as last year. The front is holding me back, it has too little rebound, too much compression on the top of the stroke and the stack of 4 springs is a joke. I wonder why they sell that for XC It has too little power to reset the shocks for the next bump and feels dead. Control is not bad at all.
I miss my last year front end for the woods, but the stockers are too narrow

But I have a monster awaiting it's birth, about two more months of work to go...
 
#6 ·
Very cool idea and fab! I have never seen such creativity with suspension before.
 
#7 ·
Thanks a lot,
the idea was to reuse existing components and optimize for XC racing or woods, combine this one with the front end I made last year, you get a very potent suspension for a fraction of the price. I have many friends that won't race because they say it cost too much money to build a race quad...I see those broke kids that race stock quads and gather pennies to buy expensive part that they can't afford.
So what aftermarket shocks do that the stock shocks can't do ?? How they absork Kinetic energy better, do they absorb more, no, stockers can basically lock solid, they can also free flow and everything in between. Friction is comparable, weight is comparable, they have short stroke that, in my own designs suits me better (but here opinions and theory differ)

I didn't knew how good my last year setup was until I had a reference point from the aftermarket to situate, it's a different approach maybe I got used to then and just liked them better, I will take the time to tweak those front shocks, set the crossovers, revalve them until they perform at their best so I can squeeze all the performance from them to know what they are and what they can do...to pinpoint what they can't do !!
 
#8 ·
Race test is done !!

Went very well, rear was perfect, the bumps were sharper than the training ground and the damping was perfect for square high speed hits.
Landing jumps took all the travel and could bottom here and there, I could catch up on the others in the whoops.
Front was a bit stiff and the steering damper a bit stiff.

As expected I was the weak component lol
I need more oxygen to my muscles and there is only one way to fix this...
I could sit on the quad for extended periods in the woods, that helped a lot to save precious energy.
 
#10 · (Edited)


After half a turn and 4 1/2 to go I broke my rear spring, I knew something was wrong, I could hear loud clunks from the rear end and feel pain from my rear end... but the thing still goes, I could smell hot oil and a whole lot of it, not good, there was menhirs sticking out of the woods sections, roots, stumps, but the thing still goes forward and it's all I care, went by a seat, I have seen fenders, nerf bars but a seat was a clear indicator that it was kinda rough... turned out that the oil was from a guy ahead, maybe a stranded one, I know now that I will blow my engine since I won't stop for anything until the very end, even if I have to dump another grand and a half...will do eventually anyway !
Note that the TM designworks chain guide had lost it's second slider, these things can't survive XC, the tube style seem to be best. The seasonned home made and welded over weld skid plate held up.


turned out 10th over 19 and a sore bottom, stiff legs since I had to stand on the pegs to avoid ejection.





Looks like metal fatigue, from the rust that spring had a defect, a fatigue crack crawling it's way in, as a reminder it was from a LTR450, that was the only Suzuki part on this quad and it broke, what do we learn here ?? Well that we need to cheer up those LTR owners since they have their quads built from part like these...
 
#12 ·
Time to update the 2016.
Facts about last spring build:


  • The stock rear shock worked, but the valving was far from optimal, after two revalves I got it to a point where it would take about anything...that the front let me take !! But overheat so much that it fade under intense whoops. But more heat means absorbing more energy from going faster and returning less energy to my butt, good sign.
  • The "no link" link was a good start, it was lacking an inch in the top and some mean of adjustment to fine tune the bump stop, the airbox is 1.750" above the stock location and has the rear caliper banjo bolt printed 1000 times on it.
  • The front, the part that held me back so much, high friction, too much springs, wheels not touching the ground, vague steering input, but good jumps landing ability, good damping characteristic and good heat dissipation.
  • Engine lacked the throttle response of my 08, huge torque and power on the top.
  • The tiny filmsy aluminium handlebar riser gives me nightmares.
  • Want to run 4+1 rims instead of the 1,5+3,5 stockers.
  • Holeshot GNCC on the front were awesome, Ambush on the rear delaminated, rims lips unprotected all bashed up and massive air leaks.
  • Chain got way too slack and was swallowed between the chain guide and the swingarm, wiped all the teeths of my front sprocket.
  • Skid plate and chain guide were cooked, the TM designwork is not bad but too exposed for XC.
  • So I have decides to go ahead and build my own A arms, even if the aftermarket is flooded with products, there is none truly XC oriented, most are MX style.
  • My poor man modified stock A arms and revalved shocks were by far the best XC front end I had, but 46 inch wide on the grasstrack and MX section held me back to swap them back for 2015.

So I have ordered some expensive metal, made a mock up from scrap steel and started to tune caster camber, travel ball joint angles.

Then I have made two double jigs, machined parts out of 4130 solid round bar and made me a set of my own style.

