I've had my Arnott Air Ride (9010-BS-C) for a few years now, and have enjoyed it for the most part. Had to chase down leak, fixed it, now it's back. Then today, I thought my compressor went out, but then started working again. I haven't chased down any wires or did any troubleshooting yet, might do that later.

Now I'm thinking about running a coil/progressive type shock, which I've never run before. I'm curious how the ride is? With my current setup, 1" bracket/relocator and the shocks, I guess I'm lowered about 4" when I have it slammed. (parked, maybe some hard tail cruising) If I switch out my setup, I'm thinking about taking the bracket off and maybe going with a 10.5" or 11" shock. If I still want to go lower, I'll throw the bracket back in. I've got to take it easy with the extended bags. The 2 I've seen are Burly and Progressive. I'm 250lbs, and ride solo 99% of the time. I like this option, because the preload is adjustable (in case my passenger ever decides to jump on).

With normal riding, I usually air the shocks up to about half way, to keep the lowered look, but still have suspension travel. The ride is ok, I'm just curious if the ride would be any better with coil shocks.

If anyone has removed their Air suspension and went with coil types, lets hear it!

 

To get this started, I have never ridden an 'air ride' bike. But I went from the stock HD air-shocks to coil-over Progressive shocks. The ride was a great improvement with the Progressives...

Seems to me, if you want to keep a 'slammed' look, and a compliant (soft) ride, the coil-over shocks might not get you there. The problem is, if you go with a 10.5 or 11 inch shock, the shock travel will be greatly diminished. This means in order to keep from bottoming-out you'll need a really stiff ride (lots of pre-load) and/or really 'stiff' springs.

In my mind there's no question that if you're willing to do the trade-off for raising the bike some (12.5-13"), you'll get a nice ride out of a set of Progressive 940's or 440's. But if you compromise the ride with very short shocks, my guess is you won't have any better ride than you've got now, and maybe worse, and will lose the adjustability for 2-up riding. The bottom line is, short coil-over shocks are probably not going to give you a better ride than you have now.

Alan

 

Thanks for replying Alan. I'm somewhat familiar with my trucks suspension, as in, I lifted it by adding some preload, and supposedly I was supposed to have a crappy ride, which I have yet to notice. Then again, we are talking about a 6,000lb truck, not an 800lb bike.

I think I understand that if I go with a shorter shock, and adjust it to load it, that it will stiffen the ride. I'm just curious how it would be if I don't adjust it at all. I assume that the shorter shocks have less travel, but how much less travel would be my question. With my air ride aired up, I think my bike sqats maybe an inch with me on it. I'm just curious how much "give", or up travel do these shorter shocks have. I'm not too concerned about bottoming out, I just wanna ride on a cloud, if possible.

But yeah, I get it, if I have to preload the shock just to handle my weight, the ride might suck.

Also, by you saying that you went from factory to coilovers, and it improved your ride, that gives me hope. I don't remember my ride getting any better going from factory to air ride...just the adjustability has been nice. In other words, I think I'm over it, I just want a nice ride but still maintain the lowered ride. I'm willing to give up an inch or two.

Also, I don't do any cross country riding, though I've done the dragons tail a couple times. Kids and wife have reeled me in, so its pretty much around town short riding.

 

I have some progressive front springs and rear shocks I'm getting ready to put in but I don't have any experience with them yet. I bought the bike from a guy who had a 11" shocks installed, but I hate the Harley air shocks. I read of guys going with the 11" shocks on their bikes from progressive and loving it. I personally went with the heavy duty 13.5" shocks as I want all the travel I can get. Either way, I heard it's a great improvement over the stock Harley shocks with a progressive setup. You can also go with heavier oil in the front to increase dampening with the heavy duty shocks.

As another note, I have a friends whose pops installed the progressive shocks on his UC and he loves em. I think the street glides are stock 11" rear shocks so it shouldn't be a bad ride.....

 

Thanks for the reply jrmy. My front is squared away, I just have a 1" lowering kit. No complaints.

Another + review for 11" progressive, I'm digging it.

I found an 11" no name shock on ebay for $100. Not sure if I want to take the risk, when I can get a 10.5" burly or 11" progressive for $200. Still in research mode, but I'm probably gonna go ahead and pull the trigger one way or the other. If I don't like it, it was a $200 learning experience. If I like it, I'll have a $900 Arnott setup that I can try to sell for $300-400

 

Let's step back a bit. The spring-rate required by a given rider is the same for any shock, no matter how long. Short shocks don't need stiffer springs, they need more damping than longer shocks. Unfortunately short shocks tend also to be cheap and don't have good damping. If you consult the premium brand shock makers they don't make very short shocks, because of the difficulty of making them ride well.

If you want very short shocks you may not get a very good quality ride. On the other hand, if you get the shortest good quality shocks at around 11 1/2" you can expect a very much better ride.

 

Thanks for replying grbrown. Can you recommend a shock that's in the 11.5" range? Thanks.

 

Yes! Mine are not that short, but I have Ohlins, custom-built by Howard of HDF sponsor Motorcycle Metal. A link to his website is down the right of your screen (it is on mine!). If you search for 'shocks' or 'ohlins' you will get countless posts! They have transformed the ride on my Glide.