I weigh in at 200lbs with my gear on and I'm wondering if kawasaki or anyone on the sight has a recomended setting for aggressive riding for a guy of my weight? I'm experiencing a lot of wallowing in the corners. The bike seems to squat way too much for the amount of lean I'm getting. Any suggested settings at all would be appreciated. Thanks, Jason S.

I weigh about 160 lb with gear, and with the fork preload screwed in to 12 mm (top scribed line even with the base), the free sag is 25 mm and the total sag (with rider) is 38 mm. Each 4 mm of preload compression only nets about 3 mm less sag, and with only 2 mm before the screw is bottomed out (the range is 25 to 10 mm; factory setting is 19 mm), there isn't much more to be gained. This is o.k for my riding, with the rebound damper 1/2 turn out (stock is 1 turn out), but it may still wallow a little bit at your weight. You really need about a 0.95 kg/mm fork spring (stock is 0.82 kg/mm). The rear shock has about 9 mm of free sag and 30 mm of total sag for my weight (again, rebound is 1/2 turn out). This is about minimum sag for street use for my weight, so it should be about right for you. I hope this helps.

I am slightly more than you and I was having problems setting the rear shock preload. The shock just is hard to set up for us gravity challenged folk. I am waiting my my ZX-12R shock to see if the heavier spring in that shock will give me what I want. From the checking I have done the shock looks to be much similar to the ZX-9R shock but has a 13kg/mm spring in it. It might be too stiff, but it was only pennies and it is 3 way adjustable. I can always send this shock into the shock guys and have them rebuild it.

...that I replaced the 35 pound stock stainless steel exhaust system with a near weightless titanium/carbon fiber one. That removed about 20 pounds of sprung weight from the rear, and about 10 pounds from the front, so that makes my "weight equivalence" more like 140 pounds. So maybe the 10.5 kg/mm stock spring is too weak for you and your bike, although you could increase the prolad by at least 5 mm at the shock, which should reduce the sag at the axle by about 10-15 mm. I suggest starting by measuring and setting the sag to as close as possible to recommended ranges, then increasing rebound damping and see if much of the wallowing goes away. If not, then a new set of springs and shock may be needed. Ohlins uses a 100 N/mm spring (10.2 kg/mm) on their KA302 shock for an average 165-180 rider, and suggests increasing/decreasing 5 N/mm (~0.5 kg/mm) for every 10-15 pound weight change.

The stock fork springs are way too soft for you, and the rear shock spring is a little too soft for you. The stock shock lacks compression damping, which is contributing to the wallowing you're experiencing. Best solution is to fix the problem with some suspension upgrades, but short of that you'll just have to get things set as close as you can. Crank the preload on the rear shock until you have 5mm free sag. Check rider sag, it will probably be too much still but you'll have to live with it. You don't want less than 5mm free sag, or it will top out. On the forks, crank up preload until you get 15mm of free sag. Check rider sag, it will probably be too much but again you'll have to live with it. You don't want less than 15mm free sag on the forks, and even that's marginally too small. Once you have sag set, you can try to add more rebound damping in the rear shock (1/4-1/2 turn out from full stiff), but with the stock valving there's not too much available. Compression damping is weak and non-adjustable on the stock shock, so there's nothing to do there. This will get you set up about as well as you can be with the stock components. Ride it and see if it's livable. If you're riding aggressively, my guess is you'll still experience problems with it, there's just no way to make up for incorrect springs.

Originally posted by jarelj
The stock fork springs are way too soft for you,.

I'm 250 and I have my preload way down. It was hard as a rock and no sag at all adjusted to max. I have just over 3 lines showing I think and with me on the bike it's at 25mm

Thanks for all the info. What a wealth of knowledge this site is.

So, are the upgrades available on this site sufficient for fairly aggressve riding? Will I outgrow them very quickly? What's the cost difference between the upgrade and just buying an ohlin outright? thanks again, Jason

Originally posted by SuperNaked
Thanks for all the info. What a wealth of knowledge this site is.

So, are the upgrades available on this site sufficient for fairly aggressve riding? Will I outgrow them very quickly? What's the cost difference between the upgrade and just buying an ohlin outright? thanks again, Jason

We sell Ohlins too, shocks are around $800 and forks start at about $2500. You won't "outride" the suspension upgrades. We're actually a racing shop, and all of our stuff is developed from that perspective, so it's more than sufficient for "aggressive" riding. You'll find the limitations of the actual bike itself (weight, etc.) are the limiting factors, and not the suspension.

The limiting factor is always going to be ME. I'm sure I will never outride this bike's capability. Looks like the upgrade is the way to go. Will you still be offering this service when the weather gets cold? I want to wait for some down time before sending my stuff in. Thanks, Jason S.

Originally posted by SuperNaked
The limiting factor is always going to be ME. I'm sure I will never outride this bike's capability. Looks like the upgrade is the way to go. Will you still be offering this service when the weather gets cold? I want to wait for some down time before sending my stuff in. Thanks, Jason S.

Sure, we do a ton of suspension work over the winter months.