Have had the hd159 shocks on my 14 sgs for a few thousand miles now and love the performance of them. Have noticed ever since they were new one shock had a lot of resistance trying to adjust the preload collar. Pretty much had to use the shock adjustment tool grabbing with both hands and took a lot of force to turn it. Long story short, after adjusting them for a ride with my wife, went to turn the preload back to my solo setting and the collar would not budge! The shock adjustment tool completely reemed out the holes in the collar. Figured what the hell, the collar is screwed at this point, so with the shock off the bike and grabbing the collar with large channel locks and a screwdriver through the eyelet, got the preload collar to turn after some force and the shock body threads were trashed under the collar, almost no threads left. Hopefully ohlins has good customer service bc the shock is completely ruined. Clearly the preload collar was either cross threaded from ohlins or there was some sort of burr on the collar or shock body that eventually ruined the threads adjusting them a few times

 

Sorry to hear that,

I've thought about the aluminum to aluminum threads possibly galling.

I know if the collar would freeze while turning, I would not try to turn it any more, as galled threads never come off without more damage because their essentially welded together.

A dremel with the tiny cut off disk to split, then spread the collar would have been the route I would have taken, though it might get hairy when the spring unloads.

Hope they take care of it for you.

 

Was gonna go that route, but with the spring under tension it might get ugly when the collar snapped off. Figured forcing it would just cut the threads eventually and would turn, couldn't be more wrong!

 

Guess I just don't understand why you didn't contact Ohlins when you noticed the adjustment wasn't turning properly...??

Not trying to be an a$$, but it's best to contact the manufacturer and/or vendor whenever problems surface. Even if it's beyond warranty, they sometimes cover services/fixes pro-bono.

Good luck & hope things work out.

 

Bc i'm a complete idiot and thought if I forced the collar to turn all the way up I could unload the spring tension and cut the collar off with a dremel

 

I know how it goes........who in their right mind wants to tear their bike apart, install new parts, just to find out something isn't right. I'd be like "*** it, I'll make it work" lol! Until it breaks.
I'm sure they would have liked to have detective shock back sooner. But then again. I'm sure rider does like installing defective shock.

 

Gave Howard a call, he refuses to work on them bc I bought through ohlins, which is understandable, but he said the shock bodies are replaceable without buying an entire shock, so hopefully ohlins can repair it at minimal cost

 

yep save a few bucks on the purchase and give op the support you would get from Howard. give him a call and talk to him, more importantly listen to him.

 

Yeah, I'd call Ohlins for sure. Howard would do you right if you got it through him. The US HQ is about an hour ride from me, and the techs there are very helpful.

 

Oh man, sorry to hear that. After many weeks of turning and adjusting I finally got my Ohlins set right. After so much turning of the collar it started to squeal a little. I immediately squirted some lube onto the threads. Problem solved. The threaded part of the shock body is aluminum, which is much softer than steel. Doesn't take much to gall it up. If you get no dealer help most machine shops can duplicate the collar and chase the threads.