There wasn't much of a break
between the 06 and 07 seasons, but I tried to cram as many modifications as
possible for the Hyosung into the short time span. Of course this led to
many headaches and even more late nights in the garage. The three big changes
were in the suspension, a complete engine teardown, and a 520 sprocket/chain
conversion.
The front forks were sent out to Race-Tech to be torn
down, evaluated, and to determine what could be done to improve them. The
stock front end is not that bad, but I knew there was better performance to
be found. My main complaint was that the suspension was too stiff for my
weight. The Race-Tech crew were able to swap out the fork spring to a .85kg/mm
(stock is a .95kg/mm) and they also threw in some gold valves for better
compression and rebound damping adjustability.
Towards the end of last season I had really started to
overwork the rear shock. It felt like someone had installed a pogo stick
on the rear of the bike and it would just hop around the track as it seemed
fit. Works Performance had already developed a new shock (in conjunction
with TCS) so I ordered one up with pre-load, compresssion, and rebound adjustability.
I had requested ride height adjustment, but they said they were not able
to incorporate it into the shock. So I called up Tim (CEO and El Presidente)
of Y.C.H. (Yavapai County Hackers) to see about getting some shorter "Dog
Bones" (shock links) to raise the rear end of the bike about 3/4". The goal
was to get more weight on the front end, as well as increasing ground clerance,
to help save bodywork damage.
When installing the rear shock it was apparant that a
section of the swing arm would need to be notched for clearance, as the new
spring has a bigger diameter than the old spring. After removing a small
section of steel from the swingarm, it became very apparant how overbuilt
the Hyosung really is. Not only is the swingarm made from thick steel, but
they reinforced the inside with a piece of 1" square stock steel from side
to side! No wonder the bike weighs a ton and a half.
