It's my fault, I admit it. I can't keep the front tire on the ground, but good freakin' god, I just replaced these things not three months ago and now the same mother f**ing side is leaking again (worse than before)!

Therefore, I am going to have to learn to replace these myself. So, my question is this. What tools am I looking at buying here? I have all the norms (ie: all tools required to remove the wheels and maintain normal maintenance). Still, I figure I will be visiting the hardware section of somewhere before this is all said and done.

Damn my showboating ...

 

if you search around you can find out how exactly to make a fork seal press (or whatever its called). its made out of like 3 dollars worth of PVC pieces and is used to hit the fork seal into place without damaging it. other than that if you have basic tools and a way to suspend the front end off the ground thats all you need. i just replaced mine a few months ago and although it was time-consuming because it was my first time changin it, it costed only like $30 in parts as opposed to probably like atleast $150 in parts and labor from a shop. YOUTUBE is your friend when it comes to this also! watch some videos a few times and memorize what they do and itll be really simple. that and just search google on how to change them and youll come across a few popular tutorials for like F4i's and such which are all basically the same im pretty sure.

 

^ thanks man

 

First, I'll say good luck with this project cause it takes a dedicated and patient person to do some of the work on these bikes. (i know because i worked for six months breakin down 2 engines to swap trannies cause mine was shot) Then I'll say, you might wanna learn a little better way on wheelies. You got to come down really hard sometimes for you to keep having this issue. I pull wheelies all the time; street, highway, 2nd gear, 3rd gear standups and haven't messed my forks up. Don't get me wrong, sometimes you may have to come down for traffic or fear of flipping, but get some more throttle control.

 

[QUOTE=RPM_RIPPA;826189]First, I'll say good luck with this project cause it takes a dedicated and patient person to do some of the work on these bikes. (i know because i worked for six months breakin down 2 engines to swap trannies cause mine was shot) QUOTE]

 

its a fork seal, not tranny swaps(...however that compares). dedicate 4 or 5 hours to do it and youll be good, trust me lol. if you feel like you cant do it yourself after getting into it, THEN bring it somewhere to get done, you cant hurt anything by trying first.

 

Thanks guys, I appreciate all the help, and don't worry, RPM. Unlike some, I'm not too proud to take some good advice. I would rather it be a problem with my technique then a problem with the bike. I will really work on letting the nose down a little softer.

If I were a smart man then I would just fix the damn thing once and for all and keep the front tire on the ground. Yet, we all know that just isn't an option.

 

One thing I never saw mentioned was the condition of your fork inner slider. The chrome surface is hard, yes, but it can get nicked easily by flying debris. If there is a ding in the tube anywhere along the sliding travel path, that nick will act like a saw blade and slice away at the fork seal lip as the bike bounces up and down. Depending upon how bad the nick is, it can do its damage in one day or a few months.

Get the bike's front end unweighted and use your fingernail to very diligently check the sliding surface of your inner slider for even the slightest nick. If you can scrape it off, then it was just a dead bug or something, but if it won't scrape off, you have to fix it! What you're looking to do is repair the damaging part of the nick. Your typical ding has two components- like a crater on the moon, you have a concave dished area and an upraised, jagged rim. The rim is the part you have to file down. I use 2000-grit sandpaper folded into a ribbon, and just whoof it back and forth long enough to polish down the raised edges. There's nothing practical you can do about the depression. If the depression is REALLY deep, then the oil will seep past the seal anyway, but since it took a while for your new seals to leak, that's not the problem you have. This isn't work that's so complicated and critical that you have to hire a professional to do it, either. All you're doing is using very very fine sandpaper long enough to de-nick your nick. Just looking at your work will tell you if you're off-target or over-doing it. Just don't use 80-grit! Finish up by using a chrome polish if you want to.