398 Wood Shavings on the Ground

Yesterday, I skipped a Sunday ride and went out to clear the fallen tree parts as planned, so not much to post about, other than saying I brushed-up on my bow saw technique.
Although it seems like a drag not going for another Pachaug ride, I simply didn't have much desire to do so since conditions were as they were yesterday, and I felt as if I'd already ridden enough for the weekend with my vision being compromised.
Plus, it really was more important to clear the tree fall out of the way.
Now, any Pachaug loop riders may pass unhindered.

I sometime wonder how many more times I can ride the Pachaug loop before I become completely sick and tired of riding every weekend in the same place.
I did feel a bit like that yesterday, but, I know all it will take is one more ride on a cloudy day when I'm feeling good to make me feel otherwise.  :)
Plus, I'm curious to ride the bike in my normal manner in order to really test the results of the softer shock spring and make any fine tuning clicker adjustments if necessary.

Also, as the harsh realities of the autumn season are now here, I do feel it won't be long before my weekly pay at jerk gets reduced to my "winter pay", even though fall just started a couple of days ago.
When that happens, I reduce my hours to match, and that leaves more time for other things.
Like riding.  ;)

397 Slippery Rocks

Today (Saturday) was another Pachaug rock pile ride on the ol' WR-250FP, and today was the first ride with the new, softer-rate rear shock spring (the stock spring is 5.0 kg/mm and the new one is 4.8 kg/mm).
So, what was the first impression?
Much better balance between the front and rear, and the bike feels good in that respect.
Not surprisingly, now that the front and rear are sporting softer spring rates, the suspension feels noticeably softer overall.
Not a bad thing, but it did lend a different feel to the bike, a bit more like a softly-sprung luxury car than it used to be.
I'm willing to give it some decent rides in order to see how it really feels.

So, what's the present verdict on the cushier suspension settings?
To be honest, I'm still waiting for a ride that has good conditions where I'll feel good about wicking it up a bit and riding at my usual pace, and today was another bummer as far as that goes.
Today was not only bright and sunny, but it fucking rained sometime overnight and doused all of those lovely rocks and roots with water, making things more slippery.
God, where the hell are the cloudy and dry weekends hiding at?
My feeling during the whole ride was to basically back it down a notch and err on the side of caution and not risk getting out of shape.
I hate it when that happens, but, I listened to my conscious.
So, riding the bike as I'd really like to - and experiencing what the bike can really do and feel like - will have to wait a bit longer.

We must have had some kind of wind storm a few days ago because there were a few spots where tree branches fell down across the trail and I had to find a way around.
Big ones, too.
What I plan on doing tomorrow is driving out there in the truck with my trusty bow saw and clearing that shit out of the way - who knows how long it might be there, otherwise.
So, no ride tomorrow?
Well, the goddamn weather forecast is for more rain overnight and a sunny day, so, it sounds like a replay of today's weather (fucker).
I think the day would be better spent clearing that junk out of the way.
If I change my mind, I'll let you know.

-John

396

That's a pretty short title, eh?
I haven't done that in a while, me thinks.

I went out for another Pachaug ride yesterday (Sunday), but this time I changed things up a bit.
I went late in the day and rode from 6:00 pm - 7:00 pm, until sunset.
Since I had one hour of riding time, I concentrated on my favorite whoops through the pine needled woods section, making the usual 2.7 mile loop out of that.
I did 22.2 miles, so that means 8 times around.
Funny, it seemed like more laps than that.
I guess the odometer don't lie.

I decided to go late in the day because for the past two weekends, the bright sunshine mid-day has made me squint like a mad man.
Light conditions were much better this time, I do say.
If this coming weekend is bright, I'm using two tinted goggle lenses at the same time.

How did the suspension work on the whooped section?
Since this section of trail is faster than most of the Pachaug loop, I can easily feel the imbalance in the front-to-rear ride heights (due to the lower fork oil level which allows supple fork action, but effectively results in a softer fork spring rate) whenever pressure is put onto the front fork, as when braking for a corner, or even just rolling off the throttle.
On the slower sections of trail, no big deal.
So, while the supple fork action is fine in the slower going, I still want to try to get a better front-to-rear balance with the spring rates, and the next step is to try a rear shock spring that is one step softer.
I'm guessing that it will make an improvement, but to what degree can ony be discovered by testing it.
So, I hope to have the softer rear shock spring installed for this coming weekend's ride.

