Which fork springs for a Bandit?

[nzspokes]

$249.90 per pair gst incl

US retail at the time conversion rate, NZD $135.

[Robert Taylor]

us retail at the time conversion rate, nzd $135.

now factor in freight if it wasnt consolidated with other stuff, add clearance charges , port fees and then gst on top of it all.

[nzspokes]

now factor in freight if it wasnt consolidated with other stuff, add clearance charges , port fees and then gst on top of it all.

So you buy at US retail?

[wasiler]

Its Race Tech policy not to sell worldwide direct to the public, that is why they have retailers. This is no different to most other manufacturers of a wide range of products. Manufacturers generally dont sell direct, they have a distribution chain to do that for them.

I am a little confused by this statement. I went to the racetech website, they had a handy calculator to help pick your spring rate based on bike and weight, they have the option to purchase. Someone should let them know that their policy is not to sell to the public.

With these NZ prices, I think I might go in business for myself. Just get a customer request, order it in 7 days or just drop ship it directly to the customers' door. Hell, 30 minutes of my time to make $100 sounds like a pretty good rate. Anybody interested in some springs. I have a sale right now going on. $200 plus shipping. You would be doing the country a service by buying local.

[hayd3n]

I am a little confused by this statement. I went to the racetech website, they had a handy calculator to help pick your spring rate based on bike and weight, they have the option to purchase. Someone should let them know that their policy is not to sell to the public.

With these NZ prices, I think I might go in business for myself. Just get a customer request, order it in 7 days or just drop ship it directly to the customers' door. Hell, 30 minutes of my time to make $100 sounds like a pretty good rate. Anybody interested in some springs. I have a sale right now going on. $200 plus shipping. You would be doing the country a service by buying local.

what if i want to return them?
what if you send me the wrong ones?
what if you send them to the wrong place??
can you also advise me of the correct springs for racing? / and correct fork oil?
preload spacers?

[Robert Taylor]

I am a little confused by this statement. I went to the racetech website, they had a handy calculator to help pick your spring rate based on bike and weight, they have the option to purchase. Someone should let them know that their policy is not to sell to the public.

With these NZ prices, I think I might go in business for myself. Just get a customer request, order it in 7 days or just drop ship it directly to the customers' door. Hell, 30 minutes of my time to make $100 sounds like a pretty good rate. Anybody interested in some springs. I have a sale right now going on. $200 plus shipping. You would be doing the country a service by buying local.

So what you are saying is that you would order each set individually and get them sent to a residential address thereby evading entry fees / port charges, clearance and gst on the declared value and all those charges? From time to time there are people doing just that sort of unethical business. I.e Not operating as a legitimate business, evading tax and being less than economical with the truth of what you are doing. And of course you will have a technical backup service and be fully knowledgable in all things suspension?

And if you had enquiries from dealers you would also build in a dealer margin????????????????????????????????????????????

Its little wonder that the rules of operating on Trade Me have been tightened up

[Madness]

Oh, look!, that deer has no eyes.

[Robert Taylor]

So you buy at US retail?

Of course I dont and you would be surprised what the buy price is compared to US retail, its not that wonderful. One thing practically everyone has overlooked is that the US buy price that is stated is exempt of local US taxes. If you are a US customer purchasing within the US you will be paying freight, federal and state taxes ( consumption taxes effectively ) So if a domestic US buyer is paying tax on the goods why shouldnt an overseas buyer pay local taxes?

Anyway, you evaded my question about what the springs would cost with representative freight content, port fees, clearance and gst, because its clearly not important to you. But its deadly important to NZ retailers and the people they employ who are in part being crucified by this imbalance of private importers not being charged like they are.

Its great on this forum to have reasoned debate with people who will listen and see all sides of the story, but on the other hand there is just so much emotive nonsense on here ( evidence the gutless Viscount Montgomery, is he an opposition suspension guy? ) and people who havent got a good thing to say about NZ business. But are also not prepared to understand why the world trading situation is as it is

We have sold a few springs today including to dealers who for their work deserve a decent margin, and as part of jobs that we have done today. We have customers who we are very flexible on price with, as the situation requires. For the most part our customers are all very decent people and we respond in kind . Thats business, but if people come out all guns blazing and are abrasive then Im not going to go the extra mile.

