ARO S - Seat height

[CATSLEDMAN1]

Doing the shortening setup on my 500ktm with Riot.
Enduro engineering seat and 2.5" shorter forks ( done for dual sportr riding severals years back ),my ride height is right at 40". Thats shocks at full extension. I see a lot of 37 and 38" ride heights before shortening, on the three KTM snow bikes sitting around here 40" to 41". with aftermarket seats.

I put 1.3" spacers in my RIOT shocks, that does not lower the kit 3", but about 2.6", I still have to put the front end together to check all the final dimensions. If I recall TS says the s kits are 3" lower? not sure how they do that with 1" spacers in the shocks.

I like the looks of the track attack angle, however, 5 years ago we made suspension changes to see if a lower flatter approach on our kits was an advantage..........mmmmm, not so much. Didn't hurt us, but not worth the effort.

 

[CB-BLR]

I put 1.3" spacers in my RIOT shocks, that does not lower the kit 3", but about 2.6", I still have to put the front end together to check all the final dimensions. If I recall TS says the s kits are 3" lower? not sure how they do that with 1" spacers in the shocks.

The two S kits I have checked (mine and a buddies) were both right at 2.5" lower...don't know why Timbersled says 3 inches...unless they are suggesting raising the forks in the triple clamps or shortening the TSS on their demo bikes.

The new front S spindles are exactly 2.5 inches shorter.

I have not seen any setup instructions for a S kit.

Chris

 

[CATSLEDMAN1]

My riding partner and I spent a good afternoon swapping bikes and riding in stiff crusty snow up into dense powder and some sketchy road the first two miles from the truck. Made some addjustments here and there. We had lowered both setups.

My Riot : I put 1.3 spacers in the shocks, added a .900 x .009 shim to the rebound side dampening, ported the pistons, put on a shorter spring in the rear.......had been running a 10" spring, now back to an 8" I had that shorter spring from some of last years experiments. Shorten my stock spindle 1" and slid my forks up in the triple clamps about an 1.5". So that about 2.250 lowered bike all the way around.
My seat height with an enduro engineering seat 37.9 ". Thats after repositioning my forks twice to a taller stance durning the ride.

Dan's ARO: I put in 1.3 spacers in the shocks/new floating pistons/schrader valve for nitrogen and added .900 x .010 shim on the rebound side, with a spring compressor he could just get the 8" springs on and ran them about 3 threads from all the way out/ if I
recall 225 springs from and rear. Slid his forks up in his triple clamps almost 2" total. Seat height with quite a big cushy aftermarket seat, 38.3 inches.

We swapped bikes all day. Both decided my forks need to be shoved back out, stopped and did that.... went .300 back down ,better for sure. better overall ride feel, did int change handling in the junk, but feels more secure..We bashed some hard drifts and old sled track up at 7000 ft. Dans comment on reaching the summit, best suspension yet for his ARO. Two things, springs with almost no preload/ then the added rebound dampening./piston porting. For my Riot, I can't at this point see a suspension down side. Now we wait for the deep stuff to see whats up there.

Both bikes : Lowered ride height, for sure more comfortable stopping on hard pack, we both can reach the ground........ok tippy toe, but all good.
Slow speed handling in the trees improves, noticeable. So seems like some headway in our bikes/kit development.

 

[CB-BLR]

Thank you for the report.

 

[CATSLEDMAN1]

Another day of fooling and testing our bikes. Not that much snow, so might as well ride and test and compare.

1. with a couple of brand new bikes along, swapping around between 4 bikes, our two lowered KTM's fell way more comfortable to sit on, pull up on flat ground and not have to worry about tipping over.

2. the better agility of the lowered bikes noticable in slow tree riding .......for sure its a plus.

3. after testing and swapping and riding the worst junk roads at lower elevation, both my KTM 500 Riot and Dans KTM 450 ARO benefitted from shortening out fixed strut rods about an 1/8 of an inch.

4.after our shortening and adjusting and resetting spring rates we both agreed , best our KTM with TS kits have ever handled.
Closest we have ever felt our snow bikes ( after we have owned 5 different bike/kit combo) somewhat mimicked how our dirt bikes handle. Stuffing our snow bikes this afternoon hard in a bermed corner, pretty darn good, for us the best setup in 8 years.

Of course.................snow conditions can change everthing, but for today, that the report.

 

[00Tundra]

My riding partner and I spent a good afternoon swapping bikes and riding in stiff crusty snow up into dense powder and some sketchy road the first two miles from the truck. Made some addjustments here and there. We had lowered both setups.

