toe scraping!

[redranger08]

ive been scraping my toe sliders on my boots lately on my weekend rides and was wondering if that is ok to do? am i leaning the bike over too much or is it my body posistion that needs work? the balls of my foot is on the foot pegs when im leaning into a corner and its pointed towards the same direction im leaning into. my bp is lowered and rested on the tank and i am kissing the mirrors when leaned into a corner. the rear sets are stock. is there something im doing wrong?

[SLOWn60]

Originally Posted by redranger08

is there something im doing wrong?

Yes. You're not on a track. If the balls of your feet are truly on your pegs properly and your bp is really as you describe: you're riding on the street way above your pay grade and your future may be brief.

My gut tells me your foot probably is not in the correct position and your bp may not be as far over as you feel it is. Best advice I can give is to study Twist of the Wrist ll and take an advanced riding course.

Dragging anything on the street without real skills & knowledge (and even with skills!): it's only a matter of time before you run out of luck.

[redranger08]

i did this at the track as well but it was on a fz6. i am planning on going to buttonwillow this july with the ninjette. and yes i know i shouldnt be scrapping anything out on the streets. ive read and watched twist of the wrist numerous times. im in the middle of simon crafars "motovudu" video as well. was thinking maybe i need a new set of rear sets or maybe the yoshi rear set adapter? i dont know. maybe i can post up some videos of me riding.

[MrAtom]

The only toe scraping I do is with one of those little pumice rocks.

[SLOWn60]

Glad to read you're exploring your limits on the track!
Raising the pegs will add clearance.
Another thing to check is your suspension sag. If your suspension is settling needlessly low it reduces clearance.
Without actually seeing you ride it's impossible to know based only on your descriptions. If you can; post a video taken by a rider following you. Best of all; get a coach to fine tune your riding.
Good luck and have fun at the track! Warning: track days are addictive!

[Sirref]

I deal with this issue myself a lot at the track, I'm dragging my pegs as well too though

-raise pegs with aftermarket rearsets
-put your toes on the pegs rather than the balls of your feet
-don't rotate your foot, keep it planted on the peg and stick your knee out without sticking your toes out. You don't need to force your knee out as far as you think you do
-make sure your upper body is as low as possible to keep the bike more upright, keeping the inside elbow bent helps with this a lot (this is what I'm working on right now personally) as well as the outside elbow straight and resting on the tank

other areas to look into
stiffening the rear shock, a gsxr shock swap is the cheapest way to deal with this. Or you could just re-spring the shock. As it is the rear will squat a bit as you get on the throttle causing reduced ground clearance
If you stiffen the rear, stiffen the front. You don't want an unbalanced bike

[SLOWn60]

The cheapest suspension upgrade is to check/set your sag. You may not have to spend a dime or it will point you in the right direction if you do need to spend some money.

[redranger08]

i really need to up my suspension front/rear. hopefully by changing them out and adding some rear sets will help me out with these issues. will have to wait til trackday to see if i will have the same issue. until then i will be working on my suspensions. for the rear gsxr shock who nakes dog bones to raise it back up to stock height?

[csmith12]

Originally Posted by Sirref

other areas to look into
stiffening the rear shock, a gsxr shock swap is the cheapest way to deal with this. Or you could just re-spring the shock. As it is the rear will squat a bit as you get on the throttle causing reduced ground clearance
If you stiffen the rear, stiffen the front. You don't want an unbalanced bike

Some bikes do squat, but track or performance oriented bikes should NOT. If it does squat, the setup is generally considered bad. Rolling on the throttle should cause the rear of the bike to rise. This is due to the chain pulling on the rear sprocket around the swingarm mount point. That tension pivots the rear sprocket downward and can easily be seen but watching riders do a burnout or exiting the last corner onto a long straight. The rear shock is nearly topped out as the lower shock knuckle and bones moves with the swingarm. This is how sport bikes are designed to work.