-John

Interstate 395

Bright sunshine.
Ignore the bird.

I went out yesterday (Saturday) for another Pachaug rock pile ride on the ol' WR-250FP with it's new/old fork settings.
I think what I have now is a good compromise, giving a good feel and a ridable front-to-rear ride height balance, along with fork action that is willing to absorb the pesky sharp bumps out there.
What did I settle on?
The internal valving was done by Tom at Nasin Machine (the re-revalve), featuring a different base valve piston that is not as restrictive to oil flow, along with shim specs that are to allow for more supple fork movement out on the trail (the stock fork setup was similar to that used in motocross where you don't see the pesky rocks I have to ride over for 60-or-so miles and gives a firm feel with little front end dive under braking).
The oil height is 5mm lower than stock at 145mm from the top.
The fork tube height is lowered 5mm (the fork legs have been slid down 5mm in the triple clamps) in order to raise the ride height back up due to the softer overall fork settings resulting in a lower ride height.

This worked well enough so that I felt satisfied, and, at least for now, no longer feel compelled to mess with the fork settings after each ride.
The sharp bumps are being absorbed in a good manner, and the front height of the bike feels decently-balanced with the rear.
The front does dive a bit more under braking and deceleration, but, at least for now with the current fork internals, that's a trade-off I'm going to have to accept until I feel like pulling the forks off again and try yet another re-revalve.
A re-re-revalve?

The Pachaug loop ride, itself, was only fair, all-in-all, and that was because the sun was out brightly and I had to squint like my life depended on it all over the place.
Well, it does actually depend on it, as hitting a big rock I can't see coming can result in a big crash, you know.
When you can't see well, that puts a big damper on the fun, and things were bad enough that for today's ride (assuming the weather forecast for more bright sun is true) I'll try the two-tinted-goggle-lenses-at-once trick to cut down the brightness and give my eyes a break.

Another thing about yesterday's ride was the use of a new rear tire:
A Michelin AC10, size 100/100-18.
This is a DOT-approved knobby tire, and the Michelin spec sheet lists it as being intended for harder terrain.
My opinion?
As is always the case, it can't match the feel the Bridgestone M22 gives me - even a worn M22.
No other tire has worked as well.

The AC10 was left behind at jerk by some meathead who ordered it but did not pick it up, so, out of curiosity, I decided to try it.
It may be listed as a hard terrain tire, but it simply doesn't feel (or even look) like one.
As all tires I've used seem to be (other than the M22), it prefers dirt where you can sink a knob into it, like loamy dirt with some grass on top of it.
Well, Lenny, there ain't much of that out there on the Pachaug loop, and it's performance over the hard ground and miles of rocks was, basically, a bit skittery-feeling.
It wasn't bad, but I knew the rear grip wasn't as good as the M22 delivers.
If I rate the M22 a 10 (on a scale of 1 to 10), the AC10 is a 6.5 .
Could be better, but at least not a disaster.
Guess what tire I'm putting back on before long.  :)

I plan on another ride today.

-John

394: Pillow Soft for your Bum-Bum

Aaawwww.
Ain't that a cute little kitty-cat?
No, I just grabbed the first image I saw that said "pillow soft".

Went on yet another Pachaug rock pile ride yesterday (Saturday) with the re-revalved forks on the WR-250FP.
Result?
Much better at absorbing all of those pesky sharp bumps, so the base valve piston with the bigger oil flow ports combined with a reshuffling of the valving shims of the base valve worked as far as getting a more supple feel over the sharp bumps.
The fork now feels like it actually wants to move when I hit a sharp bump, and in this respect the fork is working OK.

