The Speed Triple Challenge race series for the MK1 Speed Triples meant the fitment of steering dampers. The bikes were running longer rear shocks and dropped the forks through the yokes a little this speeds the steering up plus also makes the bike slightly more unstable. When riding to the limits this would help keep things in check.

Standard street bikes won’t see any benefit to be honest and not ridden the same way, it’s also fair to say street bikes are probably have not modified the stance of the bike too much to affect stability.

My Ohlins is longer and I’m also running shorter drop links on the suspension which raises the rear quite a lot, I have dropped the forks a little too but even then mine is fairly stable. I’ve had the odd wobble on some back roads when pressing on but couldn’t tell you if it would have been worse without the damper as I haven’t been able to ride with/without mods back to back. I guess I’m just in some way trying to give a nod to the race bikes and I like the look so was going to tick that box either way !

Sprint Dampers and Toby I believe supplied the original kits and I bought mine years ago direct from Sprint, but alas the company no longer exists, I ran this for years and then replaced the old damper with a new Toby damper on the original fitting kit, the stroke of the original and replacement is 160mm.

As you can see the fitting kit replaces the two right hand cam cover bolts with two top hat spacers, then two stainless cap head bolts go through to bolt the bracket across the top of the cam cover, the standard bolts and the replacement steering damper bracket bolts like all the cam cover bolts screw directly in to the cam caps. It is worth noting that the thread in the cam caps to receive these bolts isn’t blind therefore the hole goes all the way through to the cam journal itself.

This is important because if the bolts used to attach the bracket are over 50mm you will bolt down directly onto the cam with !! This would damage the cam but if the engine was started it would probably right the head off too !!

The right hand headlight fork should needs to be cut down to space in the fork legs clamp (clamp 43mm ID)

Once fitted I tend to space out the bolt and spacers at the fork clamp with nylon washers to take out too much slop and prevent the damper from rattling around too much

All of the above pictures of of the original Sprint damper, This is the Toby damper I have on now with a black fork leg clamp to match

The Toby damper has a few more clicks of adjustability which is redundant mainly as for general use I run it on the minimum setting for road use as if too stiff on the steering it gives the sensation of the front wheel tram lining a tad.