Hey guys, when I ride in a straight line, my triple clamp looks like it's turned to the right just a bit. I can coast with my hands off the clipons and the bike tracks perfectly straight, but the bars look slightly turned from the rider's point of view. I checked my rear wheel alignment (just the alignment marks) and it looks okay. Is it possible for the front end to be out of whack? It seems as though the front end would be self-aligning by default once you put the front axle in. Any ideas?

I know this misalignment could be other things, but I'm simply asking if the front forks CAN be misaligned, that way I can completely rule that cause out if not. Thanks.

 

if they bent then yeth...

 

Ya bent -- has it been in a crash?

 

Fixed it. I loosened the lower triple clamp, axle bolt and pinch bolts and was amazed by how much I could twist the tire back and forth. I straightened it out, and it's good now. Thanks.

 

Good deal. So what happened before? Was it in there cocked when you tightened it up? Seems like it could've led to a serious case of the shakes at speed -- glad you found it.

 

Yeah, it was just cocked a little bit I guess. The bike rode great and tracked fine, it just looked like the upper triple was turned a bit and it bugged me. You know how it is. I was thinking all kinds of bad stuff from my lowside.... But no biggy. I think my rear wheel is a tiny bit misaligned too, which could be causing it because it's still not perfect. I did the string trick on the rear wheel and it looks like it's off a couple turns of the chain tensioner.