South West Bikers | Motorcycle Forum

Looking for a little bit of advice.

While at Cadwell last Monday I had a lot of front end chatter at one particular part of the circuit. When braking into the chicane I had a lot of chatter, I didn't have any chatter while heavy braking on any other part of the circuit. I didn't feel any knocking or clonks from the front end, however when chatting someone said check your head stock bearings, I did this and was able to tighten the nuts by about 3/4 of a turn (being careful not to over tighten). Next time out better at that point of the track but a few laps in chatter back.

Anyone got any ideas

I've checked

front discs not looking warped and wear is even on both
brand new bearing in front wheel
brake pads all good
ran brand new slicks and tyre wear is very good on front and rear

Cheers Jimbo

Were the forks under full compression? You could of been bottoming out.

Chatter seems to be a term thrown around when people get vibration, wobble, bottoming out, warping of disks, too high tyre pressure - the list can go on and on.

I was getting vibration through the handle bars only under braking and tipping in on that part of the track. Forks haven't bottomed out as i have about 20-25mm from the cable tie indicator. if it was a warped disc I would of thought it would happen when braking at all parts of the circuit.

Check your front wheel bearings and disc bobbins are free,

If it's only happening in one place round cadwell i would be thinking it's something else.

Also if you still have 20-25mm from the bottom it seems your suspension set up maybe off for your riding style.

Have you had it set up at all?

Front wheel bearings are brand new had those put in when I had my slicks fitted.

Running 34 psi in front hot off the warmers

What slick are you running??

Plus 34 shouldn't give you any issues at that pace.
I still would be looking elsewhere for your issue.

Its been apart recently! Has the front been put back together properly, as in torque, sequence , balance.

25 to 30mm up from the base of the stanchion is where your bump stop will be inside the forks (unless you've had it removed) this is to stop you from bottoming out the forks and damaging them. You could be hitting against that.

Running with Metzeler CompK slicks

Front end not been apart for a while, I'll have to pop over and get you to service forks as they probably could do with an oil change.

Not a problem mister.

I'm going to pull the front forks next week so will pop them over to you asap as I'm off to Pembrey at then end of the month, have you any luck looking into springs and valves etc?

You won't need valves. Springs, decent oil and the correct gap will see you right.

When I've had chatter in the past it's been because the oil I was using was too heavy. What happens is the forks are overdamped and can't respond to the ripples in the road. People often turn the damping right up in the belief it'll help handling, up to a point this is true but turn it up too far and it introduces its own problems. Think about paying for an expert setup. Can also happen with worn tyres BTW.

When I've had chatter it's been down to hearing the wife