another CRST evangelist who "saw the light"

Hello Dave!!

I had my suspension tuned by you at Willow Springs on April 18th (Trackdayz Academy) and I am still amazed at the suspension adjustments that you made for my GSXR it's like night and day!

I am in need of a new set of tires and I thought I would ask the master about tire choices. The bike had BT-014's on them when you set it up and I would like to switch to Pirelli Diablo Corsa 3's. I guess my question to you is, will switching to the Pirellis from the Bridgestone affect the suspension of the bike as in will I have to change ride higth, etc?

I know next to nothing about suspension tuning so I would like a tire that will least affect the tuning you made to my bike ( I would prefer a dual compound tire as a replacement to the BT-014's) any info would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks again Dave for the great setup! I wish you could have seen the huge grin on my face all day after your great setup job!!

Ray Shiu



Hi Ray,
Thanks for the kind words and glad the grin was ear to ear!

If you are looking to try other tires, the rationale is very simple. Measure the circumference of the tires you are removing while fully inflated and then measure the same way for the new tires when full inflated. That will tell you what happened to the geometry of the bike. That is solved by changing fork position and/or changing shock length via ride height adjuster.

If you are moving between brands, Michelin, Dunlop and Bridgestone have similar carcasses while Pirelli and Metzeler share the same carcass but it is much softer by comparison and that will need some subtle suspension changes mostly in compression.

Please let me know if you have any other questions!