suspension setup and chain tension

Starting to think about getting the bike out again soon. Its a 08 250x with about 3300 miles on it. I noticed the other day that my chain seems a bit tight. only about a half inch of play on the kickstand. What are you guys running them at? I searched and found all kinds of conflicting information. Also, what kind of sag should I be running? How far should I let the stock sprockets wear? Any other preventitive maint. you would recommend?

You searched?

Did you look at the sticky? <-- clicky


2 page - most of the way down - look for diagram in a Shewolf post.

Skithis wrote:

Starting to think about getting the bike out again soon. Its a 08 250x with about 3300 miles on it. I noticed the other day that my chain seems a bit tight. only about a half inch of play on the kickstand. What are you guys running them at? I searched and found all kinds of conflicting information. Also, what kind of sag should I be running? How far should I let the stock sprockets wear? Any other preventitive maint. you would recommend?

Crawdaddy's website had people suggesting using a ratchet strap to pull rear suspension down halfway to check. I left a fairly tight 5/8" chain slack at half travel with this method. Removes all guesswork.

I have 14/48 sprox so standard check is OFF for my bike. Greer (thanks, Sara!) had it pretty close with 14/49, though.

It's quick and easy. Just thread strap UNDER plastic, not over..

Then after it is set with the 'strap method', record what your chain slack/gap 'er whatever is at the standard checking point with your bike on the side stand and you're set for easy future checks.

What gearing you run has no efect on chain tension.
Raising or lowering the bike does efects how loose the chain is while the bike is on the side stand tho.
The chain is at it tightest when the swingarm is perfectly straight back from the front sprocket, use the ratchet strap method to get the suspension to that point, its some wheres around 1/2 way compressed like mentioned but can it be 1/4 of the way compressed if you lowered the bike alot, then adjust the chain so it has 1/2 an inch of slack.
Unless your bike sits at the same height as someone elses their chain adjustment on the stand will be different.

the measured gap using whatever method will be much larger with the big sprox.