My Riot : I put 1.3 spacers in the shocks, added a .900 x .009 shim to the rebound side dampening, ported the pistons, put on a shorter spring in the rear.......had been running a 10" spring, now back to an 8" I had that shorter spring from some of last years experiments. Shorten my stock spindle 1" and slid my forks up in the triple clamps about an 1.5". So that about 2.250 lowered bike all the way around.
My seat height with an enduro engineering seat 37.9 ". Thats after repositioning my forks twice to a taller stance durning the ride.

Dan's ARO: I put in 1.3 spacers in the shocks/new floating pistons/schrader valve for nitrogen and added .900 x .010 shim on the rebound side, with a spring compressor he could just get the 8" springs on and ran them about 3 threads from all the way out/ if I
recall 225 springs from and rear. Slid his forks up in his triple clamps almost 2" total. Seat height with quite a big cushy aftermarket seat, 38.3 inches.

We swapped bikes all day. Both decided my forks need to be shoved back out, stopped and did that.... went .300 back down ,better for sure. better overall ride feel, did int change handling in the junk, but feels more secure..We bashed some hard drifts and old sled track up at 7000 ft. Dans comment on reaching the summit, best suspension yet for his ARO. Two things, springs with almost no preload/ then the added rebound dampening./piston porting. For my Riot, I can't at this point see a suspension down side. Now we wait for the deep stuff to see whats up there.

Both bikes : Lowered ride height, for sure more comfortable stopping on hard pack, we both can reach the ground........ok tippy toe, but all good.
Slow speed handling in the trees improves, noticeable. So seems like some headway in our bikes/kit development.

Where did you get the shims for your Shocks ?

 

[CATSLEDMAN1]

the spacers for the shock shafts I made from 1" aluminum rod and drilled a 1/2" hole for the rod, the shims are from tearing apart discarded fox shocks the past 30 years of sledding, you can order shims from CARVER INC, fox shock parts dealer in MN.

 

[00Tundra]

the spacers for the shock shafts I made from 1" aluminum rod and drilled a 1/2" hole for the rod, the shims are from tearing apart discarded fox shocks the past 30 years of sledding, you can order shims from CARVER INC, fox shock parts dealer in MN.

Thank you

 

[00Tundra]

So after some experimentation, I have got my 2018 YZ450F and ARO3 converted to an "S" model and am loving it.

I lowered the kit By using the OEM "S" spindle and putting a 1.06" spacer and 250 lbs springs in the QS3 rear shocks. I found this ok but the rear shocks defiantly needed to be re valved. I weigh 240 lbs with gear. To soft and would bottom out easily. So I got a shim kit and changed the compression stack from .008" thick shims to .010" and added an extra .008 shim to the rebound stack. Bingo! Kit rides perfect now no bottoming and is not too stiff for the trail. (Disclaimer I am no expert on shocks. I have taken the racetech coarses and do revalve my own dirt bikes.)
So far trail riding is great. powder performance is a ? because our powder in the INW vanashed in a flash. We now have a heavy crust with 2-8 of snow on top of that. In these conditons we could climb Mount Rushmore LOL! Will update as conditions change. Thank you all on this forum for the help!

Bike setup.
2018 YZ450F
2020 ARO3 "S"
Radiators deleted now run heat exchanger.
Trio front shock
SelKirk Armor no heat exchanger.
Selkirk heated bars
Timbersled guantlets
C3 thermostat
Seat concepts seat.
Air-force velocity intake
TKI belt drive and big wheel kit.

 

[TreewellDweller]

I just made my ARO 137 into an "S" model by cutting the front spindle down by 2" and adding 1.25" spacers in the shocks. I also slid the forks up about 1/4". With all of this I now have 2.25" shorter model. I was hoping for a bit more but take what I can get. The new seat height is 35.75”.
The only drawback is that the ski setback went from about 1.5" to about 0.5" because of where I had to drill the new holes in the spindle for the ski mount. I am going to have to elongate the holes on the fork clamps to rotate the spindle and ski backwards and get the correct setback.
Once that is done, I think it will work as well as before and I will finally be able to touch the ground in the parking lot.
Here's a few pics of the spindle. I have a homemade wheel kit and axle that attaches through the holes on the 1/4" strap between the spindle and the ski mount.
While doing all of this I swapped the sprockets in the chaincase, changed out the jackshaft sprocket to an 18 tooth, and changed out the drive sprocket on the bike to a 15 tooth. I replaced the plastic chain guide with a piece of 3/4" pvc that I split and popped onto the shaft in it's place. This let me slide the track kit all the way forward and should make it run more efficiently.
Now I just need some time to take it out and give a good work out.