And Ben is spot on about stiffening the rear shock. Finding the balance between, the type of riding you want to do and an acceptable comfort level while doing it, is all about keeping your shock (front and rear) working in their mid stroke ranges. It's about as good as it gets...

There is some good stuff in here; having tidy feet while riding, using body position to decrease needed lean angle and good throttle control are some of the easiest ways to keep your toes off the tarmac and they cost $0 too boot. After that, riders can then explore what hard parts can be modded to gain additional ground clearance.

[InvisiBill]

Originally Posted by Sirref

stiffening the rear shock, a gsxr shock swap is the cheapest way to deal with this. Or you could just re-spring the shock.
If you stiffen the rear, stiffen the front. You don't want an unbalanced bike

FYI, the GSXR shock that most people use (the one mentioned in the DIY) has the same spring rate as the stock NewGen shock. While the shock is more adjustable and higher quality, the swap won't affect the stiffness of the spring at all.

According to RT's calc, the rear is actually too stiff for most people (~215lb). I haven't seen much posted here about final spring rates that correlated to rider weights. One person posted that they needed to go much stiffer than what RT said, another said they had to go softer as RT indicated. RT's calculations seem to be in line with the numbers for the similar PreGen and 500 rear suspensions, and I assume they have enough suspension experience to not have a totally jacked up formula, but I have no firsthand experience setting up a 250 suspension. I'd love to see more data on this.

Assuming RT's calc is at least fairly close, the stock suspension is completely imbalanced. The fork springs are listed as being good for someone <100lb, to go along with that 215lb rear. Most people need to stiffen the front end at least a little regardless of whether they stiffen the rear.

Originally Posted by SLOWn60

The cheapest suspension upgrade is to check/set your sag. You may not have to spend a dime or it will point you in the right direction if you do need to spend some money.

Yes, as always, check your own bike before blindly buying parts. If you can't get your free (no rider) and static (with rider) sag both set correctly at the same time, that tells you that you need a different spring. With the preload adjusted to give you proper free sag, too much static sag means the spring is too soft. Too little static sag means the spring is too stiff. Increasing the preload excessively on a soft spring will give you proper static sag, but too little free sag (which will impair the bike's ability to rebound).

[Sirref]

Originally Posted by InvisiBill

FYI, the GSXR shock that most people use (the one mentioned in the DIY) has the same spring rate as the stock NewGen shock. While the shock is more adjustable and higher quality, the swap won't affect the stiffness of the spring at all.

According to RT's calc, the rear is actually too stiff for most people (~215lb). I haven't seen much posted here about final spring rates that correlated to rider weights. One person posted that they needed to go much stiffer than what RT said, another said they had to go softer as RT indicated. RT's calculations seem to be in line with the numbers for the similar PreGen and 500 rear suspensions, and I assume they have enough suspension experience to not have a totally jacked up formula, but I have no firsthand experience setting up a 250 suspension. I'd love to see more data on this.

Assuming RT's calc is at least fairly close, the stock suspension is completely imbalanced. The fork springs are listed as being good for someone <100lb, to go along with that 215lb rear. Most people need to stiffen the front end at least a little regardless of whether they stiffen the rear.

I don't know where you're looking but it is definitely a stiffer spring rate in there, I don't remember what the exact rates are but I looked them up with a local suspension tech a few months back and there was a difference (though they were both higher than where they need to be)

beyond that there are other huge differences from the shock swap, among ride height increased because the shock doesn't compress as much which does help with the whole toe scraping thing


off the showroom floor our bikes are stupid soft for any hard use since they weren't actually designed for it. You fix the suspension and it's twice as stiff, hop on an R6 it's twice as stiff as that, hop on a race prepped R6 and it's twice as stiff as that and it goes on. Unfortunately we can never stiffen these bikes up as much as we need to since the frames are so soft

[InvisiBill]

BIKE MODEL	RATE (kg/mm)	RATE (lb/in)	RIDER (lb)
EX500 OEM 	5.4         	300         	<30
PreGen OEM	7.9         	440         	136-144
NewGen OEM	9.3         	520         	209-218

