Fork Problems

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brianinpa

brianinpa

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I am working on removing my fork lower legs from the fork tubes for cleaning and painting and I have a problem. The hex head bolt in the bottom of the lower leg is loose but it is just spinning. I suspect that the dampner rod is spinning but I cannot figure out how to hod that dampner rod inside the upper tube. Has anyone had this problem before, and how did you fix it?
 
I was going to post that reply because that is exactly what I did. Reassembled the fork, compressed it and gave it one more try and sure enough, the bolt broke free. When I got the bolt removed, i found that there was an ample supply of Red Loctite on the threads. I have moved on to the other fork and got the lower leg removed but now the top bolt is locked tight: so tight I am starting to round out the recessed allen head. I have to assume there is a lot of loctite on those threads also. So I guess the next question is...

Does anyone have a sure fired trick to loosen up some loctite? I am thinking it is time to heat things up, but figured I get some other opinions first and it was getting too cold to do any more work.
 
On my '80, I had the same problem. I ended up using a star bit - not sure what size - and hammered it into the hex bolt. Between the hammering and the points of the bit grabbing the bolt, it came right out.

Good luck with yours, and if you use heat, use it lightly!
 
brianinpa":2pnjtzsv said:
I was going to post that reply because that is exactly what I did. Reassembled the fork, compressed it and gave it one more try and sure enough, the bolt broke free. When I got the bolt removed, i found that there was an ample supply of Red Loctite on the threads. I have moved on to the other fork and got the lower leg removed but now the top bolt is locked tight: so tight I am starting to round out the recessed allen head. I have to assume there is a lot of loctite on those threads also. So I guess the next question is...

Does anyone have a sure fired trick to loosen up some loctite? I am thinking it is time to heat things up, but figured I get some other opinions first and it was getting too cold to do any more work.
Click to expand...
Heat in its right amount wouldn't hurt I would hit the head of the bolt slowly and let the heat transfer thru.Make sure you got a wrench to fit snugly before starting.
 
Success and I didn't have to use any heat. A little tapping all around the tube cap and a little swearing... well alright, a lot of swearing when the allen wrench slipped. Then as soon as a drop of blood was on the tube the cap came right off. I hope that isn't a sign of things to come.
 
brianinpa":3pt101ad said:
Then as soon as a drop of blood was on the tube the cap came right off.
Click to expand...


:headscratch: hmmmm....using blood as a penetrant....I never thought of that. I'll have to give that a shot sometime..... :smilie_happy:
Glad ya got it apart, anyway. If we dint shed a little plasma, and make up a few new werds every time we werked on these things, it wouldn't be near as much FUN..... :mrgreen:
 
Actually the blood sacrifice is for the Shop Gods appeasement..;)

As to the special werdz...remember,these ole gals came from Japan,not Tennessee,so sometimes they don't"savvy" Merican;....The wondeful thing is the Interwebs can teach ya ta cuss in Japanese :)

When heat is needed and flame is not,Don't forget your soldering gun(not pencil,GUN) or you can heat a steel rod/bolt etc red hot and transfer the heat by contact :mrgreen:

PPS: DOH"Threaddate" :(
 

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