Looks like you're about 3hrs away from me. Have you found any good places nearby to ride? cuz there isn't squat near me, other than the small properties that friends let me 'bush bash' on, and one of those properties is about to be developed.
Here's a link to some videos I made while testing the new spool made by @hondasrule , and showing off the air suspension as well. Spool & suspension demo
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For anyone who hasn't been following the "who wants a locker" thread, I managed to tear the top rear drivers side control arm mount away from the frame. It didn't come off completely, but it moved enough to make the machine almost unsteerable. (Is that a word?) Anyways, here's some pics of the damage. I did some video of the repair, but I'll have to post that later. After the repair was completed, I grabbed the drivers side wheel and checked to see if there was any slop in the suspension, steering etc, and found that there is like 1.5 in. of movement, slop, play, in the steering rack, only on the drivers side. So I'm going to replace the rack. I think alot of damage was done when I ripped the rack boot on that side last summer, and didn't catch it till the rack was full of dirt. I cleaned as best I could-at the time- without removing it, loaded it up with grease and replaced the boot. That was about 400 miles ago... so that'll be the next repair.
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Here's a link to the video's I did of the repair. Mount repair
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hmmmmm i still running coilovers very very hard and no issues? this makes 4 ppl trying air shocks and having arm mount issues......... just going to connect the dots
Smitty335
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I got lamb basted talking about the rubber bushing restriction on the P1 forms, it's real! I'm running Elka Stage 5's and wanted to get rid of the restriction. If I was going to double nut the a arm bolts, I would think about over sizing the bolt holes and run bushings, been thinking about this on mine, even though I'm running SATV A Arms now. Or getting rid of the rubber bushings and find some full floating bearings that would fit and tighten the crap out of them (A arm bolts)
Smitty335
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With the double nut, I think you will get a click in the steering, or you will hear/feel it. I don't know if SATV (Super ATV) make A arms for the P5's, if they do, they are well worth it, I paid in-between $ 500.00 and $ 600.00 for front and rears, they have camber, toe in adjustments.
i just watched your vids and great point on the no back side welds!!!
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The first time I took my axles out I notices that the A-Arm pivots were super stiff and way too tight, this can cause work hardening in the weld area of the mount. I believe this is what is happening to a P5 when ridden hard...regardless of shocks. In fact, the last time I saw an arm mount torn it was on stock shocks.
gotta agree with you there slightly longer sleeves on a floating bushing would save that
Smitty335
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Rubber bushings! Go to a Honda Service manual, they give you measurements from top shock mount to shock a arm mount before tightening up a arm bolts!
That confirms my theory that they actually are using the a-arm bushings as torsion springs that act in compression as well as extension resistance- hence the 'teeth' in the ends of the steel sleeves inside the rubber bushing. Apparently they never really intended the control arms to move through their full travel capacity very often- nothing like they do with any of the aftermarket shock set ups. This is most likely why W.E.'s replacement shocks don't add much more travel capability, just way, way, better control.
The more I learn and mostly what I've observed using the air shocks, I'm surprised I haven't torn up more stuff. My riding consists mostly of climbing and descending rocky, mountain trails- every 'black diamond' we can find, or traversing the most difficult tight woods obstacles we can find. The air shocks allow the control arms to travel their entire available motion from full extension to full compression, and I've been doing that, virtually every ride for 1600 miles in about a year and a half. After seeing how poorly the top rear control arm mounts are secured, I'm even more amazed that the damn thing has stayed together this long. That front end has taken literally dozens of brutal hits, my front bumper is demolished, my skid plates have soft-ball sized dents, and gouges all over the place, I'm about to replace the drivers side tie-rod, or possibly the whole steering box, I've now replaced every boot- except the right rear inner CV (?) I believe it's a testament to how well overall the P500 is built. I've been modifying everything I've ever owned my whole life, and usually find that weak link in the stock set-up in days, or maybe weeks, but never years, let alone a thousand plus miles! So, absolutely, using the air shocks is going to wear stuff out quicker, particularly if you don't make some additional simple mods to stave off some of the excessive wear issues I've found along the way. If someone starts now, and makes all the additional improvements at initial install, that I've discovered and added along the way, the set up will probably go years and many thousands of miles without anything more than common sense maintenance, probably a life time for many riders, cuz I doubt most owners purposely push the machine to it's limits every time they ride.
Thanks! I was shocked (sorry) when I saw that. I wonder if that was/is an oversight on the assembly line. Maybe someone with a '17 or '18 model can take a look to see if that's been changed. Mines a '16.
I'm going to post some vids on the the spool/locker install later in the week- I've run out of storage for now- where I show the mods I made to allow the a-arms to 'float' freely. I didn't double nut anything on mine- if that's what you're talking about in reference to the repair vid. The extra nuts are just spacers cuz the bolts I bought are a little too long. The outer nuts are nylocks, so they won't back off. The main thing is to grind the teeth off the ends of the control arm bushing sleeves, and then I added a washer on each side of the sleeve to add a 'bearing' surface between the control arm and mount tabs, and then tighten the locking nuts to just contact the mount tabs, and not squeeze the mounts at all. At worst, it wears the bolts, and those are easy and cheap to replace. My mount tabs got slightly damaged at first, because the air shocks allow the control arms to move through their entire available motion, and the teeth in the bushings started to chew through the tabs.
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