I did a post in this thread about what to look for with springs, I forgot another point that I just realised today. Ohlins fork springs ( our most expensive for previously stated reasons ) are laser etched on their ends with the part number series and their rate. When you come across such springs at a later date and there is no documentation this information is invaluable and saves a lot of time. Most other springs are ink rated on their sides and that can rub off in short order.

And a word about spring rate calculators ( Race Tech etc ) Tongue in cheek they are not always gospel. They dont account for rider height ( and therefore implied leverage ) They dont account for rider preference ( not unimportant ) They dont account for tyres used and that can sometimes have a not insignificant effect ) They also dont account for how any extra loading is displaced . More than a few times we have adjusted spring rate from ''the reccommendation'' to make the customer happy.

But what would I know? Apparently all the info is on the net, its dead easy and anyone can do it....................

[wasiler]

what if i want to return them?
what if you send me the wrong ones?
what if you send them to the wrong place??
can you also advise me of the correct springs for racing? / and correct fork oil?
preload spacers?

I was being facetious. Seriously though, anyone that is interested in starting a business, this might be a good opportunity if you do your homework. I have a career I like and have no desire to get into this biz. If I was unsure and looking to start a biz, I would surely look into this. You can buy retail from overseas and sell it for a profit here. Go figure. Trademe could be your store which I am sure a lot of people are doing that right now.

If you buy the springs, you should have done enough research to understand, that has a lot to do with the rider, track, bike and other factors. The rest is up to the rider to experiment and don't be afraid to. Just don't go balls to the wall after a major change. Just keep a log of your settings and check your tires/times after each session...or go for a ride and see what you like if you're not into track. If it worse, go the other way. If it gets screwy, go back to your original settings and start over. I have got a spread sheet that I keep on my phone and computer with all of my settings (original, track and street). If I make a change, I record it. I use 2 different settings because the roads are crap out here and the track is rather smooth. If it rides better, I make a note of it. If it is worse, I go the other direction. You can also learn a lot by being able to read the tires. Again, check youtube or go to your local track day and talk to the guys. There are some super fast cats out there. They are always willing to help and very nice people to chat with. I can honestly say that I have gathered a lot more information from talking to people at the track than a 10 minute conversation with someone standing behind a counter. I have even got incorrect information from people in sales plenty of times. If you do take it to a shop and just take the first setting out of the shop and leave it because joe-blow said so, then you might be missing out on a lot more speed or comfort by not experimenting...whatever you're looking for.

Give a person a fish he will eat for a day.
Teach a person to fish he will eat for life.

[Robert Taylor]

Taylors arrogance is extreme, a scurrying middleman full of rhetoric, hanging around a biker site grasping at peoples wallets. A self righteous prat thru and thru. The fucking arrogance to label people buying online to save themselves a few bucks to pay bills or put some extra food in their cupboards as arseholes. What an ignorant jerk.

The same fucking arrogance to sit here with head up own arse labeling any backyard mechanics who work on their own bikes as idiots/morons. All the time sitting here on a high horse surrounded by phony, fawning, squid-riding, givi-wearing, ass-lick sycophantic cronies living in a little fantasy world of sticky rubber and fiddled suspension. Bitching that it's all so unfair on himself, wants others penalized and taxed even more, yet all the time this jackass doesn't even have his own product. What a tosser supreme.

This is the same piece of work who secretly colluded with racetech to halt their online sales to kiwis, then proceeded to sneakily monopolize the sale of racetech products at inflated prices all to himself without a word muttered about it. Shrewd and as slimy as they come. Always has an answer and an excuse. A national party toady who votes for, defends, apologizes and supports the likes of ratfink Key, slime-ball English and stinking dogshit weasel-turd N.smith. The same smirking elitist cunts with priorities totally totally fucking twisted who are fucking this country over like never before. Yet now suddenly these fucking creeps aren't the best thing since sliced bread? .. Oh the fucking irony of it all.

Yes the economy's lurching into epic-fail under our leadership so lets just give ourselves a pay-rise for christmas and we'll backdate the fucker a year with it. Fuck every other cunt, we need a new fleet of beemers to look the part again and we need a few more billion to pay fees to shifty dodging consultants for more phony bullshit advice guaranteed to fuck the country even more...

