VOL. 55 ISSUE 49 DECEMBER 11, 2018 P73
comfort. Meanwhile on the shock, across
the board our testers were looking to calm
some jarring sensations on landings as well
as through acceleration chop.
On our second day aboard the bike, we actually
tested a version of the RM-Z250 with lighter spring
rates front and rear. Our lighter (and arguably fast-
est) test rider of the day said the lighter sprung bike
was a necessity for him and the stock spring rates
were simply too rigid. Even our heavier vet-class
guys backed the fork compression off more than five
clicks in search of compliance. One of us experi-
mented going stiffer, hoping to find more hold-up in
the fork and possibly lighter compression-stroke
valving. That didn't work better than stock so we're
still hunting here.
In the next weeks, we'll be trying our best to wear
these new suspension components down a bit and
hope they free up. If not, we'll be looking for more
solutions via spring rates or valving adjustments.
Regardless of our tuning game status at the
moment, we're happy to see the return of a coil-
spring fork on the Suzuki, the previous air system
wasn't compliant or easily tunable and contributed
to a less-than-stellar score on the compliance/
ownership scale for Suzuki's small-bore MX ma-
Basically, the
2019 RM-Z250
got a ground-
up restoration,
which includes
trashing the
previous air forks
for new coil-
spring forks.
