Jamie,
The best way of thinking of damping is:
'When I ride over this bump / rut / pothole, does my suspension absorb the impact or does it pass it on to me up through the bars / seat? If there is jarring motion from either / both ends then it's fair to say your suspension damping isn't quite doing it's job. With the Fazer's standard forks & rear shock there is fairly minimal adjustment / tuning you can make to either end to eliminate this problem.
If however you go over the road irregularity & there is minimal disturbance transferred up to you then the suspension setup is doing a much better job.
Compression damping is the forks / shock compressing as the impact pushes the wheels upwards. Rebound damping is the forks / swingarm extending & returning the wheels back down. You want both movements in a controlled manner, but with damper rod forks only partially successful.
There are further complications, such as high and low speed compression & some rear suspension characteristics affecting the front, but you get the basic idea.
This might help u understand the basics of suspension (or make things more confusing!) http://www.wpsuspension.co.uk/setup.php
I started by changing the rear as I already had the shock from my FZS 1000 days, but improving one end will definitely highlight the inadequacies of the other end. You could hunt down an appropriate R6 shock (currently on ebay : Item number: 121128085249, Item number: 180988631654, Item number: 111015636838) but aftermarket dogbones are needed & will raise the overall costs. Failing that, you could get get a Fazer 1000 shock & then stick the 600's spring on it. Providing the shock isnt shagged & needs a rebuild, either option will be much better than the standard Fzs 600 rear shock. This is because they also have adjustable compression and rebound adjustments built into them.
Front end....wait & see whether there is enough interest / demand for a group buy, although IMO £50 is still fairly cheap to cure front-end compression woes. I might start doing the fork conversion for any people interested if it's beyond their abilities or the tools they have available. Would really like some others to try it first tho, as I don't wanna come across as some sorta snake-oil salesman for something no-one has yet tried...
The best way of thinking of damping is:
'When I ride over this bump / rut / pothole, does my suspension absorb the impact or does it pass it on to me up through the bars / seat? If there is jarring motion from either / both ends then it's fair to say your suspension damping isn't quite doing it's job. With the Fazer's standard forks & rear shock there is fairly minimal adjustment / tuning you can make to either end to eliminate this problem.
If however you go over the road irregularity & there is minimal disturbance transferred up to you then the suspension setup is doing a much better job.
Compression damping is the forks / shock compressing as the impact pushes the wheels upwards. Rebound damping is the forks / swingarm extending & returning the wheels back down. You want both movements in a controlled manner, but with damper rod forks only partially successful.
There are further complications, such as high and low speed compression & some rear suspension characteristics affecting the front, but you get the basic idea.
This might help u understand the basics of suspension (or make things more confusing!) http://www.wpsuspension.co.uk/setup.php
I started by changing the rear as I already had the shock from my FZS 1000 days, but improving one end will definitely highlight the inadequacies of the other end. You could hunt down an appropriate R6 shock (currently on ebay : Item number: 121128085249, Item number: 180988631654, Item number: 111015636838) but aftermarket dogbones are needed & will raise the overall costs. Failing that, you could get get a Fazer 1000 shock & then stick the 600's spring on it. Providing the shock isnt shagged & needs a rebuild, either option will be much better than the standard Fzs 600 rear shock. This is because they also have adjustable compression and rebound adjustments built into them.
Front end....wait & see whether there is enough interest / demand for a group buy, although IMO £50 is still fairly cheap to cure front-end compression woes. I might start doing the fork conversion for any people interested if it's beyond their abilities or the tools they have available. Would really like some others to try it first tho, as I don't wanna come across as some sorta snake-oil salesman for something no-one has yet tried...