I.ve talked with guys with big rice touring bikes and they say thier ride is great. some have air shocks some don,t. what are they doing right? Hate to say it but like most of the things they make work right.

 

albngore,
You absolutely will not find a “set it and forget it”, off the shelf suspension product to meet your perception of the "Cadillac" ride. The good news is that your desired suspension characteristics can be achieved. The bad news is, it takes a lot of time and effort, and some times a lot of money, to tune a suspension on an individual machine to your liking, via the trial and error method. I feel your pain, literally. I want to tune my front end using the Ricor Intiminators that I already have, but there is no information available. Ricor has published nothing technical about "How To" tune or the functions of the circuits in the Intiminators, other than their sales marketing description. We must be able to thoroughly understand something before we can attempt to improve upon it. Fact is, most folks just don't know or care how or why things work, they just want it to work the way they think it should. Case in point, I have posted here twice requesting info about factory spring rates, and not one reply with useful info; so either know one knows what the factory spring rates are or they don’t care about the topic. My thought process is simple; that info is highly relevant because a big part of tuning your suspension is the way it "feels" to you. If you know your start point, the stock spring rate, then you can make an association of how the OEM springs "feel" and you can decide what spring rate you would like to try in order to achieve your goals. Now then after you evaluate the feel of the new spring rate, you can again make an association of “feel”. Having felt two different spring rates, your next attempt at spring rate selection should be pretty close to what you are looking for. Yes, you can use any of the major spring Mfrs. online calculators or even call them for a recommendation, but can they really factor your perception of what "feels" right to you, kinda like trying to predict the exact output of a given engine build, too many variables. There are a lot of excellent suspension products out there, but they all need tweaked to get it the way you want it. I'm very happy with Ohlins on the rear and currently playing with the front end. So far the only thing I know about my 06 Street Glide suspension is that it needs improved. Begin your pursuit with a good set of spring shocks with adjustable circuits, built to your weight and then work on the front. Also understand that the front and rear need to be tuned to work together in a balanced condition. Good Luck, be patient and persistent.