After a recent trip out rippin' up some nobbs on the 500. I noticed, to really be fast it was hard to get the bike to get a "sweet spot squat" I'll call it. On my 250, it will get to that spot, when on the gas hard, and is really easy to manage around the trails even when on the pipe. I had alwasy just attributed the difference in bikes to the differences in the suspensions and power delivery to the rear wheel along with the different rakes of the front ends. In fact, its the rear spring. I thought it seemed to push me up out of the sweet spot and noticed the only way to ride it is to really be back on the bike hovering over the fender, which is dicey on the 500 at best.
Anyways, thanks to the write-up on Race Sag and Static Sag by Paul, I am on the track to changing all that. After going through the process, I have determined that I have a spring that has too high of a spring rate. I found that I need a 5.0 and the stock is like 5.4. Also, after researching other threads, it seems that the last two digits on the spring give its spring rate, but where are the numbers located? Are there numbers on a stock spring? I am pretty sure my current spring is stock, but I have a couple places to look for other springs, but need help identifying them. Any other help with the process I am obviously overlooking would also be appreciated. I can't believe it took me this long to figure it out.
