Hello everyone!
Hope you're all doing well. After a long time, I have finally upgraded my Bullet's rear suspension to what I had wanted since I purchased the bike. My primary motivation was the looks/cosmetic side of things. I wanted the original 1950s Bullet look, with the springs in full shrouds - black and stainless/chrome look.
Firstly, these are not Hagons, hence the topic title. I had wanted Hagons so badly since I saw Scotty's thread regarding them and reading other people's reviews about them. I was literally |--| this close to buying them from Dave Quinn. However, Dave was not confident sending 16kg springs with soft/medium damping all the way to Australia as it would be a lot of time waste sending springs back and forth across multiple continents if they didn't suit me. They were also cheaper to buy from the US, including postage. It came around to be around $350. Dave recommended that I purchase the shocks from the Australian Hagon dealer, who is selling them for $330..plus postage. Now, I was kind of reluctant to spend so much dough on a set of shocks. Keep in mind that I absolutely love Hagons, and have nothing against them. I was almost about to buy them.
Secondly, after giving up on getting the shocks, I was looking up suspension sets for REs on Ebay in my free time. All in hope of finding some full shrouded 320mm springs. On the 7th or 8th page of the search query on Ebay, I stumbled upon these -
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Classic-Triumph-BSA-British-Bike-shocks-12-5-320mm-1960s-70s-80s-/321195457719?ssPageName=ADME%3AL%3AOU%3AAU%3A3160&nma=true&si=Q4X9%252Ff5%252FOMmozyzB4ciC8zSKj6A%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557They are made by a wholeseller back in England
http://www.tecbikeparts.com/ But they also have a distributor here in Australia, albeit in another state. These shocks have 5 pre-load settings and are progressive. Also, people upgrade to modern type gas-filled springs, but in this case, these are
oil-based. So all in all, I purchased these for AUD $65, asked the seller to bush them with 10mm bushings. Bought on Saturday, and got them today
They arrived nicely packed -
Good quality on the finish -
Lets do this!
But in my excitement I realised that I can't remove the stock spring bolts without removing the rear mudguard due to its mounting bars. I think you don't need to remove the fender, but can just loosen the lower mounting brackets and shift it up to remove the bolts. But in order to make it easier for myself, I just removed it. And to remove the mudguard/fender, we have to remove the seat -
Out with the old -
And in with the new. No problems whatsoever with the bushings. Fit perfectly. -
Looking sexy!
Assembled everything back and took it out for a spin. This is how they look on the Bullet now -
As far as riding goes. These are around 18kg/cm as the supplier does not stock 16kg/cm. They are on the softest preload setting and as I went for a short ride, I took a route with quite a number of speedhumps/bumps, some irregular road surfaces etc and can easily say that they are an improvement over the stockies. They might be oil based, but they are softer than the OEMs, although they are still a bit hard on the bumps, but no way near the OEMs. As they are progressive, I noticed the ride was way smoother than before, and I actually liked the riding experience. It was quite comfortable. I am very happy. For $65, they are awesome.
All I need to do now is to replace the front-fork oil within the next couple of weeks and it should run like a charm. Then just change the tail-light to 1960s style, and wait for the tyres to wear out...then I get me some K70s. Bullet complete!
Thanks for reading
P.S. Thanks to Ducati Scotty for his Hagon thread, and fellow members for contributing useful information all over the forum, through posts and PMs.