ADV350 suspension vs 750’s or Tmax

[colin72blue]

Have had my 350 since april and done about 2500 miles mostly commuting. Been a revalation for me as been riding bikes for over 30 years but this is my first scooter.

It’s been brilliant for commuting, which i haven’t done for about 20 years! Daily commute about 45 miles each way with town, open A roads and central london traffic.

The one minor issue is suspension. 95% of the time its fine. However on some fast sections of A road that have joints between changes of road surface it feels like i am hitting a speed bump. Some of them throw me out of the seat at certain speeds (which must look funny from behind).

Is this normal for all scooters? Are the bigger Forza/Xadv 750 and Tmax any different?

Ita fine when you know where they are but been caught off guard a few times!

[velocipede6295]

Hi Colin, I have owned quite a few scooters, and it is fairly normal in my experience for a scooter not to cope well with potholes /rough roads when ridden at speed. The ADV 350 is better than most mid range scooters with it's suspension / handling, but it can feel firm on rough roads, which I have found are best tackled at a slower speed, missing
the worst of the bumps/ potholes, to avoid jarring/ jolting.

Re your question about the Honda X ADV 750. It is a much bigger heavier, machine, has very good compliant suspension and rides better than the motorcycle upon which it is based - the Honda NC 750. They improved the suspension over the NC 750, and it costs more too. The X ADV 750 is really a motorcycle with scooter type styling. I am sure it would cope better than the ADV 350 with the uneven A roads you described. However, a new X ADV 750 is also double the price of a new ADV 350, and for me has other drawbacks compared to the ADV 350 - mainly it's weight and height even for a tall rider.

[MrGrumpy]

The Tmax is of course similar to the NC750, being a bike disguised as a scooter, with bike like suspension. The Tmax's suspension normally works exceptionally well - keeps control on bumpy roads and provides a reasonable ride. Normally mid sized scoots are really awful on the bumps. The clever thing with the ADV350 is that its long travel suspension and top quality shockers and forks work really well on bad roads. Having recently moved to Cumbria and bought an ADV350 the comparison with the Tmax is interesting. Yes, the ADV350's ride can be hard, and yes, I've felt those big jolts as well! However, on the really awful tiny rough back roads, the ADV works really well - and its the Tmax that can get caught out by worst of the holes and bumps! So, the Tmax/NC750 are normally better suspended, but the ADV has tricks up its sleeve for the truly awful roads!

[Greyerbeard]

I hesitate to contradict MrGrumpy (!) but I find my (otherwise excellent) '25 ADV350 pretty awful on poor backroads where a T-Max used to be fine. You can't beat the laws of physics, and small wheels with stiff suspension are never going to cope...maybe I'm too light at 73kg; I do find that most modern bikes feel extremely stiff.
Having said that, the ADV350 is generally better suspended that the Forza350, XMax300 and Forza125 that I've experience of!

[roadster]

The problem with conventional scooter layouts is that a large proportion of engine and transmission weight is unsprung and furthermore the weight distribution is biased towards the back of the bike. It is much easier to design effective suspension when the ratio of sprung to unsprung weight is higher than can be achieved by this layout, not forgetting that this includes the weight of the rider so lightweight riders will feel the bumps more. It is not such a problem with cars but still heavier cars will always give a smoother ride and of course electric cars with heavy batteries will benefit too.

The same difficulty also affects rear wheel traction and makes traction control something that a scooter rider will notice quite often but a car driver will seldom experience. The ADV has 3 level traction control and I am looking forward to trying this out next month!

[MrGrumpy]

I hesitate to contradict MrGrumpy (!) but I find my (otherwise excellent) '25 ADV350 pretty awful on poor backroads where a T-Max used to be fine.

It may be that on normal backroads the Tmax is fine (I certainly found my Tmaxs immense fun on Yorkshire backroads), but the ADV comes into its own where you'd really want a Motocross bike rather than a scoot!

[Greyerbeard]

[quote=MrGrumpy post_id=314293 time=1755679747 user_id=101

It may be that on normal backroads the Tmax is fine (I certainly found my Tmaxs immense fun on Yorkshire backroads), but the ADV comes into its own where you'd really want a Motocross bike rather than a scoot!
[/quote]

We will have to agree to disagree on that - and yes we do have awful back roads darn sarf!
(Try parts of the small road from Honeystreet, Wilts, towards Upavon, some time...)

[colin72blue]

Thanks for all the posts

Think i will try and find some local tmax’s and forza 750 and see if i can test them on a couple of particularly bad local roads one afternoon

Not in any rush to sell the adv though

[roadster]

Not worth a new thread, but I found the ADV front suspension harsh on my new machine so I took a closer look. It is a motor cycle upside-down fork design and should be good. When bounced hard with the front brake on it didn't move as freely or as far as expected so I slackened the right hand side axle pinch bolt and sure enough there was a slight ping as the clamp moved to a more relaxed position. With the clamp just free I applied some rubber friendly spray to the fork tubes and gave the suspension a few sharp stops while moving slowly forward then retightened the clamp bolt. It seems to have done the trick.

If you have a torque wrench I used 20 N.m to tighten the M8 bolt after noting that the torque to initially unscrew it was about 35 N.m. I don't have a reference for this but the original paint marks seem to confirm its about right.

[Greyerbeard]

Not worth a new thread, but I found the ADV front suspension harsh on my new machine so I took a closer look. It is a motor cycle upside-down fork design and should be good. When bounced hard with the front brake on it didn't move as freely or as far as expected so I slackened the right hand side axle pinch bolt and sure enough there was a slight ping as the clamp moved to a more relaxed position. With the clamp just free I applied some rubber friendly spray to the fork tubes and gave the suspension a few sharp stops while moving slowly forward then retightened the clamp bolt. It seems to have done the trick.

Interesting! Standard procedure after working on motorcycle forks, but it hadn't occurred to me to try it on a factory-fresh ADV...