a little help & measurements?...and a map of my RTW ride - 38,000 miles done so far
 

2009 - XT660Z - 50,001 miles on the clock

just finished riding from ushuaia to prudhoe bay, then east to newfoundlnad and south to key west...i did 38,000 miles

i carry on riding around the world May 2013, i am going to do a few mods before i leave, but i have some issues, i live in the states so i am one of the very few lucky ones!!!!

...but by being lucky i can't drop in to dealers to see parts, take measurements or in most cases see other XTZ's on the road to ask questions so here goes

thinking of doing a rear shock change/ upgrade...any advise?
just change the spring or the whole unit?
anyone used a particular brand for 25,000 miles + with no issues (my next stop is africa, south down the west coast and north up the east coast) don't want to get stuck with a blown shock

front progressive springs by hyperpro?
for the rear just use the hyperpro spring, over the stock unit?
can someone send me a photo of the stock rear shock, don't know what was stock on the 2009???

can someone measure the rear suspension links not sure if mine are stock or lowered, i'm thinking mine was lowered...give me a center to center measurement

has anyone used the jack up kit from Lust Racing (i'm 6' 1" so height not an issue) if so handling, same/ better/ worse? can i get an eye to eye measurement from someone for these?

i have stock bars, i'm going to add risers 30mm but want to change bars (i know i'm coming off more than a few times in Africa) any advise on aftermarket bars, heavier duty larger diameter etc

any other advise would help as i have to pay double to get stuff over here unless i can find parts that cross over from another bike available here

BTW i'm a welder/ fabricator by trade and also owned a motorcycle shop for 17 years so i can make stuff if need be

the map...the route

red already done...
blue line...Louisiana to NY via west coast
fly to iceland - ferry to faroe island
ferry to denmark, north to Norkapp
south to Cape Town via UK taking the western route
north to UK taking eastern route
Uk to magadan and back, via stans and Mongolia - road of bones and BAM road
Uk to New Zealand hitting everywhere possible!!!!



http://dmh65.smugmug.com/Other/RTW/i...y-route-XL.jpg

Wow. Very jealous, not sure I should help :D.


Shocks: I only did 25k on the stock shock before deciding it was fit for the bin, so yours must be very tired! Mine's a 2008 bike, but I'm pretty sure they've all got the same Sachs shock with a piggyback reservoir. I thought the damping was still OK at that point, it was just the spring that was rubbish. There's a few on here with the Hyperpro spring on a stock shock - but no-one I know of with 50k up on it. Similarly I can't think of anyone who has put more than about 15k on an aftermarket shock.

Linkages: I'll try and measure later if noone else has by then. I've got stock ones on the bike, and a set of Off-The-Road +35mm ones ready to go on. Can't comment on the ride as I've not fitted them yet.


I've got Renthal 613 bars on mine, which give you about 25-30mm rise over stock without changing risers. You'll lose the standard handguards/bar weights unless you feel like tapping the ends with whatever thread it is. I just fitted Barkbusters, the vibration doesn't bother me.

thanks for the info, the story on this bike is i got from a dealer in Lancs and it was shipped to Ushuaia argentina, i did some reasearch and it came in pretty conclusive this was the best all around bike for what i was doing. I was hoping that it would be released in the US soon...and it wasn't, they went with the super tenere instead which is like a street bike with jacked up suspension and way to heavy and too many things that could go wrong!!!

anyhow, now i'm here contemplating mods

my bike has the sachs shock, with a white spring, is that how it comes from the factory?

my links measure 145mm eye to eye, my center stand appears to have been reduced in height so this makes me think its lowered. when i was fully loaded riding to prudhoe bay was when i first noticed it bottoming out on real rough terrain, at that point i had around 35,000 miles on the bike, by the time i got home at 50,000 miles reasonable bumps on normal roads would make it bottom out, it happened especially on bends

have you done your front springs? standard spring or progresive hyper pro again?

i like the sound of your bars not having to add risers, i'll see if i can find those here, i'm sure i can, are they a larger OD bar or is it just thicker wall tubing, and do they fit in the stock clamps, also i guess you didn't have to lengthen anything?

if you could give me the measurments on the plus sized linkages those i can cut on the CNC or waterjet at the shop

thanks for your help

Paul

Yes.

