Ohlins rant, or

[Guest drknow]

I have become very dissolutioned with Ohlins lately. I wrote the following paragraph in my last race report. Since then, something else happened.

 

I’m fed up with Ohlins. I have friends who work there (Doug Shaw is awesome, Mike Watt, David), and it’s a good thing. Clearly, they make the best stuff in the world. Crystal clearly, you and I can’t buy it. The stuff we get is second rate, valved poorly, and expensive. I bought the early edition of the 2006 ZX-10R shock because I thought I’d rather deal with sourcing a spring compressor when necessary then deal with mounting the remote reservoir on a Penske. That, my good comrades, was DUMB! The Ohlins came with a lower clevis that was too short to fully maximize the length, too soft a spring even though I told them my weight and valving that was so ridiculously soft I cranked all the low speed, all the high speed, and all the rebound in and didn’t get close! I’ve never had (or spoken with someone who has) a Penske that you couldn’t race outta the box. Sure, you could sometimes make em better, but they were useable. I’m speaking as a club privateer here, but from now on, Penske shocks for me when possible.

 

Ok, after I posted that (wondering if I should possibly burn any bridges), I drive 9 hours to Willows, CA to attend a Jason Pridmore Star 2-day school. Two laps into the fourth session Jason, passenger astride the back of his GSXR1000, waves me off track as I go to pass him. That's odd I think, as I only passed him one lap ago. After pulling over, he tells me he's glad to see me ok and upright, as I have a serious oil-leak. I'm instantly off the bike and inspecting for the dangerous drip and can't find anything at first. Then, as my scan moves towards the rear of the bike, I find it. The shock has gone blooey. There's shock oil all over back there, it's all over the exhaust that coils around that area on my bike, and that's what's been smoking so badly. Jason says when I went over the turn 9 hill and out of sight, I was trailing a plume of smoke big enough he was expecting total carnage at the bottom. He cut the track to flag me in once he rode over and didn't find me spread all over the track. Sigh.

 

I didn't ride the rest of that day, and just played pit bitch for Peanut on day two. It sucked. The shock is at GP Suspension getting the leak fixed, whether it came from the leaky shock shaft seal or the hydraulic preload adjuster or a combo I don't know. I simply boxed it up and overnighted it up to Dave and asked for it to be fixed.

 

I know that Penske makes a shock for the V11, and for those of you in the maket to update your suspension, I would heartily recommend that route.

 

 

dk

[wsholar]

I have become very dissolutioned with Ohlins lately...

Quick questions:

 

Were you on your Scura when the rear shock blew?

 

If so, then...

 

What is your total body weight, with riding gear?

 

What was your mileage when the shock blew?

 

thanks!

[Guest drknow]

Quick questions:

 

Were you on your Scura when the rear shock blew?

 

If so, then...

 

What is your total body weight, with riding gear?

 

What was your mileage when the shock blew?

 

thanks!

 

Sorry, on the zx-10. That shock has very low mileage, but all track. Maybe a thousand track miles.

 

To be fair, I've never seen the stock Ohlins fail, just not that happy with what you get for the money there.

[wsholar]

Sorry, on the zx-10. That shock has very low mileage, but all track. Maybe a thousand track miles.

 

To be fair, I've never seen the stock Ohlins fail, just not that happy with what you get for the money there.

 

Ah, okay. Have you been able to dial your Scura Ohlins in satisfactorily? Have you had them modded? Again, what's your total riding weight and mileage?

[Guest drknow]

Ah, okay. Have you been able to dial your Scura Ohlins in satisfactorily? Have you had them modded? Again, what's your total riding weight and mileage?

 

It's good enough that I wouldn't replace it now that I've gone to a 11.5 NM spring for my 230 lb weight. However, If I were going to buy a new shock for one of the bikes that didn't come with an Ohlins, I'd go the Penske route. Oh, and to your other question it's got 16k on it, and I'll get it revalved when I get it freshened in another 5k or so.

[stobie]

However, If I were going to buy a new shock for one of the bikes that didn't come with an Ohlins, I'd go the Penske route..

