My C twin has a re-made (by Maughans) original Vin front damper and had the short eye bolts. After the Bawtry meet I was motivated to check the lower link and damper travel. With the link level, there was almost no travel left on the damper ( fully extended.) So, put in shorter springs to make the rear of the lower link lower than the front, still well extended. Fitted long eye bolts and it now sits in the middle of the damper travel. What it will ride like, I've yet to discover, but reading this forum it seems the lower link should be pretty well level.The longer eye bolts make better use of the available travel for the shocker and the springbox cases, if you use the short ones, the issue of the guard/wheel hitting something on full bump will be worse. So long as it clears everything with the wheel in the straight ahead position you should be ok. I too have had the set up where it will clip the front exhaust pipe, but the chances of having the bike with that much steering lock whilst hitting a savage bump is extremely unlikely. If you think of how much you actually turn the bars when riding, it is very little.
The occasional "clonk" I was hearing was clearly the damper topping out. Looking at other bikes they all seemed to have well extended dampers, as if lower link down at the back should be right.
All very confusing !
Regards, Terry
(I AM a member, the system says I'm not, more confusion).