You can't balance rebound, or compression. You can only set for the spring and rider weight. Set each to make that end work correctly.

 

Well, "new" as in less than 3 years riding... so not "brand new"... maybe "new-ish"?

Anyway, goal is to get to the track at least once or twice this season and just want to make sure I don't get to the track and start floundering around because of poor suspension setup. If I do poorly, I want to know it's because of me, not the bike!

Thanks for the suggestions!

 

As long as your suspension has damping and rebound adjustments you can. setting spring tension to get your sag set is just the first step. You want to balance your rebound and compression front and rear after that, otherwise the bike may not react how it should during transitions(front diving too much under hard braking, rear squatting too much while accelerating out of a corner, etc). for street riding you can stop there, but once you start doing track days and get to around an upper intermediate pace, you'll want to learn how to make minor adjustments from there.

 

I guess we have a different deffinition of balance. For example, if the front end dives too much, you need more compression damping most likely. You do not need to adjust the rear anything. That's not balancing to me, thats setting each end correctly. I've been riding advanced track days for a few years now and have never heard it described like you, but I think we are saying the same thing in the end.

Op- there is a good chance your rebound will not be able to deal with the extra energy the heavier springs put into them, you'll most likely have them maxxed out to work. I did rebound valves with .85kg springs but did not change the compression valves. As such my compression settings are only like 1 turn out from full soft or something really low, while my rebound is more like 3 turns or so. Having the proper valving lets you have more adjustability when setting things.

 

Got everything together today! With all settings on full soft, I went one full turn on preload, and 1/2 turn on both compression and rebound. I also raised the forks just a touch (1mm). Totally forgot to check sag but will do that before the week is over. Regardless, bike felt much more firm and controllable. Definitely pleased so far!

 

Keep the updates coming there is still 3 feet of snow here so there is no way I can test mine lol

 

​​Pretty much. What I'm suggesting just gives you a good baseline to start from, and then make adjustments accordingly from there. For a street bike, all the fine adjustments you'd make at the track aren't really necessary.

OP, good luck with the progress!

 

200 mile update - Checked SAG a few weeks ago and was pleasantly surprised to find it was good to go. Suspension feels a-real good and significantly more controllable in the turns! Next up - TRACK DAY - May 12th @ Summit Point.

 

So, track day on May 12th was cancelled due to rain and I ended up rescheduling for today. Rode Shenandoah circuit (very technical track that let's you know almost immediately when you screw up!) at Summit Point and it... was... freaking awesome! Can't recommend it enough if you have a track near you! I felt like the suspension really worked well and by the end of the day I was putting some nice, flowing laps together. Still made plenty of mistakes but I almost always knew what I did wrong.

 

Good you enjoyed your trackday. It can be intimidating for sure, was for me on my first at Brands Hatch. I'd highly recommend tuning the suspension and getting some rearsets. Even an inch of 'rise' will completely change the feel of the bike and make turn ins more natural. Not I am not saying you get rearsets as stock rearsets will scrape soon. They will, but for beginners that's not a problem as they won't lean that much. Slightly Higher set rearsets will give you better feel/body position for track.