Kawasaki Sportsbike Riders Club - Australia - Online Forum

This may sound like a silly question, but what do steering dampers do exactly?

I have seen them on heaps of the bikes on Ebay but have no clue what they actually do.

it attaches to your steering column, or front fork to your frame on older bikes.
it has oil and a piston and you can adjust the rate of which oil flows around the piston which gives you a softer or harder steering so in turn you can get better handling at higher speeds to your liking,,,, basically reduces the impact of hitting a pot hole mid corner at the handle bars.
the newer bikes have a speed controlled dampner fitted, that makes it harder to turn the steering the faster you go, where at stand still its as easy of if its not there
hope this helps mate
cheers Tim

kawasaki250 wrote:it attaches to your steering column, or front fork to your frame on older bikes.
it has oil and a piston and you can adjust the rate of which oil flows around the piston which gives you a softer or harder steering so in turn you can get better handling at higher speeds to your liking,,,, basically reduces the impact of hitting a pot hole mid corner at the handle bars.
the newer bikes have a speed controlled dampner fitted, that makes it harder to turn the steering the faster you go, where at stand still its as easy of if its not there
hope this helps mate
cheers Tim

Or if you ride an 06/07/08 10 they tame a fair amount of the inherant head shake under hard accel..[farkin savage without damper].

I went a step further by running the billet anchor and tank brackets to eliminate flex and changing the fluid weight in the damper[Ohlins]

Down side is that if you try to pull into a servo etc after a fast run with the damper set tight it'll scare the shit outa you when she tries to highside you at 5km /hr if you forget to back it right off!!!