Hi all, I am fairly new to this forum but have getting alot of great information here for the past few months. Havent posted anything yet so decided to start with a question. My issue is that the front wheel is twisted to the left when my handlebars are completely straight. I'm not sure if the forks are bent or just my triple tree is tweaked. I was going to try and loosen the triple tree and see if i can straighten it out. CBRclassic had a good write up on how to check wheel alignment but i had a few more questions before i tried this myself. Does the bike need to be on a stand when i loosen the triple tree? I have a rear stand but that wont do any good obviously. does the alignment have to be absolutely perfect? Any best way to do this?

Any more info on how to do this would be greatly appreciated. Im planning on doing this tomrorow and im basically winging it.

p.s. ive been riding with the front end like this for months. no leaks or anything so i dont think its the forks. only thing i notice is it turns in easier in right turns but really sucks at slow speeds.

 

The forks are going to bend before your upper or lower triple does. There is no alignment adjustments you can do yourself to straighten the front wheel with the bars. They should be automatically aligned. Strait forks will give you a strait wheel. Has the bike ever been wrecked or laid down to your knowledge? Luckily F4i forks are pretty cheap and plentiful on craigs and ebay.
Post up some pics looking down the forks if you can.

**YES** The bike MUST be lifted before you losen the triple clamp bolts. If you have quality frame sliders you can prop some jack stands under them to support the front of the bike that way. This is how i lifted the front to replace my fork seals and it worked great.

Also riding with severly bent or tweaked forks like that is very dangerous as the bike is not handling like it should. Just throwing that out there. Hard to turn in one direction? comon man! How can you ride with crooked bars anyways i would go insane!

 

Do NOT loosen the top pich-bolts on the tripples or, yes, your bike will fall
to it's knees. You don't need to loosen the forks entirely for what you have
in mind.

Just loosen the bottom bolts on the triples, get a buddy to hold the wheel
and give to a torque on the bars to straighten it. When you've got it real
close, then try grabbing the brakes, straighten the bars to the bike and
pump the front end a couple of times.Then, without a lot of jostling to the
bike, tighten the lower pinch-bolts back down.

If the above doesn't fix it, then the tubes might be bent. I'm doubting it, though,
based on the seals being intact/no leaks.

Hope this gets you back on the road, Ern

 

Thanks for the replies guys. Yeah i laid it down around a corner going 35 ish and cracked the stator cover over a year ago but im pretty sure its been like this since i bought it. Im going to try madhatters idea thats what a buddy of mine said to do too.

also its not hard to turn unless im going like under 5 and turning hard right like in a parking lot. Other than that im so used to it i dont even notice. Im sure it will make a hell of a difference with it straight though.

Here's some pics the first with the handlebars straight and the second with the tire straight. the bikes on a rear stand.

photo1.jpg?t=1319151137

photo2.jpg?t=1319151147

 

obviously twisted forks aint helping, but it's hard to turn in parking lots and slow speeds because your front tire is shot. guaranteed.

 

and christ crank down those preload adjusters!

 

yeah i know theres like 0% tread on my tires thats my next investment. once i can get a buddy to help im going to try straightening the front so hopefully that works and i dont need new forks (im super broke!). Im just getting into learning about the suspension, i know what the preload adjusters are but could you be a little more specific like what to do with them? Thanks in advance!

 

Are you a stunter? Because there is a secondary brake on the left side. So if you didn't put it there, someone else did, and probably stunted the crap out of this bike - which they sorta fixed and then sold to you - the lucky customer. Note there are no barends and new grips/levers, no left side mirror, etc.

PS in the first pic it doesn't look like your handlebars are straight. Either that or the clip ons aren't even.

And don't just crank down the preload. Check your sag first. There may have been modification done to the forks. And we don't even know what you weigh. Cranking them down too far isn't really a fix for anything.

 

dbl post

 

i dont stunt it but yeah im aware of all those issues ive had the bike coming on 2 years now. shes been beat up but these f4is are tanks and im not afraid to take it apart and work on it. you may be right about the clip ons i was just eyeballing the straightness so ill check those when im trying to adjust everything.

I was just reading about checking sag for front and rear so im going to do that soon. im 6'2" and 180 so ill probably need to tighten it up. its always felt pretty loose but never thought to tune the suspension