Attractive Quality national oil seals Choosing Good Quality

Attractive Quality national oil seals Choosing Good Quality. Remove the Brake Calipers.First thing to do is to remove the front brake calipers. This is pretty straightforward and covered nicely in Clymer’s. You remove the two 8 mm caliper mounting bolts and slide the caliper off up and to the rear. There are two cautions here: once you take the calipers off, do not touch the front brake, or the pistons may be forced out of the cylinders leading to potential problems.
I didn’t do this, but Clymer’s recommends you fit a piece of wood or plastic in between the brake pads to hold them in case someone touches the front brake. I used caution and it worked well for me. You’ll find that you have to swing the front end back and forth a bit during this job, so make sure you don’t reach up without looking and squeeze the front brake by accident while the brake calipers are unsupported!Attractive Quality national oil seals Choosing Good Quality.
The other thing to remember is that you will need to use something to hold up the brake calipers – you don’t want to let them hang by the brake lines. I have two thin nylon luggage straps that I use specifically for this purpose – I wrap them up around the handlebars, then feed the strap up into the caliper between the brake pads, and adjust the straps so that they take the weight off the hanging calipers. I purchased them in Wal Mart for about $2.00 each; they are in the auto section near the bungee cords. They work great for this single purpose.
2. Remove the Front Axle.Next, remove the front axle. This involves loosening (no need to completely remove) the 6 mm front axle clamping bolts (2 on each side) from under the axle. Then remove the 8 mm bolt that holds the axle on the left hand side of the bike. Insert a drift or an Allen wrench into the hole in the axle on the right hand side of the bike and slowly pull the axle out while rotating it.
3. Remove the Front Wheel.Once you have the axle out, you can slowly pull the front wheel forward to remove it. There are two wheel spacers on either side of the wheel, and they will probably fall out when you remove the wheel. Remember that they are different shapes and must be installed the same way they came out, so take a look first to see how they fit. Move the wheel out of the way, but don’t lay it down on the disc rotors.Attractive Quality national oil seals Choosing Good Quality.
4. Remove the Front Fender(s).Next, you’ll need to remove the front fenders and the lower fork brace. I have the two-part fenders on my 1994 K75 Standard. To do this, first pry off the small hinged cover on the back of the fork brace. Be careful, as this cover is pretty flimsy! Under that cover you’ll see an Allen bolt – I think it’s a 5 mm. Remove that bolt and washers. Next, remove the reflector assemblies from the side of the front forks. Refer to Clymer Chapter 13, starting on page 496.
Note: I found this to be the trickiest part of the entire job: there are several washers involved here that make this a rather complex assembly that holds the reflector and the front half of the front fender. There are two tabs that come down from the fender that slide over the bolt and there are various sizes of washers and a collar that hold everything together.
Make sure you understand how they all fit together before you take them out! I didn’t, and it took me some time to figure out how everything went back together. I’m still not 100% sure I did it right, but it seems to be working. Clymer’s warns that if you don’t get it right, you may risk breaking the tabs on the fenders, which means you’ll have to buy a new fender AND get it painted! Also, when you get to a point where the bolts are loose, hang on to the front fender, or it will drop off and probably land upside down and get scratched.
5. Remove the Lower Fork Brace.You do have to remove the lower fork brace. Initially, I thought perhaps I could get away without doing this. To remove the lower fork brace, remove the four (yes, there are four!) 6 mm bolts under the fork brace. You should now have two naked forks staring at you, ready for removal!Attractive Quality national oil seals Choosing Good Quality.
6. Remove the Front Forks.Pry off the top trim cap on the forks – they are up on top of the “triple tree” under the handlebars. Loosen (it’s not necessary to remove) the upper and lower fork clamp bolts; they are the Allen bolts in back of the forks, one on the upper fork bridge (6 mm on my bike) and one on the lower fork bridge (8 mm) in back of each fork. Refer to Clymer page 377. Slowly slide each fork down and out. You may have to twist the forks slightly back and forth as you remove them. They should come out fairly easily – if not, first make sure that they fork clamp Allen bolts are, in fact, loose. If you are still having problems, you may need to spray some penetrating fluid around the forks inside of the upper and lower fork bridge.
7. Clean the Forks.Now that the forks are out, you should make sure they are as clean as possible. I sprayed WD-40 on a clean towel and wiped them down. I also cleaned out the holes in the upper and lower fork bridge holes where the fork goes. I then left a very light coating of WD-40 on the part of the exposed fork tubes that will be covered by the gaiters. I suppose that if you haven’t done a fork oil change in a while, this might be the time to do it; perhaps it is easier when the forks are completely removed from the bike.Attractive Quality national oil seals Choosing Good Quality.
