Progressive 944 Shock Reviewed
If you are looking for something a little better ride and something that is going to help you carry a load and a passenger. If you happen to ride two up or heavily loaded for touring sometimes; these things are only made for touring bikes. There is only one set of riders who are going to use this shock.
Progressive offers something for everyone if you are just wanting a basic upgrade or you’re full on performance or something in the middle like the ultimate in touring, well Progressive has it for you. Progressive Suspension proudly made in the U.S.A.
PROGRESSIVE 944 SERIES
The 944 Series Ultra Touring Shocks are designed to deliver a comfortable ride at a 1″ lowered stance. The Ultra Touring shocks utilize all the suspension travel provided by the full-length stock units, but in a 1″ lowered ride height. The unique Ultra Touring spring combination not only delivers a lowered ride height while it’s being ridden, but also while it’s on the side stand. The 944 Ultra Touring shocks are available in 3 configurations: Standard Weight, Heavy-duty (250+lbs.) and Super Heavy Duty (350+ lbs.).
This is for your touring bikes. This shock features a lot of cool things like frequency sensing technology that allows the shocks to sense the frequency of a bump and it adjusts accordingly not only that is the progressive spring rate. Its high pressure gas is charged. So you are going to get consistent performance every time. It also has hand adjustability so you can set a preload without any tools. This is a perfect bike upgrade for your touring Harley-Davidson.
There are a couple of standout features of this shock
(FST) – Frequency Sensing Technology
This shock is smart enough to know what kind of a hit is actually coming to. It is whether a small bump or a big bump. This shock is going to damp differently depending on what exactly it senses that you have run over in the road so in that respect it makes it very easy to dial in a great ride. The shock is doing a lot of hard work for you.
Knurled Section – this is so you can get a good grip on this. The reason why you get a good grip on it is because the preload is adjustable on these things without tools. Realistically speaking, if you decide that you don’t know the way the shock is riding you want to dial and maybe say a little more preload. All you have to do is pop off your bags which is very easy to list for most of you. Take those spring bales off drop the bag and from there you can actually adjust the preload on the shocks without using tools. You can be able to do it on the side of the road. It’s a little finicky. You need some strong hands to do it. That’s my only gripe with this shock. It’s not the easiest thing if you have small or weak hands.
It has the same amount of travel as a 13 inch standard Harley touring shocks just about all touring bikes come with a 13 inch shock. Hey have the same travel as this progressive unit does. However progressive unit is cool because the way they design the shock it actually will sit your bike about an inch lower so you get to remove the rear of your bike down lower but you still get the exact same travel as your factory shock with a better ride.
NOTE: There are different version of the 944 series there are the heavy duty ones and there is a regular where you get the one inch sag if you get the heavy duties that is for a heavy rider and or if you are going to riding a lot of passenger and trunks and gear all the time. So just make sure when you are ordering your progressives choose the one depending on your particular situations.
Installation
Installation on these is not too bad at all. It is not hard to install but you need a little bit of equipment as far as getting your bike up off the ground. You can see there are only two points of attachments for each shock. It means there are a total of four fasteners, so that part is not difficult.
Now if you already installed it on the bike, there are a couple of things you need to know. First, we need to adjust sag or our preload and this can vary from different shocks to different shocks. Second, always look at the specifications for these particular 944 shocks. They do lower the bike in inches but they want it to be in between 1.2 and 1.7 inches.
NOTE: These particular 944s a lot of times, the progressive shocks will install the other way so the big bell and adjustment collar will actually be at the top. In the instructions they are actually wrong, but some other riders know what they need to do. Normally if the bell was at the top their instructions are correct and when you turn your bell clockwise it adds tension to the spring, so it compresses the spring thus it raises the bike and it adds preload. Then counterclockwise would let the spring extend and thus you would have less preload because these are technically installed upside down although that is how you are supposed to correctly install them.
Now it’s the opposite so if we go counter clockwise it actually adds preload. It compresses the spring again raising the bike and adding preload and if we go clockwise its letting the spring out thus we have less preload also on the color there is some marks down below it there’s actually nine of them grooves in it and gives you an idea of where you can set it. When you get your sag set you can always go back to that line and then you can have a different sag for if you have a passenger and a lot of gear and you can know which mark based on what sag set you wanted to.
Benefits
The 944 are really special shocks in Progressives line-up; these are only made for touring bikes so Progressive is not trying to make these fit a lot of different bikes. These were engineered from the ground up for a touring motorcycle. You have a little different need in just about every other bike combo out there. You almost are riding with a load and with a passenger so that means that you have a little different damping springing requirements than your average softail dyno sports door or whatever else it might be on the road out there. Progressive came through and they have made a shock and spring assembly specifically for you.
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