I've got a 2019 Road King and I was wondering if there's any adjustments that I can do to the suspension to soften the bumps a bit? To say the roads in the Derbyshire Peak District (UK) aren't smooth is an understatement and I find the RK 'crashes' over the bumps rather than soaking them up, which is odd as the suspension feels quite soft and squidgy when at a standstill. I often come back from a ride feeling like my spine's been compressed a couple of inches lol.

 

Ok, there are many posts concerning suspension on Harley touring bikes. You will need to go aftermarket to fix this. The stock shocks have about 2" of travel and well, basically not worth the metal they are made from. I like Legend and would use the 13" length and adjusted with 1/2" to 3/4" initial compression when you sit on the bike. Many other brands out there that will work just fine. This is going to cost you $900.00. In my opinion going cheap is a waste of your money. My good friend has a RK and is amazed at the improvement.

Many will pile on with their favorite brand and cheaper cost - you always get what you pay for!!!

 

Thanks very much, I did have a quick look for similar posts but must have missed them. If it's $900 US then it probably means I'll end up paying £1000 UK which equates to about $1300 US Looks like I need to have a chat with my local dealership then

 

yep it was 900 USD. Good hunting and let us know how you make out. Since you are across the pond maybe Elka shocks would be more readily available.

 

road king or road king special? if it's just the road king you have the 13'' shocks which gives you 3'' of travel, not 2''. if you have the special, then you have the 12'' shocks that do have 2'' of travel. and i do have to ask, as you make no mention of it, have you tried adjusting the **** on the left shock?

 

Thanks, it's the RK and not RK special. I assume you mean the preload for the rear shocks, in which case yes I have. I've recently reduced the preload to make it 'softer' and that's not helped. But to be honest the front shocks 'crash' over the bumps as much as the rears.

 

Look into bitubo's. They are in Italy. They set me up with 13" shocks sprung and valved for my weight and were $450.00 USD. I run pro action on my other bike and have run ohlins in the past. The bitubo's ride is on par with them. Should save you some coin over a US import.

 

Thanks, will definitely look into them.

Do folk just replace the rears then, or is it worth looking into fronts too? I guess it starts getting very expensive when you start looking at new forks?

 

Ahhh... that's the rub...

A common complaint, after replacing the OEM rear shocks with a quality replacement is, "I now notice how bad the front suspension is...!"

Once you get a good rear shock, the shortcomings of the OEM front suspension design is magnified...

The good news .... there are several ways to upgrade the front suspension that run the gamut of easy & cheap to more complex & expensive.. as suspected, the degree of improvement can increase with the amount of the investment... All are better than OEM, ranging from changing the viscosity of the shock fluid to a front cartridge install...

I put Ohlins on the rear a little over a year ago... I know the front cartridges I want, just haven't been able to save up for them yet... I hate it when life gets in the way of my Harley mods...!!

 

The post above me pretty much nailed it on the head what happened to me with my 03 Bagger many years ago,

As soon as I did the rear shocks, the Showa front suspension showed me what utter crap it was

I resolved the issue with progressive front fork internals.

For my 13 I have a spare set of forks set up with Progressive internals and a set of Bitubo's from @DK Custom Products waiting to be installed as soon as I get back to Florida this fall.

It should not be a surprise to anyone that HD used the cheapest suspension parts they could on the bike, leaving us to address that weakness along with the rest of the penny pinching from the bean counters.

I have people who have ridden both my baggers that will not ride the 13 Ultra Stage 4 after riding my 03 police bike cloned into a FLHTCI,

That is how much better the aftermarket suspension is, and I did not spend a lot of money on it, imagine of I went top shelf!