8. Install the Gaiters.Slide the gaiters over the forks. Make sure you have the large diameter end down, as this must slide over the fork seal assembly. It’s not necessary to do anything other than slide the gaiters over the forks at this point; you have to reassemble everything before you can cinch down the gaiters. Note that there are four drain holes in the bottom of each gaiter. You may want to locate these so that they don’t point directly forward – best to have them on the sides, I figure, to prevent dirt or rain from getting in. Remember that once you get the bottom part of the gaiters on, and you install the fork brace, you probably will not be able to move them again, as it is too tight of a fit to do this once the fork brace is on, so get them lined up as closely as possible.
9. Reassemble the Forks.The half-way point! It’s downhill from here…. I sprayed a bit of WD-40 in the holes in the upper and lower fork bridge where the forks are installed to prevent future corrosion. I suppose I could have put a very light coating of “Never Seize” instead. Slide the forks back up into the fork bridge. This is a good time also to clean up everything on the front end; the forks; under the fenders; the lower fork brace, etc.
I decided to move the forks up above the triple tree by 5 mm, just to see if it would speed up the steering a bit. This did work, as I will relate at the end.
If you are going to reinstall the forks to factory specs, simply slide them up into the upper and lower fork bridge until the top of the fork tube is flush with the top of the triple tree. You may need to lay a small straightedge on top of the triple tree to tell when you are there. Be careful, as it may appear that the forks are flush with the top of the triple tree when they really aren’t. Check the measurement you made at the beginning to determine if the forks are in the same location as before.Attractive Quality national oil seals Choosing Good Quality.
Now you should snug up the forks just enough to hold them in place, and pull the lower part of the fork gaiter down over the top of the fork seal assembly. You want to do this now, because it is a very tight fit once you get the fork brace on. I pulled the gaiter down far enough so that the bottom of the first pleat was even with the very top of the fork, right before it meets the fork seal itself. You need to make sure that there is enough rubber over the lower section of the fork so that when you install the cable tie it will have something to grab on to and hold the lower part of the gaiter on securely.
It gets a bit tricky when you’re trying to juggle the forks and the fork brace – you may have to mess with a combination of holding the forks up and fiddling with the lower fork brace to get the brace installed in the proper position as you reinstall the forks. You have to slide one fork down lower than the other to get the brace in, then move the fork up until everything is lined up.
You need to have the ability to rotate each fork as you slide it up into the fork bridge, but at the same time, you need to make sure the lower fork brace is in its proper location. You sort of have to go back and forth until you get the right combination of moves where both forks and the lower fork brace are all lined up! It’s kind of tough to do by yourself – I eventually had to call my wife out to the garage to give me a hand.
Also, you should make sure nothing is binding at this point. You don’t want to force the fork or the assembly with the fork brace; make sure everything has a bit of play or is not binding. This may take some doing.
Once you get things lined up, tighten the Allen bolts in the upper and lower fork bridge just enough to keep the forks from sliding down. I had to do quite a bit of measuring and tweaking to get everything lined up and correct, as I moved my forks up 5 mm above the triple tree. Then, tighten the four bolts under the fork brace. Make sure you torque these; Clymer’s calls for 14-16 ft. lbs.
10. Reassemble Front End.Now it’s a matter of reassembling everything pretty much in the reverse order from the way you ripped it apart. Reassemble the front fender(s), ensuring that you install the washers correctly on the reflector assembly. Reinstall the front wheel, then the brake calipers. Make sure you double check everything to ensure you torqued everything to specs; don’t forget the fork clamping bolts on the upper and lower fork bridge!Attractive Quality national oil seals Choosing Good Quality.
11. Finish Installing Gaiters.Make sure the lower part of the gaiter is secure around the upper part of the lower fork tube, and that it covers the fork seal with enough room to slide in the cable tie. It is a very tight fit between the gaiter and the fork brace; I used a pair of pliers to slide the cable tie back and forth until I was able to get it far enough down to tighten. Don’t cinch the cable tie tight yet, just let it hang there until you make sure everything is located properly. I stretched the gaiter up to the top of the fork, right underneath the lower fork bridge, just to make sure everything looked right, before I cinched down the gaiter.
Once everything looks good, you can cinch down the lower cable tie. Make sure you adjust the cable tie so that the little female part is at the back of the fork; this gives a cleaner look to the front fork.
Stretch the gaiter up to the top of the fork tube under the lower fork bridge. This may take some persuading with a piece of wood – don’t use a screwdriver, as it may cut the fork gaiter and ruin your work! Push the gaiter up as far as it will go and make sure it’s even. You should be able to get it up far enough that you see no chrome or fork tube. Once it’s in place, wrap it with a cable tie and again, make sure it’s located such that the female part of the cable tie is in back of the fork.
I used a pair of pliers to pull on the cable tie to make sure it was really tight. I then snipped off the extra part of the cable tie that stuck out. Everything looks great!
You may want to put some black RTV sealant around or under the upper part of the gaiter where it meets the lower fork bridge. I didn’t do this, but I wonder if it would have helped hold the gaiter up. I’m assuming that the cable tie is tight enough to hold it for a long time.Attractive Quality national oil seals Choosing Good Quality.