Fork oil level

[Sipper']

I've been playing with this for a while and am amazed at how it changes the chassis/suspension/damping balance with no other changes. Do you guys/gals run what RT recommends or do you actually play with the level.

Going from 150mm to 130 mm changes the balance from front heavy to front light and the fork uses MUCH less travel over bumps with the smaller air gap, but under hard braking it uses the same total and at the same time the compression damping feels MUCH stiffer as well.

Here's what I've got so far-
Soupy's bone and raised the rear 2"
Ohlins Shock at same length as stock.

12mm preload on the Ohlins spring giving 25mm total sag, 4mm free sag.

Emulators with 64lb spring on 3 revs, single hole bleed with .1" hole (made my own), Maxima 20w oil, RT .7 springs with 10mm preload- 30mm total sag.
Fork at .180" above triple.

Now, with the lower oil level (150-160mm) the fork feels like it uses twice the travel on bumps than the rear, also feels like the high speed compression is too soft vs the rear. Low speed compression feels the same. Chassis balance/weighting feels front heavy.

With 130mm level, the fork now feels like it uses less travel than the rear, low and high speed compression feels stiffer than the rear and the balance feels front light. Front end tire feel is improved at this oil level.

I've always been a front end feel kind of rider and my confidence is based pretty heavy on it, so I have been trying many changes to get the fork working very good.

[Alex]

Good info.