RG3 Suspension Tested

There is nothing like strolling through the pits at a race to check out all the factory bikes and see all the trick parts that most of us will never get our hands on. One of the most interesting components is works suspension--all the off-the-wall coloring on the fork tubes really stands out, but the part serves a purpose. Many of us will never have works suspension, so we built up a set of trick suspension with performance and looks in mind for a decent price tag.After we unbolted the Showa suspension off the MXracer Honda CRF450, we sent it down to RG3 to get a works makeover. The first thing RG3 did was completely disassemble the suspension; this procedure is very time consuming, especially taking the lower axle stays off. Once everything was disassembled, the lower fork legs were Ti-nitrided an off-black color and the top legs re-anodized a deeper gold. The Ti-nitride fork legs help with overall action and offer a tad less friction. The shock body was also re-anodized a deeper gold color for the factory look. After all the coloring was done, RG3 did some re-valving on our Showa suspension and set it up for one of our test riders. Rounding out the suspension mods were a set of RG3's trick-looking four-post triple clamps.On the track, the suspension mods worked well. Gone was the oversteering push that the CRF has with the stock clamps; the 20mm offset clamps help the bike steer in the tight sections and the high-speed sweeping corners. The suspension needed a few adjustments but was very easy to get to our liking. The forks had a lot more forgiveness and were very progressive in the hard-hitting overjump situations and extremely plush in the slow chop sections. The shock tracked much better out of rutted corners under acceleration--very little swapping or kicking compared with the stock setup. Not only did we get good performance out of our suspension but we also got that factory look; all the Ti-nitride and the re-anodizing held up and stayed looking new.