There is a trade-off (as with most things in life and with dirt bikes) that I had anticipated, and that is if the fork is valved for a softer overall ride, it will sink down a bit further into the travel and ride at a lower height, making the front end of the bike feel lower.
Since I lowered the oil level 5mm last Monday morning (before the re-revalve), that is adding to the low front end feeling.
It is not such a problem that I can't ride the bike, but it does go against how I like my bikes to feel while in motion as it tends to take away from overall stability while at speed.
So, the first thing to do is to add fork oil and get the oil level back to the original 140mm level and see how that feels.
I added a bit of oil to each fork leg after I got home yesterday via the shortcut method of injecting it through the air bleeder hole in each fork cap.
While this in muuuuuuch faster than doing it the precise way of disassembling the front of the bike and actually measuring the oil level in each for leg, the trade-off (another one?) is that I'm simply guessing as to how much oil I actually added.
In a conservative move, I added just a tiny bit (a few CC of oil), so we'll see how it feels on today's Pachaug rock n' roll pile ride.

The actual ride was a decent one.
I felt OK and pulled some nice moved on the bike.
I hit a couple of bumps that I didn't see coming and had a couple of squirrelly moments, but nothing I didn't survive - I'll be aware of them, today.

There were several tree limbs down across the trail in places, and I wondered if they fell there all by themselves, or if some nature-walking yahoo did it.
I stopped and moved one of the smaller ones out of the way, so I did my good deed for the day.

It rained overnight so the ground is wet at the moment, and I'm going to wait a bit in order for some of that water to dry-up - those tree roots and rocks can be very slippery when they're all wet and shiny.

Edit:

I went for a Sunday Pachaug ride today, but I think it was done under an omen of some sort.
Just before I was to load the bike up into the truck, I realized I had a flat front tire.
Nice.
I was a slow leak so I didn't even know I had a pinched tube until the air hissssssssssed out over night and into the wee hours of the morning and into late morning and into departure time.
Good thing I keep spare tire tubes around.

Changing the tube cost about 45 minutes but I eventually made it out to the ol' Pachaug enduro loop.
It was there that I realized two more things:

1) The oil I added to the forks didn't make things better, but worse.
The forks now felt like there was too much oil in them, so the plush feel they had yesterday basically vanished and they felt more like their old selves.
God, and I only added a drop, too.
Touchy.
They now rode higher like I wanted them too, but I missed the plusher feel over the sharp bumps.
Jesus, talk about having to choose between the two.
During the week, I'll ONCE AGAIN remove the forks (for the LAST FUCKING TIME for a while, I do hope), lower the oil level to 145mm, and LEAVE IT THE HELL ALONE!!!
If I want to experiment with ride height and front/rear balance, I'll do it with fork tube height and/or rear suspension settings.

2) I didn't feel as aggressive or ride the bike as well as yesterday.
Partly because the crummier-feeling forks bummed me out, partly because the bright sunshine reflecting off those pesky rocky trails fucked with my vision, and partly because that's just the mood I woke up in.
Sue me.  ;)
I resorted to riding the bike pretty dang slowly since I didn't feel all that great and my vision wasn't as good as yesterday's cloudy day was, but it was better than crashing, Bucky.
I still did 55 miles and became more familiar still with the southern portion of the loop, so, it wasn't a total loss of a day.

On the bright side, the forecast weather for the coming jerk week is dry and sunny, and that will dry-up the rain water we got over the weekend.
That's always a good thing because there will be less mucky shit to deal with on the next ride.
Plus, I'll have the front suspension dialed-in to where it was yesterday, which was certainly ridable.

Until then,
-John

393: Fork Off - Again

Well, it's time to fork off once more.
Take the forks off the WR-250FP and bring them to Tom the suspension guy at Nasin Machine, that is.
Gee.
Seems I did this just a couple of days ago.

I spoke with Tom yesterday (Tuesday) about how the work done has changed how they feel, and Tom took that info and told me to get the forks back to him today so he can perform another valving change in time for the weekend.

He mentioned he wants to modify the base valve shim stack (little flat washer-looking thingies that control damping oil flow by bending on demand and uncovering a valve hole or port when the fork hits a bump) for a softer feel over sharp bumps.
He also said that he has just discovered that he should enlarge the base valve port size in order to flow more oil, period.
Hmmmm.
Stay tuned for the shakedown ride coming up this weekend.

-John

392 Drops of Oil on the Floor

I meant to post last evening (Monday), but I forgot to do so.
Being tired and hungry probably had something to do with that.
So, here it is on Tuesday morning.