 

I'm a Guzzista wannabe, a refugee from the BMW world (I think I'm Beemered out). Ohlins has lost a significant chunk of market share to Wilbers in that community. I've seen a number of instances of people switching from Ohlins to Wilbers, and being more happy with the Wilbers. They seem to be setup better out of the box, and you get more for your money. Because of some of this anecdotal evidence (after sifting it thru my internet BS filter), and the cost and warranty, I installed Wilbers on both ends of the GS-Adv I had for 3-1/2 years and recently sold. They were fantastic.

 

Another factor that swayed my decision was the opinion of an auto racing engineer buddy, who has years of experience setting up Ohlins and Penske shocks for stock car and open-wheel racing. Penskes not being available for my bike, his advice was, "If there is anything decent out there besides Ohlins, that's what I would get." He sees Ohlins as something of a sacred cow, resting on their substantial laurels, and charging what he called a "Yellow Spring Surcharge" for their products. He sees the Penske products as being vastly superior, and he's been inside both brands hundreds of times. But some people just have to have that yellow spring.

 

On the V11's, I think the advantage of the Ohlins is in resale value. I have a thang for the Redframes, so my current plan is to get an early V11S with stock suspension, and go for a Penske rear, and have Traxxion Dynamics set up the fork. I don't think that setup will give up any performance to an Ohlins bike.

[Greg Field]

I had my shock, a Scura shock that had leaked and was replaced under warranty, rebuilt at GP Suspension and re-valved. The valving seemed OK, but the spring was way too weak.

 

Two months later, the shock blew one day while riding two-up. I just had GP re-seal it and also bought an 11-MN spring. I should get them installed tonight or tomorrow.

[wsholar]

I had my shock, a Scura shock that had leaked and was replaced under warranty, rebuilt at GP Suspension and re-valved. The valving seemed OK, but the spring was way too weak.

 

Two months later, the shock blew one day while riding two-up. I just had GP re-seal it and also bought an 11-MN spring. I should get them installed tonight or tomorrow.

 

what was your source for your spring? good price?

[RacerX]

J-M, Glad to hear you unknowingly kept'er upright, and you in one piece. That really would've sucked to go asphalt surfing due to a nearly new blown shock(!?). I highly recommend Penske for spines as well, however...

Ohlins has lost a significant chunk of market share to Wilbers in that community. I've seen a number of instances of people switching from Ohlins to Wilbers, and being more happy with the Wilbers. They seem to be setup better out of the box, and you get more for your money. Because of some of this anecdotal evidence (after sifting it thru my internet BS filter), and the cost and warranty, I installed Wilbers on both ends of the GS-Adv I had for 3-1/2 years and recently sold. They were fantastic.

For those interested, I am/GuzziTech.com is a dealer for all of Wilbers products, which I prefer for price against Penske twin shocks for Tontis (emulsion-type @$2300/pr); http://www.guzzitech.com/WilbersSuspensions.html

 

Just my $.03

 

p.s. J-M, you coming to the MotoFest next weekend?

[Guest GUZZI@50]

I live in the U.K and this winter i'm going get a Maxton suspension uprate on my 2001 red framed sport.Cost just under 1000 u.k pounds for cusom built rear shock and modified front forks.

[Greg Field]

Wallis: I set Moto Intl. up as an Ohlins dealer and bought it through the shop. Purty yaller springs are about $100.

[dlaing]

The problem with the non-Ohlins options is the length and travel.

The Ohlins makes full use of the range of swing arm travel.

Unless one can customize it further than what people on this forum did with Penske and Wilbers, you'll end up with less travel.

No doubt the Wilbers offers more features for the money and Penske is the best for customizing damping and rebuilding, and they are light in weight.

If Dr. Know is getting a spring that is too soft, it is not Ohlins' fault but GP Suspension.

If Greg's seals are blowing immediately after servicing, maybe it is GP Suspension.

My Ohlins forks feel many times better than my Marzocchis did.

Are they mis-valved, possibly, and yes, my springs are too soft for aggressive sport riding, but I'll suffer happily knowing the improvement I made over the Marzocchi.

 

Wallis: I set Moto Intl. up as an Ohlins dealer and bought it through the shop. Purty yaller springs are about $100.

Why do you go through GP Suspension for service?

If I buy a shock through you, who re-springs and re-valves it?

[Guest ratchethack]

The problem with the non-Ohlins options is the length and travel.

The Ohlins makes full use of the range of swing arm travel.