98-00 GSXR600	6.4         	360         	58-64
01-03 GSXR600	8.0         	450         	141-149
04-05 GSXR600	7.6         	425         	120-128
06-09 GSXR600	9.4         	525         	214-224
11-13 GSXR600	10.1         	565         	250-261

00-03 GSXR750	7.2         	400         	99-107
04-05 GSXR750	7.3         	410         	105-112
06-07 GSXR750	9.5         	530         	219-229
08-10 GSXR750	9.5         	530         	219-229
11-13 GSXR750	10.5        	590         	271-282

01-02 GSXR1000	7.7         	430         	125-133
03-04 GSXR1000	8.6         	480         	172-181
05-06 GSXR1000	8.1         	455         	146-155
07-08 GSXR1000	10.1        	565         	250-261
09-11 GSXR1000	11.6        	650         	329-341

Estimating the NewGen's spring rate based on the number and size of coils verifies that it's in the neighborhood of the listed 9.3kg/mm. It's definitely much stiffer than the 500 and PreGen springs, which I have personally compared. The '06-'09 GSXR600 shock named in the DIY is 9.4kg/mm from everything I can find online about it. I'm willing to stand corrected if any of this is proven incorrect, but I haven't seen anything indicating that yet.

The shorter shock may have some effect on things, due to where in the arc the suspension motion is and whatnot. That stuff is beyond me. But my point was that dropping in an '06-'09 GSXR600 shock isn't a huge change in spring stiffness, like you'd get by dropping a NewGen unit into a PreGen/500.

[Sirref]

Ah fair, the ideal is still lower than both then

[adouglas]

Originally Posted by InvisiBill

BIKE MODEL	RATE (kg/mm)	RATE (lb/in)	RIDER (lb)
EX500 OEM 	5.4         	300         	<30
PreGen OEM	7.9         	440         	136-144
NewGen OEM	9.3         	520         	209-218

98-00 GSXR600	6.4         	360         	58-64
01-03 GSXR600	8.0         	450         	141-149
04-05 GSXR600	7.6         	425         	120-128
06-09 GSXR600	9.4         	525         	214-224
11-13 GSXR600	10.1         	565         	250-261

00-03 GSXR750	7.2         	400         	99-107
04-05 GSXR750	7.3         	410         	105-112
06-07 GSXR750	9.5         	530         	219-229
08-10 GSXR750	9.5         	530         	219-229
11-13 GSXR750	10.5        	590         	271-282

01-02 GSXR1000	7.7         	430         	125-133
03-04 GSXR1000	8.6         	480         	172-181
05-06 GSXR1000	8.1         	455         	146-155
07-08 GSXR1000	10.1        	565         	250-261
09-11 GSXR1000	11.6        	650         	329-341

I'm having a hard time understanding this chart. It looks like the 09-11 GSXR1000 comes from the factory sprung for a 329-341-lb rider.

Huh???

[Sirref]

Originally Posted by adouglas

I'm having a hard time understanding this chart. It looks like the 09-11 GSXR1000 comes from the factory sprung for a 329-341-lb rider.

Huh???

It could be hella oversprung to compensate for all the power?

[InvisiBill]

Originally Posted by adouglas

I'm having a hard time understanding this chart. It looks like the 09-11 GSXR1000 comes from the factory sprung for a 329-341-lb rider.

Huh???

I copied the chart from the DIY thread. Those are the ideal rider weights (per the RT calc) if that spring were used on a NewGen. You could use the 09-11 GSXR1000 shock/spring on a NewGen if you were setting it up for a 330lb rider.

I originally posted it along with my comment that it might be better to use a slightly different GSXR shock/spring for your swap, to better match your own weight (assuming the other shock was similar enough to swap in just as easily, or the spring could be transplanted), rather than everyone specifically trying to get the '06-'09 600 unit.