Spring rates sag etc - wtf is going on with my springs???!?!?!?!?

[leighz]

Bike is a 2013 Tiger Sport

Front preload is wound in showing two (fat) bands - this gives me :
Static 44mm
Loaded 63mm

If the available travel is 140mm (166mm max fully extended stanchion) as per triumphs spec for this bike that means I'm using 45% of available travel just sitting on the thing

Preload adjustment seems to make very little difference (I backed it off from full as I read somewhere you're not supposed to run with max preload - can't remember the reason why - to harsh a ride maybe?)

fwiw I have a cable tie which currently sits 41mm above the bottom of the stanchion (this would give me 26mm unusable stanchion and 15mm remaining travel) try as a might I can't get lower than that 15mm remaining travel

So my questions are:

1) are these springs likely to be progressive?

2) how on earth are they supposed to cope two up? I generally ride solo

3) what static and loaded sag should I aim for? (I usually aim for about 1/3 of total travel loaded as a ball park which would be so ~ 47mm in this case).

Planning on replacing for oil at some point and taking a look at the springs to just to find out what's in there

Any input much appreciated

fwiw I've got the preload wound in nearly to max to get about 1/3 travel loaded sag

Cheers?

ps I'm 90kg

[turtle]

I know just barely enough about this to be dangerous, so YMMV.  On my Mk1 Tiger (2011) with factory springs, I had the same rider sag as you, 45%, which is too much.  Cranking in more preload won't remedy that.  I shoot for about 30% max of full travel for rider sag.  I believe you need higher rate springs.  I prefer straight rate springs.  There are plenty of rate calculators out there if you do a web search.  There's a ton of info here on the forum as well.  It takes some patience to find it and sort through all the information and opinions.  Hope this helps. 

[Paul2bikes]

Ayup leighz, did you buy the bike new? If not could a PO have put girlie weight springs in it?

I just set mine so's it's comfy...for me. Backing it all from factory settings until it stopped bouncing me out of the seat on our sh#t roads. I'm about 100kg kitted up, my luggage is about 45kg. The muck stops 54mm up the stanchion if that helps. 

[leighz]

Yes - new springs may be in order. Front and rear.

No - I bought it second hand. The guy who owned it before me had lowered it so I put that back to stock which improved things no end - well it stopped grinding the pegs out with such regularity :)

Other than that I don't know much else about the bikes history. Guess I'll have to take the springs out to find out

[leighz]

Originally Posted by leighz

fwiw I've got the preload wound in nearly to max on the rear to get about 1/3 travel loaded sag

just realised that didn't make sense

[Paul2bikes]

Could it have been been lowered, maybe using shorter springs. Have you checked it against another.