MRC Forum- brought to you by www.morini-riders-club.com

My Marzochi shocks are getting very pogo stick like and one has got a small oil stain at the seal so it's time to unlock my wallet. I was going to see if I could rebuild them but can't find a rebuild kit.

Got a budget of £150 tops and so far NJB and YSS are favourites but is there anything else I should look at. Want simple and reliable don't care about fancy adjustments and I don't want Hagons I want to be able to ride over a penny without being able to tell if it's heads or tails.

Hi,
For Marzocchi, all rebuild parts are here, also there was an article in a recent ATG about the rebuild of the shocks on the club strada.

http://www.suspensionzana.com/index.php ... Itemid=114

Cheers
Mark

NJB are good, I have them on my Laverda. Unfortunately their shortest are too long for Morinis

Have a chat with the chap at Tec. I believe he does different spring rates, and the shocks are rebuildable.

RobinSF1 wrote: ↑20 Apr 2023 20:38 NJB are good, I have them on my Laverda. Unfortunately their shortest are too long for Morinis

I have messaged NJB and they replied that they can do shocks for a Morini Strada and adjust them to suit. Perhaps they have changed the design or maybe you are thinking of the off road version.

MickeyMoto wrote: ↑20 Apr 2023 21:53 Have a chat with the chap at Tec. I believe he does different spring rates, and the shocks are rebuildable.

Had a look at the website and the gas shocks look very nice but they seem to be out of stock on most models. I will email them to see if they can help.

The original marzocchis are quite straightforward to rebuild and work well when fresh. Cheap modern dampers might be a false economy.

I fitted a wilbers damper to my dart (monoshock) and that was a transformation. But very expensive and the original damper not easily rebuildable.

On a twin shock 500 or 350 morini I would always rebuild the original damper before looking for alternatives.

If you rebuilt it and decided the damping wasn’t for you, then I would imagine you could sell your freshly overhauled marzocchis for a reasonable price to put towards some sort of premium modern damper. But for less than £100 all in I think you’ll be happy with the rebuilt originals.

I wrote a step by step guide on rebuilding them in the December 2022 issue of the club magazine.

If NJB are doing shorter shocks now, I would highly recommend them. Good product and excellent service.

Last year 330mm was the shortest they did.

mbmm350s wrote: ↑20 Apr 2023 14:55 Hi,
For Marzocchi, all rebuild parts are here, also there was an article in a recent ATG about the rebuild of the shocks on the club strada.

http://www.suspensionzana.com/index.php ... Itemid=114

Cheers
Mark

Thanks for the information I might buy a pair of shocks and a rebuild kit so I can take my time rebuilding the zocchis and not be off the road.

This was me ten years ago.
I did exactly that: had mine rebuilt, swapping to a pair of Hagons that I knew I could onsell.
There's a pleasure for me in keeping mine as Italian as possible.

I eventually went for the NJB shocks and boy are they nice no kick up the backside going over bumps. Unfortunately they show up the front fork as being harsh but bouncy that's next job when I find a roundtuit.

The original zochis will be rebuilt when I get a rebuild kit from Italy.

if you have access to a lathe showa cartridges can be retrofitted to morini forks
I did upgrade quite a few guzzi forks like that.
updates the suspension 20 years, still no match for current top of the line suspension , but lightyears better than the original stuff.

huub wrote: ↑28 Jun 2023 12:49 if you have access to a lathe showa cartridges can be retrofitted to morini forks
I did upgrade quite a few guzzi forks like that.
updates the suspension 20 years, still no match for current top of the line suspension , but lightyears better than the original stuff.

I wish I had access to a lathe it's something I have always dreamt of. Unfortunately I would have no idea how to use it so I would need someone who is made of 1 part cutting oil, 1 part grease and 1 part swarf to show me how to use it.

While I was researching YSS shocks I noticed that the company makes a gadget called a fork emulator which is supposed to improve the damping of older rod damped forks so they emulate modern cartridge damped forks. I doubt that somehow but an increase in plushness would be nice to deal with all the mid corner potholes that are so popular with local councils these days.

Has anyone fitted these fancy newfangled cajiggers or knows if they can or can't be fitted. The fitment list doesn't seem to cover bikes made outside of Japan

Fastmongrel wrote: ↑27 Jun 2023 20:31 I eventually went for the NJB shocks and boy are they nice no kick up the backside going over bumps. Unfortunately they show up the front fork as being harsh but bouncy that's next job when I find a roundtuit.

The original zochis will be rebuilt when I get a rebuild kit from Italy.

That's good to hear and matches the experience I had with NJB on my Laverda.

How long is the shortest adjusted length of the NJB? (was 330mm) when I enquired last year.

I ended up buying Gazzi shocks, also adjustable length. They work well, but the finish is not as good as NJB and though a similar price, I got stung £51 imprt duty + fees.