Rebuilding Bike Suspension

Whether or not it’s from many years of neglect or a dutiful service interval of absorbing potholes, the day will come when your suspension pukes its guts out. Rubber seals have a finite lifespan, fluids break down over time and the chrome in your fork tubes and shock shafts will ultimately fail and corrode. The telltale sight of a leaking seal brings with it the choice to restore/exchange inventory elements or undertake a serious suspension improve.

Whereas there’s no scarcity of mono-shock conversions and front-end swaps round right here, the theme of our everyman Honda CB550F tracker challenge requires an accessible and reasonably priced strategy—one thing anybody may accomplish in a weekend to get an previous bike on the street once more.

Rebuilding Telescopic Bike Forks If you wish to mess around with previous bikes, you’ll both develop into proficient at rebuilding forks or get used to paying another person to do it. A uncared for basic will virtually actually include an oil leak on the left aspect, and also you’ll should tear the fork down fully to repair it. The excellent news is that it’s not that difficult, as a result of what your basic bike lacks in experience high quality, it normally makes up for in simplicity.

Each design is slightly totally different, even amongst telescopic forks, however our Honda CB550F is actually the simplest rebuild I’ve finished. Actually, you’ve received six main items per aspect, and driving the brand new seal in doesn’t require any specialty gadgets.

Disassembly is fairly easy, however there are a few items of recommendation that go a great distance with this fashion fork. There’s a small Allen-head cap screw within the fork decrease that’s hid the place the axle is housed, and it pays to knock this unfastened earlier than eradicating the fork tubes from the triple clamps. A small influence driver works nicely, and also you solely have to loosen it barely at this stage. Additionally, in case your bike is as tough as ours, a dead-blow hammer or a wood dowl is a should to free the fork tubes from the triple clamps.

With the forks on the bench, you’ll have the ability to break every tube down in simply a few minutes. The big cap on the prime loosens simply with an influence, and then you definitely’ll wish to take away the hex-head drain bolt on the fork decrease. Stroke the fork slowly a number of occasions with a catch pan to extract the nasty previous oil. After that, fully take away the Allen-head bolt on the backside, and also you’ll have the ability to take away the spring and dampener.

Subsequent, it’s time to take away the previous fork seal, and our CB550’s unique seals put up one hell of a combat. After eradicating the snap ring, it took a big pry bar to free the seals from the fork decrease. With the previous seal out, you’ll have the ability to knock out the oil lock from the fork decrease.

Earlier than reassembly, you’ll wish to clear and examine all of your elements, and our uncared for CB550 was a reasonably robust case. Our fork tubes had severe pitting and rust across the triple clamps, and the lowers had heavy corrosion and trashed clear coat. If in case you have the means, a few of these elements benefit changing fully, however within the spirit of creating one thing from nothing, we did our greatest to wash up what we had.

Tidying up the fork lowers wasn’t dangerous. I plugged the holes with rags and popped them within the sandblaster to wash off all of the previous clear coat and corrosion, after which completed them off with WD-40 and crimson Scotch-Brite for a extra OE end. For those who don’t have entry to a blaster, a brass wire wheel ought to do the trick, and clear-coating these elements afterward might be worthwhile.

Corrosion in your fork tubes is extra regarding, as these items are plated and have to have an ideal end towards the fork seal. In case your tubes are pitted in anyplace the seal interfaces, they need to be fully refinished or changed. Our scenario was solely barely higher, because the corrosion was restricted to the triple clamp space, removed from the fork seal, however the pitting was by the chrome.

Name it doing the fallacious factor the fitting method, however I chucked each of our tubes within the lathe and frivolously sanded and polished the affected space. This received’t hurt the fork seal, because it’s outdoors the seal’s journey, however you’ll wish to coat that a part of the tube with some form of protecting end to stop corrosion later. If the distinction within the end catches your eye, a dirt-bike-style mud boot (or gaiter if you’ll) fully conceals the world, and we might swap our mud covers later.

With all the things prepped and cleaned, drop within the oil locks and the brand new seals could be put in. As at all times, coat the seal with slightly oil and you should use the previous seal to drive the brand new one in earlier than putting in the snap ring. From there it’s straightforward. Set up the dampener and spring into the fork tube and exchange the drain bolt and Allen head screw within the backside.

For oil, Honda recommends 10W30 motor oil, and even ATF for our CB550 fork, however we had one thing heavier in thoughts. The parents at Common Motor Collective advocate 15W40 for heavier riders, and we’re hoping that offers us improved dampening when our CB (inevitably) sees some mild hooning. 170 cc of oil fills every fork, after which we’re prepared to interchange the highest cap and refit our fork tubes.

Changing Bike Rear Shocks After servicing the entrance fork, changing rear shocks is a a lot easier nut-and-bolt affair. Rebuildable shocks are value having serviced, however in any other case, you’ll be looking for new ones, and the simplest strategy is an application-specific shock. For those who don’t thoughts buying round or wish to change the stance of your bike, you’ll want to determine your required experience peak, spring price, journey, and so forth. to select a common shock. Needless to say your bike’s mounting fashion (eye-to-eye, eye-to-clevis, and so forth.) and bushing dimension will slender your choices.

Ultimately, we settled on a budget-friendly, distant reservoir shock from Tec Bike Parts. It’s nothing fancy, providing solely preload and peak adjustment, however we needed to give it a shot for the worth level. In case your price range permits, a rebuildable shock with compression and rebound adjustability is one of the best cash should buy in your previous twin shocker.

Unsolicited Ultimate Ideas What our CB550 tracker challenge lacks in glamor, it actually makes up for in low-cost thrills. Our funding within the bike and the elements we’ve sourced is so minimal, but it surely will get incrementally higher with each job accomplished. There’s little question we may have coughed up for pricer shocks, or finished one thing extra thrilling with the forks, however within the spirit of creating one thing from nothing, I believe we’re getting someplace.

I’ve a bunch of unfastened ends to tie up subsequent, together with some trimming to tighten up our seat fitment, tabs to take away and brake elements to interchange. I’ve just a few concepts to enhance the previous aftermarket exhaust our bike has as nicely, however we’re nonetheless up within the air on that. We’re additionally nonetheless feeling out the entrance fender scenario, and I have to get round to reducing up our inventory one. The purpose is, there’s nonetheless work to do earlier than we get to the thrilling stuff, and now we have just a few surprises in retailer as nicely. Keep tuned.

Bike EXIF thanks Motogadget, Tuffside, Bridgestone, Lowbrow Customs and Biltwell Inc. for supporting our Honda CB550F tracker construct.