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Hi could anyone help with some fork settings for me?
My bike is a crf 250 r 2008 model.
The original oil had turned into goey snotty stuff.
cleaned and replaced with fresh oil.
375 outer and the inner oil was set to the book oil height,
Now the front forks are very harsh on the midstroke.
tried letting some compression of and that has not made a lot of difference,
all my old hondas have not had forks like these?
please advise.
Stephen uk

fourstroke wrote:Hi could anyone help with some fork settings for me?
My bike is a crf 250 r 2008 model.
The original oil had turned into goey snotty stuff.
cleaned and replaced with fresh oil.
375 outer and the inner oil was set to the book oil height,
Now the front forks are very harsh on the midstroke.
tried letting some compression of and that has not made a lot of difference,
all my old hondas have not had forks like these?
please advise.
Stephen uk

Gonna need your specs. Weight? Ability? MX or offroad?

Hi,I am 14 stone with riding gear on and good expert grade at enduros in centre, motocross i am a good junior in centre.My old cr250 has good forks which i have never had to do anything with apart from oil seals and oils.so i know how to strip and refit the forks.
The forks on my new crf feel horibly,I have removed the standard oil and replaced with a good 5 wt oil.and i then lowered the oil level to 375.
The forks seem very stiff right from the start and i seem to be only using the first 4 inches of travel most of the time.
To get the forks down any further is real hard work,and they need to be pushed real hard.
I rode at the weekend and it seemed that the bottom 4 inches of fork had not been used as once i had gone through some bogs it has left the mud on the lower section of the forks.
It seems to me that something is not quiet right inside the legs?
any ideas welcome.
Stephen

WTF is 14 stone? How about pound for us US folk or at least Kilos like the rest of the world.

08s are known to have a stiff midstroke. There are a few ways around it. revalving the mid valve shim stack, factory connection also makes a new midvalve spring for that year.

Try lowering the outer oil level. I have it listed at 370cc. Try down to like 365. Might be all you need to get them plusher to your liking.

thanks for your comments i think it works out at around 89 kilos cheers me deers.

I have pretty much the same problem on my 2008 crf 250, my forks are REAL STIFF and it means im suffering from arm pump alot more.

I got on my mates 06 (stock suspension) and his forks just soaked everything up so much smoother, and it felt great compared to mine.
since then i cant ride my bike without it just feeling way too harsh.
I wound both the rebound and compression out to as soft as they would go and dropped the oil level by 20cm and it was still nowhere near.

i have read various articles that say the 08 forks were reminicent to the harsh showas of the 1980's.

so can i revalve these myself? Ive had my forks apart before to do the seals etc and im fairly mechanically minded.... if so anyone got any suggestions of what to change to get a better feel?.... or do i just bite the bullet and take them to a proffessional suspension shop?

im 86kg so ive worked out the stock spring should be the correct one already.