So lets just close a few more schools, hit small business with more rules, bills and cynical regulations, increase tax on gas again and get rid of a few more cops and nurses with it. We're ok ourselves with our own inflated salaries and perks Jack, so employment for the masses can now get fucked for the next few years or so. Don't worry, just put some more razor wire around your doors and windows to keep all the desperate scum out there at bay. Or move to Remuera, there's no crime or lowlife there.

End of the day all these creepy bastards are so full of shit, their main concern in this life is the size of their own private bank accounts

The sad thing is Kerry, I partially agree with some of your latter paragraphs, but not your delivery.

( Note that I have helped a lot of people on this forum for no commercial gain, and will happily continue to do so )

[wasiler]

A U.S. buyer only has to pay sales tax on the item if the item is sold is in the state they are are. Racetech is in Cali I believe, so Cali residents would have to pay taxes but not the rest of the U.S. I also did not have to pay taxes when I bought recently from Germany and saved over $550 dollars on one purchase.

[Robert Taylor]

I was being facetious. Seriously though, anyone that is interested in starting a business, this might be a good opportunity if you do your homework. I have a career I like and have no desire to get into this biz. If I was unsure and looking to start a biz, I would surely look into this. You can buy retail from overseas and sell it for a profit here. Go figure. Trademe could be your store which I am sure a lot of people are doing that right now.

If you buy the springs, you should have done enough research to understand, that has a lot to do with the rider, track, bike and other factors. The rest is up to the rider to experiment and don't be afraid to. Just don't go balls to the wall after a major change. Just keep a log of your settings and check your tires/times after each session...or go for a ride and see what you like if you're not into track. If it worse, go the other way. If it gets screwy, go back to your original settings and start over. I have got a spread sheet that I keep on my phone and computer with all of my settings (original, track and street). If I make a change, I record it. I use 2 different settings because the roads are crap out here and the track is rather smooth. If it rides better, I make a note of it. If it is worse, I go the other direction. You can also learn a lot by being able to read the tires. Again, check youtube or go to your local track day and talk to the guys. There are some super fast cats out there. They are always willing to help and very nice people to chat with. I can honestly say that I have gathered a lot more information from talking to people at the track than a 10 minute conversation with someone standing behind a counter. I have even got incorrect information from people in sales plenty of times. If you do take it to a shop and just take the first setting out of the shop and leave it because joe-blow said so, then you might be missing out on a lot more speed or comfort by not experimenting...whatever you're looking for.

Give a person a fish he will eat for a day.
Teach a person to fish he will eat for life.

Some very fair points in your second paragraph

[Robert Taylor]

A U.S. buyer only has to pay sales tax on the item if the item is sold is in the state they are are. Racetech is in Cali I believe, so Cali residents would have to pay taxes but not the rest of the U.S. I also did not have to pay taxes when I bought recently from Germany and saved over $550 dollars on one purchase.

No one is arguing when the price discrepancy is HUGE. Candidly, the other issue that is really challenging distributors worldwide is that there is also an expectation to build in a dealer margin. So you stop selling to dealers and have one price? Dealers themselves have to make a margin ( and a reasonable one ) to survive

[wasiler]

No one is arguing when the price discrepancy is HUGE. Candidly, the other issue that is really challenging distributors worldwide is that there is also an expectation to build in a dealer margin. So you stop selling to dealers and have one price? Dealers themselves have to make a margin ( and a reasonable one ) to survive

Just correcting what appears to be incorrect information. The law of supply and demand naturally takes care of the weaker businesses. Every company I would think would want to survive but, this is not a utopian society. I hope your company survives. In reality, I don't see any changes on the horizon.

[Robert Taylor]

Just correcting what appears to be incorrect information. The law of supply and demand naturally takes care of the weaker businesses. Every company I would think would want to survive but, this is not a utopian society. I hope your company survives. In reality, I don't see any changes on the horizon.

Yes I dont see any changes anytime soon. For the record we are doing ok, if not for the fact we work really hard at that being so. But for all businesses I think this inequity of who pays gst is unfair. If you get two identical packages sent at the same time, same supplier, same value goods close to ''the threshold of customs interest '' One is addressed to a residential address and one to a known business. Which of these two addresses is far more likely to be intercepted for clearance charges and gst?