OK yesterday I was trying to adjust my shocks on my 02' Grizzly and had no success. I lifted the front end with a jack until the front tires were off the ground and then tried to use a pipewrench to spin the adjuster. All that I accomplished was to put some gouge marks in the adjuster. Is it necessary to use a tool to compress the coil spring to take all the pressure off the adjuster nut before you can spin the nut or what? Maybe I was just too concerned about scratching the adjuster nut and gave up too early? If anyone has adjusted their shocks could you give me details of how you did it? I've read posts in Highlifter about people using channel locks. Seems channel locks would gouge it up even more than a pipe wrench due to their tendancy to slip? Thanks for any input.

 

When I did mine I just borrowed the shock adjustment tool from my dealer last thing on the sat, and had it back on the Mon. AM. (after dropping that kind of $$$$ there, he didnt have a problem giving me a $16 tool for a day. Warning though, even with the tool they are brutally tough to turn. I don't know if compressing the spring would help or not. (Yamaha should include the tool for this in their kit, like bombardier does)
Hope this helps.

 

Well I've tried just about everything except for the correct tool. I found that channelocks work the best(and if you can have them not slip, don't make marks too bad). I think stiffening the shocks is one of the best and most inexpensive mods to do for someone who rides a little more aggressive at higher speeds. Now it slides more instead of having that tippy feel. It's donut time!![img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img]

 

*bump*

 

borrow a wrench from someone with a polaris they fit and work great,but they do turn a bit hard

 

How will this affect my ground clearance?

 

I imagine you have some grit locking them up pretty tight... Use high pressure water to blast the grit out of the adjusters, then wd40 to slick em up a bit. with a decent pipe wrench they should turn like butter. Instead of wd40 "slip plate" ( a paintlike graphite coating-non dust attracting ) might be good to use if you were going to play with them untill you had it just right.

 

Thanks for the tips. It never occured to me that they could be "locked" up due to dirt etc. I used a pretty decent sized pipe wrench, all the whole shock did was turn a little to the extent that the upper and lower mounting holes would allow it to. They just wouldn't adjust up any. Turning like butter was how I thought they would have turned, but no such luck. I'll try to lubricate and clean them, that ought to do it. I think what I hate the most about getting tools is that you have to order everything the dang dealers don't stock anything. The wrench only costs like $16, I just hate ordering stuff, If I need the tool, I want to buy it now, not four days from now. Guess I ought to get used to it. I think I read that I can use some kind of a wrench for adjusting bicycles also. Thanks everyone for the suggestions.