I've just popped out and measured the stock ones at 125mm. That was crouching down in the office car park with a plastic ruler, so I'll recheck later, and measure the +35mm ones. Looks pretty safe to say yours is lowered though.

I don't think just lifting it back up will cure your bottoming problems, you've still got the same travel on the shock, the bike will just be a bit higher when it bottoms. The problem is the stock spring is too soft to start with, and gets softer with age/mileage.

Mine are standard at the moment, but will shortly replaced entirely with some KTM/WP 48mm USD's. That's more because I'm silly enough to take mine racing. If I wasn't I'd probably have looked at sticking the hyperpro springs in, because a few people on here have spoken highly of them.


The 613's are just a standard 7/8" braced bar. Exactly the same fit as the OE bars, except that you won't be able to refit the stock bar weights. They're just about OK with the standard throttle cables, any higher and you'd have to get new cables or reroute them behind the top yoke.

Just to echo UT, cracking trip. If you need a place to wash and chill in the UK/Wales then shout.

Ok, shock. I replaced my standard Sachs shock at 10k miles as it was a bit fubar. I fitted a Nitron Race unit which has been on there now for 15k miles with no problems and is so much better than OE.
I also fitted the Renthal 613 bars, though I cut 15mm off each end to make sure the cables all fitted without mods.
I am 6' 2" and find the bars ok, though maybe an extra 10mm height would be useful when standing. Far better than OE bars though.

thanks for the offer i will definitly be in touch, i am from the UK orginally (mother lives in Dorset, sister in Ipswich) but i plan on riding the whole of the UK, i want to go around all B roads, so i'll be looking for hidden gems and if you are in Wales you must have plenty???

as for the shock, a change is for sure just trying to get info from so far away is difficult, i'll investigate your nitron Race unit...what was the reason for picking that particular one?

I've got a Nitron as well. Off the top of my head there's four options for the Tenere shock that I've heard of:

- OE with Hyperpro Spring
- Hagon
- Nitron
- Ohlins

The Hagon is a fairly basic unit - pretty much a straight swap for the OE, non-adjustable damping, but pretty cheap. You can add a remote preload adjuster, which may be more useful to what you are doing than adjustable damping.

Nitron do three specs - Road, Track, and Race - with increasing amounts of knobs to twiddle. The Race shock gives you compression, high and low speed rebound. Not that I've actually adjusted mine, because they build to order, in the UK, to my weight, etc, and they got it pretty much spot on for the riding I've done so far. Again, you can have any of the specs above built with a remote preload adjuster.

The Ohlins is, I'm sure, very nice, but you pay a nice premium for that yellow spring ;), and it's less adjustable than the top-spec Nitron.

All the four options above have been done by people on here, so should show up in searches. If it helps, I think 'Gas up let's go' has the hyperpro, 'Jmo' has the Ohlins, can't remember who fitted the Hagon. Both the Nitron and Ohlins have been raced in the Heroes-Legend rally.

UT is slightly wrong. The Nitron Race unit is adjustable for preload, rebound, and high and low speed compression.
I went for it as the company was in Oxford, I liked the products, and I got a discount as they had my bike for a week to build the shock to suit as they hadn't done one for a Tenere before.
Thusly whenever anyone buys a shock from them, they get a little picture of my bike with it!

I think there is a Wilbers option as well, but again it isn't that cheap.

Yes, front & rear.

It's a cheap upgrade that gives the bike a different feel, more so from the front springs than the rear.

The OE springs had about 20mm of sag over the Hyperpro when fitted, and sat on the bike.

I think with your plans, I'd stick with a shock replacement, and maybe use a spring upgrade for the front to balance the bike out a bit. The rear still gets overwhelmed on rough roads at speed after a while.

Oops.

I didn't mention preload because I've never seen a shock that wasn't adjustable. Just as well I've got instructions for the damping adjustments :D

By the way Paul, I'm about 21 pages into your RR on ADVrider (luckily my boss is away this week). I had a vague itching to go and do some riding in the US before... now I NEED to go :D

There's a Yacugar shock too, made at the ex-WP factory in Holland, by ex-WP engineers �325 or �475 with remote preload (+VAT).