I'm in the process of dialing-in my full custom Wilbers shock right now, setting preload and high and low speed damping -- so this stuff is all fresh in my mind. One point that seems to have been missed in previous threads on this subject is that the functional range of travel of the swingarm is completely dependent on the shock being used. The swingarm has NO other physical limits on its travel than the tire's hard physical contact with the fender tray in the upper direction, and I don't know what kind of contact comes first in the lower direction. If allowed by a longer-travel shock than stock, the swingarm will simply continue to travel well into dangerous territory and beyond -- in both directions.

 

The stock Sachs shock on my Guzzi allowed for 62 mm of shock travel (including compression of the shock bumper). This translates to 124 mm of swingarm travel at the spindle. The Sachs shock is 280 mm eye-to-eye.

 

While it's possible to install a new shock that allows for more travel than this, there is both danger and risk of enabling a greater range of motion of the swingarm than that afforded by the stock shock. The dimensions here have been carefully engineered into the design of the chassis and spec's of the shock, and should not be trifled with unless it's all fully understood -- this would logically require a greater understanding of this chassis setup, driveline angle limitations, risks of failure, etc., than the engineers at Guzzi.

 

Of the many reasons not to violate the stock range of motion as designed by the chassis engineers by going to a longer-travel shock, one of the primary dangers and risks is to the U-joints, which suffer stress and ultimately, potential catastrophic failure outside of a specific angle of operation according to swingarm travel.

 

The Guzzi swingarm is a very short swingarm, having been limited by the chassis, which was designed for a longer transmission than the 6-speeder that's in it. The short swingarm makes everything that much more critical when fiddling with shock spec's and swingarm travel. If the swingarm is allowed by a longer-travel shock into the upper and lower danger zones of potential U-joint failure, bizarre chassis geometries also come into play, which can provide unwanted and dangerous handling characteristics. It was for such considerations as these that I specified a max travel on my custom shock of 62 mm.

[dlaing]

Glad to see you got more available travel out of the Wilbers than others did.

I feared the shock body would prohibit that.

Care to share what your overall length was?

Did you get the ride height adjustabilty option?

When I took the Sachs shock off the bike, the swing arm bound (binded?) at the shaft, in topping out direction, and hits the frame, in bottoming out direction, and the wheel does not hit the fender.

This happens at points about a cm of wheel travel or shock travel (sorry I can't remember and heck I could have mis-measured, or your bike may be different.) away from the limits of travel of the Ohliins shock that the Guzzi engineers fearlessly allowed on the evil Scura and subsequentl Ohlins equipped bikes.

I thought this was a little close, but there is freeplay.

The Ohlins bottoms out at the same point as the Sachs, but tops out higher.

But note that Ohlins recommends more sag than most 'experts', which keeps the shaft angle as straight as with the Sachs, set up by experts, except when topping out.

The extra travel results in a safer bike that is more likely to keep the rubber side down and in contact with the pavement.

[Guest drknow]

The problem with the non-Ohlins options is the length and travel.

The Ohlins makes full use of the range of swing arm travel.

Unless one can customize it further than what people on this forum did with Penske and Wilbers, you'll end up with less travel.

No doubt the Wilbers offers more features for the money and Penske is the best for customizing damping and rebuilding, and they are light in weight.

If Dr. Know is getting a spring that is too soft, it is not Ohlins' fault but GP Suspension.

If Greg's seals are blowing immediately after servicing, maybe it is GP Suspension.

My Ohlins forks feel many times better than my Marzocchis did.

Are they mis-valved, possibly, and yes, my springs are too soft for aggressive sport riding, but I'll suffer happily knowing the improvement I made over the Marzocchi.

Why do you go through GP Suspension for service?

If I buy a shock through you, who re-springs and re-valves it?

I bought my Ohlins shock directly from Ohlins USA. All my issues are directly related to Ohlins, not an intermediary.

The Penske can be ordered any way you want, if you have an idea about shock travel that's different than theirs, go ahead and ask em.

The Ohlins forks are better stock to stock, but have the Marzocchi's revalved and they will be better than the stock Ohlins. Why suffer with poorly sprung and valved Ohlins forks if you already have em, by the way. Just get them fixed. They are awfully good after springs and a proper valving, better than the Marzocchi's. Just buy the Ohlin's valving kit for around $400, or buy Dave's kit from GP Suspension for less than half. If you're price conscious, just get heavier springs.