Making a Full Size Bike Fit - Part II

My last post ended with me needing to find a 250F. After much online research and going to different dealers to sit on the different offerings out there, I decided on a CRF250R. The reviews were great and the ergonomics were the most suited to me. So, in February of 2005, I purchased the 2005 model and my husband and set about trying to make it fit me better. In stock form, I couldn't even touch on tip toes.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I'm only 5'3", with a 29" inseam. We had originally thought that I'd never be able to ride a full size bike, but the popularity of supermoto helped me out there. Riders were having their suspension lowered to help improve the performance of the bike on the pavement and suspension companies began to offer the modifications to the public. So, after more online research, we sent it off to guy named Ed, the owner of Trackside Engineering. After conferring back and forth over email, we decided to lower my suspension by 1.75" front and rear. Based upon my weight and riding style, we figured we could cut out that much of the suspension without having to worrying about bottoming out. In addition to lowering the supsension, I also had the forks and shock revalved to better suit my weight and riding style. I was VERY pleased with the results. (I would highly recommend Trackside Engineering, but, unfortunately, Ed sold the business and reviews have been less than stellar on the new owner.) With the bike lowered, I could solidly touch on tip toes when wearing my riding boots, could lean it over a bit a be able to kick start it, and as an added bonus, the re-valved suspension soaked up hits both big and small. My husband then cut down the seat foam to bring down the seat height even more.

At this point, the bike was ridable. I rode it for a while in this configuration, but still didn't feel like I could dab as well as I would like, particularly when making really tight turns on a track or harescramble course or when trail riding. I'm not the most flexible person, so I also had problems kicking my leg over the bike. The last thing left to try was lowering my subframe. The problem was that the subframes on the newer bikes are aluminum, so cutting the subframe and rewelding it is far more tricky than with a steel subframe. My husband can weld steel, but not aluminum and we really didn't want to pay someone $200 to weld it and then have to hope that the welding process didn't make the metal brittle. At that point, my husband decided to put his engineering degree to work and he designed a CNC-machined link that allowed us to cut the subframe without having the weld it. The link slots into the shortened subframe and is bolted into place. The end of the link is shaped to align the subframe properly and to allow the subframe to be attached at the stock location with the stock hardware. My husband machined a set of links and installed them, lowering the middle and rear of my seat about 1.5". I kicked my leg over and was amazed. The first thing I noticed was that it was a lot easier to kick my leg over since I wasn't at full stretch to clear the rear of the seat. Then I realized that I could solidly touch the balls of BOTH of my feet. I no longer felt like the bike was going to tip over if I overbalanced just a bit because I could use my leg strength a lot better with a sturdy base. We went out to the track and I rode with a new confidence because I knew I could catch the bike if I started to go over in a turn a lot easier than I could previously. I also found an unexpected benefit to lowering the subframe. It brought the seat closer to the footpegs, making the "cockpit" ergonomics even better for me. The lowered seat height is even more beneficial when we go trail riding. There are several trails I wouldn't have made it up without being able to plant a foot to stabilize myself.

So, with cut seat foam, lowered subframe, and lowered suspension, we were able to get a CRF250R to fit me.

So, now it's time for a shameless plug. My husband decided that other people might be interested in the lowering link and thus started a business name SpeedMetal Designs to sell them. You can get more info on the links and see what models they are available for at http://www.speedmetaldesigns.com/.

Making a Full Size Bike Fit - Part I

In my post below, I talked about my quest to find a good bike with a low seat height. I ended up with a GasGas Pampera 280. I loved it for riding trails, but I wanted something with more pop (for riding sand dunes) and better suspension (for the track). I really liked my CR85R, so we decided to try a CR125. My husband found a really good deal on a nice 2002 CR125 and surprised me with it. Since I can't even come close to touching on a stock 125, we installed a kouba link on it and lowered the triple clamps as far as we could down the fork tubes. The pro of this configuration were that I could now actually touch with both tip toes or, if I slid over on the seat, I could just about touch with the ball of one foot. The cons were that the bike felt a little tilted upwards because we couldn't adjust the forks enough the really balance the lowering of the rear end and that the link changed the handling characteristics of the bike. The changing of the handling characteristics is not necessarily a bad thing, if the change suits your riding style. My husband installed a kouba link on an Aprilia RXV450 to lower it and really preferred the new suspension characteristics.

The CR125 is an absolute blast to ride at the dunes. It revs quickly and it is a fun challenge to keep it on the pipe. However, I never felt comfortable on track or trail with the 125, so it has been confined to a dunes bike, where peaky power is fine and you don't really need to be able to turn on a dime, and I ended up keeping the GasGas. So, now I had a great trail bike and a great dunes bike, but still nothing great for the track. At the time, we did very little track riding, so running a less than ideal bike on those rare occasions wasn't a big deal.

Eventually, though, my husband got interested in riding hare scrambles and as a result, we started riding the track more often. He then got a CRF450R and his brother got a KX500 and the little CR125 just didn't have enough power to keep up with them on the sand dunes. I needed a 250F. And I needed to be able to modify it so I could touch the ground without affecting its handling. Part II of this post will describe how we did this.