I woke on Labor Day morning feeling considerably better than the few days before because I got closer to eight hours of sleep.
That always starts me off on the right foot.

I decided to roll the dice and lower the oil level in the forks of the WR-250FP in an attempt to reduce the feeling of too much high-speed compression damping over all of those sharp (and pesky and numerous) bumps out there on the ol' Pachaug enduro loop.
The oil level was at the standard 140mm level, and I reduced it to 145mm.
How is 145 a lower level than 140?
It's measured from the top of the fork down to the oil, not from the bottom up to the top of the oil.
That's at least partially because the reason for doing this is to increase the amount of trapped air that is between the oil and the cap on top of the forks.
It's also done like that because it's easier.
This air gets compressed as the fork compresses, and not surprisingly, it also acts as an air spring.
The larger volume of air (because there is now less oil making room for more air) is easier to compress because the fork is now trying to compress the air into a larger space instead of a smaller space.
Geddit?
Physics is all around us, folks, like it or not, so you may as well like it, Bucky.

And, the result?
A noticeable improvement in the area where the fork suffers - the pesky sharp bumps were a bit easier to manage and weren't quite as bothersome as the day before, so it was worth doing the work.
The trade-off is that the front of the bike rode a bit lower (enough to notice), and that's usually something I don't like to feel.
It's the same case here, but at least it wasn't so much that is was unacceptable, so it seemed like a decent trade.
What I'll do before the next ride (assuming Tom doesn't get a crack at another revalve session before the next ride) is to lower the fork legs 1 mm to compensate for the lower ride height.

Of course, this is all a Band Aid until I get the fork valved to my satisfaction.
It is at least ridable right now, but not any better than the stock specification.
Worse, actually, because the current spec seems to not work too well over more trail mileage.
At least Tom will have a better understanding of what is needed for session #2, which I guess will be next week since this is a shortened work week due to yesterday's holiday off.
See?
Another trade-off.

Other than that, the ride was better than on Sunday.
I generally felt better and a bit more alert with a less tired feeling, although I should have had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich just before I left because my stomach felt a bit empty during the ride.
That tends to steal concentration away.
I made a few stupid maneuvers on the bike where I stalled the engine because I was trying to be too cautious for some reason, but no catastrophes, thankfully.
Blame it on the stomach.
The bike ran very well, by the way.

Off to jerk,
-John

I Just Caught 391 Germs

It's Sunday evening, and I'm relaxing while eating supper after today's Pachaug ride.
How was it?
Read on.

All-in-all, it was only a fair ride today, and that all started when I woke up feeling less than refreshed since I got about 6 instead of my preferred 8 hours of sleep.
I went to bed plenty early (by 9:00pm), but woke up in the middle of the night for some reason and wasted at least two hours trying to fall back to sleep.
I didn't feel like a total loss while on the bike today, but not 100%, either.
More like 70%.
So, that basically set the tone for the day.

How did the revalved fork perform?
In all honesty, there's no real improvement when the whole ride of 57 miles is mulled over.
Actually, I have to say the stock setup was better overall.
The work Tom did does make for a fork that feels differently, no doubt, but while the absorption of the sharp and pesky bumps (the bigger ones) seems to have improved a bit, the feel of the fork in most other situations is that of now having a firm overall feel where it did not before, similar to how the CRF-450X9 was.
So, while the bigger sharp bumps improved slightly, the smaller sharp bumps are now a problem to deal with - and there are a whole lot of those bumps out on the Pachaug rock n' roll pile.
And, as was with the CRF-450X9 after the revalve done on that bike, the fork seems to work best on my favorite section of pine-needled whoops through the woods (near a pond called Hodge Pond, so I read).
If the whole Pachaug loop were like that, I'd be all set right now.
Well, it aint, so...

What this means is that another valving adjustment is more than likely in store, something that is actually pretty common when trying to dial-in your suspension in this manner.
At least Tom will now have one session in the books and have some results to go on while performing session #2.
What I may try before tomorrow's Labor Day ride is to remove the fork from the bike and lower the oil level 5 or 10mm.
We will see.