Then I walked into a powder coating shop close to my work and asked the guy if he had something to keep them from rusting...

He laughed and did this no extra charge, his way..turned out to be an awesome rust protection !!





















 
#13 · (Edited)
For the rear, I have recalculated the optimal pivot location, the old link started to corrode, was too thin and could hit the base of the spring at full droop. I have machined the bearing cups to hold the stock needle bearings. Will install later, I will have to order 2 more springs to fine tune the rear shock, either I fix the stadium rear I have or I build a heat sink for the rear shock, I did last year, and worked great until the chain ripped it off lol, small but significant miscalculation :surprise:



Skid plate was cooked, but it ran flawlessly protecting chain, sprocket, disc brake. I had to weld on it a few times



So I cut some 1/4 plate and 1 inch plate, machined into it and hollow drilled some of it for weight, bought some nylon, milled it and bolted it trough flat 1/4 stock, this should make a pretty extreme duty skid plate and guide >:)
Still need to go get countersunk M8 bolts.



Ported my second head Thanks Mixxer !! and got the seats and deck remachined by Goudreau. Not sure about this one, it did not went as well the firs one, I need more cutters to get exactly the shape I want, but if it does not reach the goal I will be swapping the 08 head, probably the whole engine why not !! If the velocity is high I will be trying the stage 3 cam. If not I will find another head and start over :frown2:

 
#16 · (Edited)
Heeeyy !! Finished the front end and the rear shock and it,s exactly as I have calculated, minor fitment issues, next set I make I will weld brake hose mounts and rise the rear upper bar to clear the tie rods, they are rubbing when fully extended and steering to full lock.
But they are awesome I have revalved many times already to get right everything I could while static, I see many more to come when I start to beat on it !
I have made a dual rate spring calculator using the wheel force, SAG weight, spring rates and calculated the bottom out forces from previous setups and calculated the best spring rate. I would have used a single spring, but it would have SAG too high, so I used a stiff tender spring and a very thin crossover that closes very early, pretty much with the weight of the bike on it, then it's single rate, so call it single spring and a half...
I could have used stock shocks and wanted to do it, but after gutting my stadiums, I liked the low friction bands, big rezzys, 14mm rods long threads to adjust preload and the look lol Did I say that ??
They weren't made for my application so I had to put my touch to them:grin2:
I hate the needle nitrogen fill ports, so I have machined new rez covers to hold a truck valve, that makes the revalves and pressure checks easier.


They are not quite what's sold on the market, this the reason why I had to build them, if there was something even close I would have bought it. But this is a wood racer not MX
The front is still a bit higher than the rear the TRX frame geometry calls for it.

The rear shock is fantastic, but I have removed about 90 to 95% of the valves force, closing on the bypass would lock the shock solid, I have even checked if I forgot the jack under the quad, not too sure what happened there.
I had the shock on a box, hose was damaged, seal was blown, I have ordered the 3 seal heads and hose from Stadium and I was surprised how cheap they were, I had the box the next day, not used to that, I have orders that hold me back that were placed 2 weeks ago and counting.


Now pictures

















 
#21 ·
dayum! Im jealous of your awesome fab skills man. Thats looks like some top notch work!
 
#25 ·
Getting ready for my first race this season, I have tried it in tring junction and it's awesome, no surprises it's not a jumping machine, but it has a lot of power, Initial jetting was 45 1 turn, 162, 35 leak 3rd notch, actual is 42 1 turn, 162, plug leak and 2nd notch needle.
My zero scrub hubs were a failure, so I'm a bit wide for XC, maybe I get some time to screw those ball joints a few turns in.
Front suspension seem to be better than everything I ever tried, but race day will tell, I have revalved two more times the rear, every time it's an improvement, so it's worth the effort and is getting close to where I wanted, but it lacks testing since I work all the time.

So after rejet I had no time to go out to try it, so stood the rear on a block and did 5th gears pulls giving the quad a lot of crap, back to idle, hand on the key to shut it down until the race day...it quits...did I do that, I did touch the key, but did not turn it, won't fire back up. Is it luck or badluck, darn POS quit on me. Pulled all the plastics, air box, drained the carb, full, disconnected the coil and used my "Stator b*tch 2000" tester, shown 295 volts at the coil, but I get misfires, seem lean, maybe not, compression, maybe not ?!?! Shure thing I was heading toward the valve cover and while pulling the plug the wire disconnected from the boot with no effort at all... Is it luck ?? Yes it is, I have blessed balls, half a second more I would have shut it off until race day, pushed it on the trailer because I would have left at 6 am, drive 350 km just to be very very upset and have limited tools to troubleshoot and fix it, and to add to my luck the wire separated from the boot, I could have spent a lot of time before testing continuity on the plug wire.


Symptoms were, misfires most of times, will run some on the throttle, backfires.
 
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