Hello all, I got a pretty good deal on a leftover 2017 Thruxton, and have loved every minute of it. As I get some miles on the bike, I do find myself wanting a little stiffer suspension in the front, and was wondering if anyone had worked on putting some R suspension on their base model bike. As far as I can tell, Obviously the rears just bolt on with no modification, but the fronts I'd have to do the fork set, and the triple tree. I don't believe there is any difference from R rims and base rims- correct me if I'm wrong. Brakes would obviously be switched to the Brembo, with the master cylinder as well. Realistically I'm into my bike $4k less than a new R would of been, so I have some money to spend on parts. Even if I go OEM on everything, the parts breakdown from triumph is around $3100 for all new parts, including forks, brakes, master, triple trees, and rears. Thanks for the help! Pic for attention
And I want to soften mine!!! Why dont you look at replacing the springs/valves in the stock forks. I replaced my rear units with Bitubo and I know that the Matris kits for the front are popular. Got mine from Carpi Moto in Italy - good price and service.
If I'm honest, the rears are fine in the current configuration because the riding I do is spirited mountain roads- but I feel if I stiffen the fronts as much as the R is, the back will feel light. I'm trying to not unbalance the bike. The springs and valves in the front is a good thought, I might look into that. try and find a happy medium between the two. Thanks!
Ohlins fork internals are perfect and revalved rear ‘R’ shocks with a harder spring and softer damping perfect fork internals £600.00 ish and rear shocks second hand £250.00 new springs and revalved £380.00 ish
As standard I found the front although ok, if you pushed it, seemed to bounce rather than track the surface. The rear again ok, when pushed would tend to I can only describe felt like it was winding up and causing an oscillation. I fitted the standard ‘R’ shocks and they were just way too hard and bounced off every bump regardless of adjustments Once I purchased the Ohlins internals which transformed the front, softer in the way of bouncing but total control and feel. The rear with harder springs and revalved damping also transformed the rear. Now the bike absorbs bumps rather than bouncing and tracks perfectly. I weigh just under 17 stone and the bike is really really good as opposed to ok before
I had similar issues front n rear with my Speed twin, new YSS rear shocks and dropping the front 10mm made a huge difference, i'm still thinking about some cartridges in the forks.
To be honest I’ve not ridden one with progressive springs and a preload adjuster, the difference the cartridges made was immense
Yes it's nice to have the adjustability, my previous bike had Ohlins forks n rear shock. I'm still undecided on the cartridge kit as the new rear YSS shocks really improved the bike.
It does take some justification for the cost but in my case it worked out way less than an R in terms of initial cost and I’m probably in a minority but I love the more traditional look
Totally agree about the traditional look as that was one of the reasons for swapping down to the Speed Twin as its quite retro, i still prefer my 69 n 70 Triumphs though
