lowering bike seat height (1983 XR 350)

[glen webster]

Hi all,
I have recently bought an old Honda XR 350 and have found that my legs haven't grown any longer in the 20 odd years since I last rode a trailbike off-road and sadly my 30 inch inleg is just a bit too short for comfortably riding in tight gnarly coutryside on my XR. I had thought to modify the seat height by fitting another (ie an XR 500 or similar) shock and shortened spring in place of the original. I thought of the XR 500 as it is heavier so the spring rate would be higher and hopefully the rear suspension would operate effectively over the reduced travel with the stiffer spring. Can anyone tell me if my ideas are reasonable as I had hoped to do the work myself, hopefully on the cheap? Alternately I may have to spend some money and get a commercially altered shock/spring but you don't learn anything from paying someone else to do the job for you. In Enzed about 20 years ago, when I used to ride, everyone did their own work and it kind of goes against the grain to pay for something that I should be able to do with a bit of research and a bit of careful thinking before starting on the work myself.

I look forward to hearing from you guys. Thanks from Invercargill NZ, the deep south!
Cheers
Glen

 

[John K]

There are a number of options here. You could have the suspension modified (front and rear) by a suspension tuner to reduce travel. Alternatively devol and possibly some others make lowering links (not sure they would go back that far though). You can also drop your forks in the triple clamps to lower the front, and take as much preload off the shock as possible (these last two will make a significant change in handling, probably not for the better). OR you can remove some seat foam which is probably the best solution. Pull the seat apart and use some new harder/stiffer foam to bring it down. Hope that is of some help.

 

[John K]

There are a number of options here. You could have the suspension modified (front and rear) by a suspension tuner to reduce travel. Alternatively devol and possibly some others make lowering links (not sure they would go back that far though). You can also drop your forks in the triple clamps to lower the front, and take as much preload off the shock as possible (these last two will make a significant change in handling, probably not for the better). OR you can remove some seat foam which is probably the best solution. Pull the seat apart and use some new harder/stiffer foam to bring it down. Hope that is of some help.

 

[glen webster]

Thanks John,
I will have to have a look around in Enzed and see what I can find. I had thought of changing the rear linkage but wasn't sure if anyone had made anything suitable for the back. I knew that I needed to do that as just sliding the fork clamps up would steepen the steering angle further and XR 350's have a reputation for having a reasonably twitchy nature anyway. I will probably have to resort to lowering the seat thickness though.
Thanks for your suggestions.
Glen