Triumphrat

RideVT

Hello,

It’s getting to be that time of year again when I begin to pay more attention to my bike. As much as I love my winter sports, thinking about the upcoming riding season keeps me warm inside. This year I want to upgrade the rear suspension on my Legend. I love the bike but as many have mentioned the rear shock is woefully inadequate. At 6’1” and 195lbs the solo riding is ok however when the wife rides with me its awful. I have the opportunity to buy a TBS rear shock for next to nothing. It came off a salvage bike with 19000 miles on it. It looks to be in great shape and I would buy it and have it rebuilt if I knew I could just switch out the existing Legend rear. I know this will make the bike taller which is fine but are there any other modifications I would have to make to ensure this works properly. Thanks for the advice.

MickMaguire

You can just swap it - it will raise the rear a lot and quicken the steering, but that will probably be fine. The only thing you will need to do is change the kickstand. You will also need to ideally get the under seat mounting bracket for the remote reservoir from a dealer - last time I bought one it was just a few bucks.

You wont regret the swap its a good shock.

__________________
Mick...

gregp

I am not so sure that the TBS shock will solve your 2 -up shock bottoming problem, though. The spring rates are probably very similar, and there is probably *less* compression damping in the TBS shock. Even though the TBS compression damping is adjustable, the stock Legend shock (if it is similar to my stock Adventurer shock) has quite a bit to begin with. Adjustable compression damping on most shocks that do not have both high and low speed adjusters only effect the ride height.
Did you try tightening up the pre-load collars on the original shock?
You may end up sourcing a stiffer spring.
I installed a ZX7 shock in my Adventurer, and it rides very nicely compared to the stock shock, but carrying a passenger still bottoms the shock on hard hits. I tightened up the preload collars and found a setting that allows me to still get a decent ride solo, yet I can carry a passenger as long as I ease up a bit on the throttle.

MickMaguire

The TBS shock is 3 way adjustable so you can up the compression damping. It will also give you a tad more travel. A stiffer spring however may be the way to go - try the pre-load first. The other thing to bear in mind is that these bikes were really only designed to carry (IIRC) around 375 pounds max - are you exceeding that (remember you need to add gear weight)?

__________________
Mick...