air pressure for shocks

[vervan]

Okay...Couple of questions..
1-so why does the owners manual tell you to not use a tire pressure to check your shock pressure. they say to use a pressure gauge. Whats the difference??

2-I bought a low pressure "non tire pressure" gauge from the dealer but it only goes to 21psi and the manual says maximum 36psi?? explanation?

3-when i take the pressure on the front shock, fluid spurts out?

[chris.trombley]

i get fluid out of the front ones to?

[gearheadfla]

It's kinda common to get oil out of the front forks from what I hear. I use to get some every once in a while before I changed to progressives in the forks and now I run 0 air. Now I see you say 36lbs, I hope thats not in the front, 10 is pushing it up there, I ran 7. But I run 50 in the back and have had no problems with that. If your getting a lot of oil, there is a "filter" that's inside the fork tube that maybe having a problem, but I've never seen that here.

[vervan]

thanks for the input!

[tinsailor]

Someone on this forum named "neal" called me at home one night outa the blue awhile back about a post I made and we were talking about XII's and motorsicklin in general and he mentioned about how to set the air in the shocks. He advised to overfill the shocks a bit and sit on the bike and deflate em enough that you just begin to feel em creep down. Thats it,thats all you do. I carried it a step further and sit on the bike with whatever load I'm going to carry weather its camp gear, passenger or just me, hook up the bicycle hand pump and fill the shock till it tops out and then press the schraeder valve till I feel the shock start to depress. Do front and rear and you're done, I don't even use a gauge anymore. He said this works on any bike with air suspension and I don't see why it wouldn't. I know it works great for the rear of my C-10 Concourse too.

[Neal]

This is something that us 'long in the tooth' riders remember from the 70's.
Back then the 2 major companies selling rear air shocks,,,, S & W, and Reeder Gas Spring,,,suggested this way to adjust the air. This therefore only works for the rears. Simply put in too much air, then with the bike 'loaded', slowly let some out till the seat just barely moves. That's it. You just set it for your present needs. Admittedly, this doesn't help with damping, but at least the pre-load was set. Using this system I usually find I use about 35 to 40 # solo, then 45 to 50ish for 2-up, and around 60 to 75 for 2-up with the bunkhouse. I know, I know,,,That's not what the book calls for....But I've found no problems using this method for just over 225,000 on my 2001, with stock shocks. I change the oil every 45K to 50K.