Hi folks,

I think i have a problem with my forks. Before i took the bike off the road 2 years ago, i felt some play in the front end. Assuming it to be the head bearings, i changed them but although there was some wear, it made little difference...

Now the bikes back on the road, the problem seems to have gotten worse. With the brakes on, if i push the bars forward and back i can hear and feel a click. My next guess was it is simply the pads and calipers moving however, i now have a crunching sound in the right side fork when i push down on the bars to compress the forks! his leads me to believe that there is some wear to the fork internals...

What have i done??? I am thinking about stripping the forks but I'm not really sure what to look for. My fiancé's dad suggests i check the fork oil level, which i will do but if anyone else has any ideas, they would be most welcome...

Could be a bit of wear in your bushes..I replaced mine last time I srtipped the Sprints forks, I did a little write up on Mottleybiker if you click into fork overhaul ;-)

Yep - I'd second the bushes. It *should* be the only place that wears in there, and the bush is made of a softer material than the rest of the unit (so you only have to replace the bush when things wear out). Could be crumbling a bit, I don't know, but that's where I'd be looking.

Might be worth dropping the forks out, stripping down both legs, cleaning them out and rebuilding them. Should be an easy weekend job if you have the time and the parts.

Make that X 3 for it being the fork bushes. Dead easy to do, just order a set of all the bushes, new fork seals & dust seals and replace the retaining circlips.
Either strip them both in one go,, or if less confident , do them one at a time. Shouldnt take more than a 2 or 3 hours.
HTH

Thanks guys, i think you're all right... I shall be stripping the forks asap, it seems to be getting worse now so i'm not gonna ride the bike till it's sorted. Good job i have the car eh!

I know from memory that i'm gonna need some sort of tool to undo the bolt at the bottom of the fork. It's like a long bar with a square drive at the end, hopefully i can knock one up with an angle grinder and get it welded to a steel bar or somthing... I love a good bodge me!

Oh yes - it was the same with my Divvie forks. Wasn't a square drive, though - that's too easy to knock together with wobble-bars. I think it was a hex drive, like a giant allan key. I fashioned one out of the cheapest wheelnut wrench ever made by British Leyland. No idea where it went though.

Impact wrench will have them off in no time....beg borrow steal one

On my old Daytona you were supposed to get some special tool to dismantle the forks but I got a sength of square tubing from B&Q and it worked fine.

That's a good plan wilf! Cheers!