Have replaced springs, valves and oil. still have what seems to by a sticky
slider? the bike is uneven in turns? have aligned the wheels, forks and am
fairly certain nothing is bent, this bike has not been layed down hard. so
what the f%$K? ANY ideas, guesses, hair-brained schemes????? thanks
in advance.

 

This shouldn't be that hard to figure out. What do you mean by "uneven in turns."

 

How squared off is the rear tire and have you checked your tire pressure lately ?
If the bike feels like it's hard to turn it's usually one of the above unless you have recently changed your geometry with different forks/shock.

Kai Ju

 

First, to check if something is binding, back off the rebound adjuster all the way and compress the forks a couple times feeling for sticking/binding. If you do find something odd then it's time to figure out which one it is. This requires removal of both forks and putting them in a V-block and checking the runout.

If you find no sticking then you should try this method for aligning the forks/axle. Put the bike on stands. The type that lifts by the steering stem works the best. Loosen the lower triple clamp, axle, and axle pinch bolts. Spin the front wheel as hard as you safely can and then rapidly squeeze the front brake. Do this a couple times. This will "shock" the front end into alignment. Tighten everything up and go for a ride to check your results.

If there's still something wrong then I'd question the tire condition, straightness of the triple clamp assembly, or even something as simple as tire pressures.

 

i backed off the tire pressure after the test (backing off of the preloaders, there is no binding!). feels as if one fork rebounds much faster than the other, strange my previous S-Hawk did not have the problem. i suppose i may have
to take the forks apart again. might be oil level? one of the dampening adjusters does not turn all the way in, can it be bent?

 

There is no way to feel if one rebounds more than the other when they are installed in the triple clamp. Hell, some racers use one fork for compression damping and the other for rebound. Marzocchi does this. It has no affect on the steering. They do the same with springs. If a .95 spring is not available they use a .90 in one fork and a 1.00 in the other.

From what you describe, the forks have been assembled incorrectly. When you are ready to take them apart give me a PM and I'll walk through the process with you to get them right. We may do this over the phone or MSN Msngr too.

What did you do with the valves???? Racetech or reshim? What stack did you use? What about the check valves - coil springs or wave washers? What spring rate? Are you getting proper sag numbers? Did you properly bleed the forks before you measured the air gap? Did you measure air gap properly? What oil did you use? These are the questions I will need answers to before we start.

Hehe, hope you didn't think this suspension stuff would come easy, did you?