The XRs Front End.

Today was more work. Hot stinky work. It reached 96F in the backyard, (That’s 35C for you metric people) it made the garage like a sauna. It least the garage door gives shade so I could work outside, but it was still insanely warm. I kept wondering what the horrid, horrid corpse like smell I would occasionally get a whiff of was. I eventually figured out it was the garbage bin in the other corner of the yard giving off the rancid stink. Turns out the slow roasting dirty diapers in there were the culprit. Gah! Anyhow…

I am still waiting for the wheel oil seals, so the bearings had to wait. I started out by taking the right handle brake lever off to make getting the front brake cable off easier. The cable came off easy enough and was cleaned. I wish I had bought a new one now though. All new cables would have been nice.

The front tire was next and came off easy enough. I put all the parts for it in a pile. The front brakes weren’t to bad, but they smelled burnt and were pretty rusty, so they were tossed into the junk bin and the new pads went on. The wheel assembly was given a nice cleaning and then put into the corner. The ugly front fender came off next and was cleaned and put aside as well.

I then took the forks off. I thought the bolts for them would be a bit of a battle, but like everything else on this bike, they were fairly loose. I slid both fork tubes off the bike and looked them over. They have the usual amount of wear on them, but they aren’t to bad. The tubes are pretty rusty though. The old aluminum foil rub trick took most of the surface rust off. They’ll have to do for now. I drained the oil from both of them then flipped them over to have a look at the bottom bolts. Turns out they were Philip head bolts and looked like they were pretty soft material. I tried removing one but could feel the screw driver start to slip. I needed better tools then I owned if I wanted to get them out with stripping them.

Into the car and off to San Jose BMW! They had a good laugh over the wee forks when I came in. They are cute little things. One of their mechanics was nice enough to have a go at them and got the bottom bolts off no problem. My impact wrench never seems to be able to break them loose, but the big boy shops never seem to have a problem. They had them off in a few minutes and I bought the mechanic lunch for his troubles.

Back home I started disassembling them. With some work the circlip came out along with the ring, at this point they should have separated. I couldn’t for the life of me get them apart. On the DT, they slid apart no problem, but not with this little one. I put them into a large vice and hauled on them, but they were stuck solid. After about 30 minutes of trying different things to get them apart with no luck, I figured it was time for plan B.

I got a small thin bladed standard screw driver and gently pushed it into the seal around its perimeter, being real careful not to damage the bottom of the fork. After going around the outside of it a few times, I put it back into the vice and got out the persuader; also known as a hammer. I gave the bottom a whack and it slid free! Once all was free, I took it apart and cleaned it. It was full of nasty black gummy stuff. The new oil seal went on and it all went back together. Rinse and repeat for the other side. Interestingly, it didn’t take fork oil, but transmission fluid instead. I’d never heard of that.

They went back on the bike easy enough and then the wheel followed. Everything went back on nice and easy and looked much better then when I started. The brake cable was hooked back up and adjusted. A quick pass over the spokes to make sure nothing was loose and it was done!

Everything turned and worked fine, no leaking oil from the fork seals either. It looks much, much better then it did a few days ago. It still has a long way to go, but at least it’s getting there. I’m not worried about it falling apart or not stopping if someone uses it now.

I still need to redo the grips and throttle cable, but I think I’ll save that for later. I want to paint a bunch of the parts and handlebars so it’ll be a bit of work and I don’t have the time left this week. Still waiting for those points and oil seals as well.

I think this is a little milestone for this newbie! No extra screws, bolts, washers or pieces either!