I do wonder whether I should simply tell Tom to valve the forks to work on rocks and roots and not to worry about it feeling soft through the Hodge Pond whoops, which has been what I've stressed to him up to this point.
Next time I talk with him, I'll bring this up and ask what he thinks about that idea.
Since 90% of the loop IS full of pesky rocks and roots, maybe that would make sense and I should quit messing around with trying to achieve some kind of (unrealistic?) compromise that works well everywhere..
Yes?
No?
We shall see.

Other than the fork performance, the ride was a decent one.
I did the usual route, and by now that means including the southern part AND the Baby Head Hill trail, although I did take the bypass trail that runs alongside the Boulder Head Hill section.
This second pass through this trail was actually a fair bit easier than the first time last weekend, and that's mainly because I was much more familiar with the lay of the land and was able to know fairly well in advance what was coming up.
I liked it, and I should add it to my normal route.

The bike performed well, as usual, and I now think I'm definitely done with carb fiddling for the time being - no complaints with how the bike ran and responded.
Once again, I was impressed with the low-end torque and light feel of the bike while negotiating the numerous rocky uphills on the southern section.
Good stuff.

I talked to a pair of KTM 2-stroke riders out there today, and we had a decent 15 minute rap session about riding the Pachaug loop and our bikes.
They seemed fairly gung-ho with KTM motorcycles, and that is just fine with me.
Me?
I like blue dirt bikes.  ;)

I'll post tomorrow.

-John

I Got Forked 390 Times

These aren't my forks, but they do look like the ones from my WR-250FP.
Today, I got forked-up by Tom at Nasin Machine.


One characteristic about the WR-250FP that I do belive I've mentioned is that, just as with the WR-250FY before it, the rear suspension works better than the front does.
How, specifically?
In situations where you hit sharp, square-edged (or seemingly square-edged) bumps that require the fork to move very quickly if there is any hope of the bump being absorbed in an acceptable manner, the fork needs help.
Kinda' like driving over a speed bump in a parking lot at a high speed and then feeling the sharp jolt sent through your car, the front fork of the WR-250FP, as delivered off the showroom
(10 years ago  ;)  ), gives a similar result.
That is, bump absorption in this situation could be much better, and after I thought about the fork's performance after last weekend's rides, I decided to have my friend Tom from Nasin Machine revalve the fork to achieve a more supple ride over these pesky (and numerous out on the ol' Pachaug enduro loop) obstacles.

As mentioned in previous posts, the parts that control the flow of the damping oil inside the fork (and rear shock absorber) are able to be changed in order to achieve a suspension setup that works better in certain trail riding situations.
Basically, I brought the forks to Tom and described to him how the forks felt to me, and since he knows from experience what parts need to be changed in order to get the fork performance I want, he went ahead and did just that for me.
Or, he performed what is called a "revalve".

So, I got the forks back today (Saturday), put the bike back together this afternoon, and it is now sitting, ready to go for a Pachaug rock pile ride tomorrow with it's newly revalved fork.
I'll let you know how it works over those sharp bumps that litter the place in numerous spots.

Two other things I did to the bike during the jerk week were to better clean-up and better route my home-made wiring for my taillight/brake light, and I also mounted a mucho better license plate holder, one that angles the plate downward enough to be easily seen from behind while also being much more rugged and apt to withstand thousands of Pachaug miles out in the sticks.

When I got the bike past DMV inspection/registration, one thing I absolutely wanted to do when putting the bike in it's post-inspection setup was to retain the original rear fender which has a taillight already built into it.
Why?
I like the styling, it fit the bike perfectly (since it's the one that belongs there), and the original taillight already has a dual-filament 1157-type bulb in place as well as a bulb socket with an unused third wire that would be capable of illuminating the second brake light filament.
So, all I had to do in order to have a functioning brake light was to connect my rear brake pedal switch to a couple of wires that would power that third tail light bulb socket wire when I step on the rear brake.
Done, uncle Leroy.
Nice, neat, tidy, and using original parts, too.

So, after tomorrow's ride, I'll post back on fork performance and the ride, in general, General.
This weekend is, by the way, Labor Day weekend, so that means Sunday and Monday off from jerk, and I also wonder how many horseback dykes and hikers I may see out there.
Sunday AND Monday rides?

-John