dialing in my trail

[troubleshovel]

My quick question is if i go from a 21 front tire to a 16, will that be reducing my trail because the angle of the steering neck will drop? My true trail now is at 6.25 inches and i want her around minimum 2.5 and max 4.5. I am fairly certain 2.5 in unrealistic, but you gotta have minimums . I have a 16 wheel in storage ready to go, but i want to make sure I am going the right direction before I go get it. If it wont do the trick, then I will have to raise the back end or swap out trees. Thoughts?

[SamHain]

Sure. Depending on tire sizes it might reduce trail by about .5

https://www.rbracing-rsr.com/rakeandtrail.html

[troubleshovel]

thanks, thats the link of info i was looking for

[troubleshovel]

For those future peeps with the same question: After tweaking some things and remeasuring my trail, I have determined that i am sitting right a 5.75ish trail. Using the calculator provided in the link above (thank you @SamHain), I figured out that the best i can get out of swapping to a 16" from my 21" is 4.68. By playing with some weight distribution and adjusting the rear-end, I think I will enjoy the ride a lot better.
P.S. For anybody following along, here is a new question (related).
The 21" i have on there now is really narrow. honestly it looks cool but i want to go with a fatter tire anyway. Will going to a fatboy 16" up front change the handling drastically? I imagine it will grip and track better (fatter tire are better in grooves), but will the added weight make it into a full body workout when turning? I am thinking if i can get a decent trail, then it wont be too bad. What are your thoughts?

[SamHain]

A 16 will feel significantly different. I ran one for about 3 hours and made sure to get a skinny 21 on there. The difference in trail is much less of a significant change, shit, the cycling of a telescopic front end varies trail a good 6”. If my front end doesn’t feel like a death trap I’m fine with it, 2-9” is all pretty rideable.

Good luck finding the ride you’re looking for.

[SamHain]

https://www.chopperhandbook.com/rake.htm

[Tattooo]

It doesn't matter what it looks like on paper...... How does it ride with the trail like it is with the 21??????

[Luky]

That swap should not cause you any problems. Flop factor could change but unlikely.

[MOTher]

You'll get used to it. When you first make the change, you'll notice a difference. It may feel better, or worse, or neither, just different. Then, if you ride a lot, after a week you won't even notice it.

[troubleshovel]

After a ton of changing out and testing yesterday, I've decided to keep the 21"
Then 21, at first was a real pain to handle. I had a side to side wobble on my test ride (first day done with build). At first I thought it was due to weight transfer combined with the trail combined with the narrow bars I made. However, while swapping the front wheels to test them out with various adjustments to the rear suspension, I noticed a few small screw-ups, on my part. First major screw up, the springs were not equally torqued down. Second screw up was the front caliper mount. The adjustable swivel mount (idk what its actually called) was way too tight and lacking any grease or anti-sieze on the joints. I think the caliper caused more of the wobble as it wasn't allowed to move with the flex of the front end. After addressing these issues and making sure the fall off was correctly adjusted, she rode a lot better with the 21" vs the 16"
I am going to get some better rockers for the front-end (I wanna drop the axle height approx an inch and go out about 1.5"). I am building mono-shock brackets today to add a little dampening.
For curious individuals this particular bike used to be a 97 Fatboy. Motor has a mild build and is built to perform on the highway as I do most of my riding on the hwy. She had the stock front end and other suspension etc.
I know some may ask why in the hell would someone swap the front end to a springer. I went down roughly six months ago and screwed up the front end, bars, paint, pegs etc. After getting it home, I slapped her in a jig and started measuring. Frame was good to go, not bent or tweaked. I'm a poor white boy, so I decided that i was gonna do what i do best and scrounge my parts bin for what I need. So happens I had a 6 over springer in the corner with the wheel. I got it on a trade a while back and was saving it for my next chopper build (panshovel). I found some mild lowering shocks (cartridge) and slapped them on and left them as high as possible. I built new bars out of some chromoly and taught myself to paint metalflake, funny enough. so Now I've got some bassboat flake in there. Then the tins just became my pinstriping practice (literally started striping 4 days before hahaha). I found out the pimary was f'ed from the slide and i went to a swap meet to find some parts and found an 2.5 open primary. I couldn't resist at this point and the chick selling is was selling off all of her Ex-husband's parts, so I stole it for $250. That thing was still in the packages. I almost broke my wrist pulling the money out of my pocket. Anyway, now i have a running scoot again and will be fine tuning it over the next three weeks. thanks for your input guys.

[Tattooo]

Post a pic of your bike......

[troubleshovel]

I'm gonna try and post a video, the video is of the bike right before I took it for a test ride. I have a lot more to do. She ain't the prettiest but she's mine and will be a reminder to me of what I can do without money. Also if i ever get good at stripping, itll be my inside joke and reminder of how i started. low budget, big dreams, and no time lol https://youtu.be/54fHtOMB3Y4

[Tattooo]

^^^^^ Nothing is showing up....^^^^^^

Just a pic will be fine......