I think this falls into the same category as Tenere headlamps ;)

The +35mm dogbones are 115mm centre to centre.

my original plan when i got back was to start a touring company, doing 18 days tours for adventure riders, taking only 4 people at a time thru nevada, california, colrado, utah, new mexico and a little bit of oregon maybe. i have it all routed so if you do want to go let me know an i can send you the tracks, its all gps routed, includes a lot of what you see on my US part of the blog plus some of the best parts of the teans america trail and some other little gems i know having lived in the southwest (vegas) for 12 years

i did set up website with some details www.5000mileadventures.com and the trip is around 5000 +/- miles and would take 14 to 30 days depending on how you ride...but i decided i can do that anytime so a quick 15 year ride around the world first is in order!!!!

at least now i know i have a few people to stop in and say hi to around the Uk and do some rides and have a few beers too

BACK TO THE REAR SHOCK...

price range and quality, Ohlins being the most expensive, what are other prices??

main issue i can think of is the size of the main strut/arm/rod whatever we call it and the strength of the mount, all i read is failure in these two areas, but mainly on the lower mount (mainly on heavier bikes GSA etc) but i will be loaded so the concern is there, LMK what you think

Oh, and i have great beer stories, wait until i tell you about the kidnapping in mexico!!!!

Definitely, shout up when you get here.

Ohlins, �869 from here:

http://www.off-the-road.de/XT-660-Z-...-Z-Tenere.html

Touratech also list it for �731.09 here, which is probably a better offer at the moment given the exchange rates. I guess you might even be able to get it via TT-USA:

http://www.touratech.com/shops/008/p...3b5fa476dfda38

Nitron, �295-475 from here:

http://nitron.co.uk/nitron09/index.p...e50f8abc1349f0

The remote preload adjuster for the Nitron is �150, here:

http://nitron.co.uk/nitron09/index.p...e50f8abc1349f0

The Hagon seems to be about �274. This is just the first place I googled:

http://www.lm-spares.co.uk/acatalog/...e_2009___.html

And the Hyperpro springs seem to be about �123 for the front and �88 for the rear. Again, first result on google:

http://www.bici.co.uk/Shop/Suspensio...o-Springs.html


The price difference isn't quite as bad as it appears, bearing in mind the Ohlins price is in Euros and inc.VAT, the Nitron prices are in GBP and ex.VAT. I assume if they were shipping it to you in the US you wouldn't end up paying the VAT anyway. But you can still get the top spec Nitron complete with preload adjuster for about the same as the Ohlins.

I've not seen anyone mention issues with other parts of the suspension mounts/linkages failing - but then there's not many frequent posters who have given their bikes such a hard time as you.

thanks for all that information

i'll look at those links tonight after work, doing 12 hours+ a day right now, which is good, no time to spend money that i should be saving to ride!!!

BTW if you do want to come over here, the ride i'm telling you about is roughly 2500 off road and 2500 miles on road

allow me to add Wilbers to that list. I fitted Wilbers springs in front and a Wilbers 641 shock in the back. Rear shock is adjustable for preload, rebound and separate low and high speed dampening for inbound. You can get them with external hydraulic preload adjuster, but I didn't bother with that.
I have tested it thoroughly on the road, in the Flemish mud and on single track Welsh trails. Performed admirably.

Paid a little over 800� for front and back.

do you know or anyone else that reads this, is the shock that is used on the xt660z - stock or aftermarket the same as one used on any other bike, just thinking maybe i can get a better deal over here if i can find a shock locally, so i don't have to pay crazy shipping or import duty

i'm going to cut these on the waterjet and mill the holes on a CNC machine here in the next two weeks (have to fit it in the work schedule) anyone reading this needs some let me know ASAP and i will cut more?

i'm coming to the UK on Dec 22nd, i can drop them in the mail then to keep the cost down

Let me know a price and potentially count me in.

i haven't got a definite price let me know what they cost from other suppliers, give me a link and their price and i will be below that

Thanks, but I had a word with an engineer friend of mine and she's making me up some adjustable ones :)

good thanks for letting me know, shoot me a photo when he's done...adjustable?

I dropped an email to Ohlins and asked for a possible sponsorship???

yea right! yea right, they said yes based on what i'm doing (the RTW), and even offered to through in the first service...this is from the US based part of the corp.

don't ask don't get?

Result!

i will test the thing to its absolute limit...

I'm certain you will :D

Will do, she said it would be sometime in the next week or so.

Well done on the Ohlins!