Warren
2
Am I correct that you have to remove the forks to change the fork oil? I am not able to see a drain plug in the forks.
Changing Fork Oil
- Thread starter Warren
- Start date
elizilla
Guest
No drain hole. You could use a mityvac to suck the oil out, but if you go that route you won't be getting things cleaned out very well, so it's probably best to just remove the forks.
OP
OP
Warren
2
Add another thing to the list of maintenance hassles Honda gave us. I might try the mityvac angle since I have one and the fork oil should be fairly clean at this stage.
elizilla
Guest
No bike I have worked on that was made since the 1980s, has had fork oil drain holes. It seems to have gone out of fashion.
I have used the mityvac trick and not really felt it did a good job. Last time I did it, I bought an extra bottle of fork oil and used it to rinse the inside of the forks, and sucked that out as well. But I really should have taken the forks off. I just put it off because I find it a difficult job to do alone. The bike is suspended in some precarious way, and then it takes a lot of strength to yank the darn forks off, and I am not strong enough to hold both bike and forks and pull them apart - instead I have to pull on the forks with all my weight, and count on whatever mechanism is suspending the bike, to hold it. I'm always afraid of sending it all crashing down, perhaps on top of myself.
So I miss having the drain hole. OTOH, I suspect that the reason they don't have 'em any more, is because they don't get things much cleaner than the mityvac trick does. When I have taken the forks apart, a lot of the moss that grows inside of forks is stuck to the various parts, even after the oil is all drained. Disassembling and cleaning is better.
I have used the mityvac trick and not really felt it did a good job. Last time I did it, I bought an extra bottle of fork oil and used it to rinse the inside of the forks, and sucked that out as well. But I really should have taken the forks off. I just put it off because I find it a difficult job to do alone. The bike is suspended in some precarious way, and then it takes a lot of strength to yank the darn forks off, and I am not strong enough to hold both bike and forks and pull them apart - instead I have to pull on the forks with all my weight, and count on whatever mechanism is suspending the bike, to hold it. I'm always afraid of sending it all crashing down, perhaps on top of myself.
So I miss having the drain hole. OTOH, I suspect that the reason they don't have 'em any more, is because they don't get things much cleaner than the mityvac trick does. When I have taken the forks apart, a lot of the moss that grows inside of forks is stuck to the various parts, even after the oil is all drained. Disassembling and cleaning is better.
OP
OP
Warren
2
Everything you say makes perfect sense. I have been toying with the idea of installing the Ricor Intiminator fork valves. One of the pluses is that all you have to do is drain the fork oil, remove the springs, drop in the valves and fill it back up with oil. It can all be done without removing the forks (other than the minor detail of draining the fork oil). The Race Tech gold valves on the other hand requires removing the forks to modify the fork tubes which is something I was trying to avoid. Looks like I might need to noodle on this a little more. Since my work shop is a parking lot I want to avoid major surgery when I can.
Do it, Warren! Do it! I want someone to be the guinea pig on this mod. Then find a reasonably priced replacement shock and tall us how it all works.
DirtFlier
Site Supporter
I've had Race Tech valves on two bikes now, actually the same set of valves transferred from bike-to-bike. A lot of the harshness felt over the small bumps, such as "tar snakes" or cracks in the blacktop is due to undersized compression damping holes in the standard damper rods which is solved by drilling those holes oversize and even adding two extra holes per Race Tech instructions. This allows the spring-loaded valve do its work without restrictions downsteam. I'm not sure how a true slip-in valve, such as Ricor, can solve this end of the equation.
I have been experimenting with my NT's front forks. A while back I shortened the spring spacers. I ended up 3/4 inch shorter than original. That helped but the front end still seemed harsh esp on expansion joints and such so I have now also changed the fluid to 5W instead of the 10W that comes in it originally. I have only done a short shakedown cruise on it but I think it will work much better for me. I think it is good enough that I won't consider race tech valves or other mods like them even though I'm sure they are very good stuff. Keep in mind I'm smaller than some (~155 lbs) so if you decide to make adjustments do it incrementally to get the best fit for you.
The rear suspenders are also quite harsh to me but I don't think there is much I can do with them other than replace which is pretty expensive usually. Has anyone done mods or replaced the rear shock? I would be interested in the results.
ARKNT
The rear suspenders are also quite harsh to me but I don't think there is much I can do with them other than replace which is pretty expensive usually. Has anyone done mods or replaced the rear shock? I would be interested in the results.
ARKNT
For that matter, has anyone other than ARKNT done any suspension mods? I think about the cartridge emulator and I'm sure there's a $1000 shock out there somewhere for the rear. But I really doubt if I'll do anything.
DirtFlier
Site Supporter
I have the Ricor valves plus recently changed to a Works Performance rear shock. The Ricor valves have similar performance to the Gold Valves except in one area - it knows whether the wheel is going up (over a bump) or the chassis is coming down (hard braking). Hard braking results in the fork dipping a tiny amount then it just stays there so you still have plenty of fork travel to absorb bumps.
The biggest improvement at the rear was the result of Works fitting a much softer spring than the OEM, at my request. The Showa spring was progressive but had only a short section of "soft" then it was into the "hard" which was ideal for riding 2-up
or being a heavier rider, of which I am neither. I could never bottom the Showa shock because the spring was way too strong for me and I don't purposely don't look for chances to bottom the shock but if it doesn't ever happen, that means you're not using full travel.
I'm extremely happy with the Works shock and I do have plenty of experience (all good!) with them as I've been buying their stuff since the late-70s. On my last bike, I had the Works shocks rebuilt every 40k miles and they were still going strong when I sold the bike with 102k on the odometer - all that mileage was mine since I bought the bike brand-new. Those shocks had around 85k miles so having them rebuilt on a regular basis was a good deal.
I was the first customer to ask them to build a shock for the NT700 so it took time but that was alright with me.
In regards to changing fork oil - I do it every two years and my way involves total disassembly. After two years the crud that lives in the bottom of the slider is significant and what started out as 5 wt oil looks more like 10 wt! Doing it this way to time-consuming but it saves the oil seals plus the fork bushings.
The biggest improvement at the rear was the result of Works fitting a much softer spring than the OEM, at my request. The Showa spring was progressive but had only a short section of "soft" then it was into the "hard" which was ideal for riding 2-up
or being a heavier rider, of which I am neither. I could never bottom the Showa shock because the spring was way too strong for me and I don't purposely don't look for chances to bottom the shock but if it doesn't ever happen, that means you're not using full travel.
I'm extremely happy with the Works shock and I do have plenty of experience (all good!) with them as I've been buying their stuff since the late-70s. On my last bike, I had the Works shocks rebuilt every 40k miles and they were still going strong when I sold the bike with 102k on the odometer - all that mileage was mine since I bought the bike brand-new. Those shocks had around 85k miles so having them rebuilt on a regular basis was a good deal.
I was the first customer to ask them to build a shock for the NT700 so it took time but that was alright with me.
In regards to changing fork oil - I do it every two years and my way involves total disassembly. After two years the crud that lives in the bottom of the slider is significant and what started out as 5 wt oil looks more like 10 wt! Doing it this way to time-consuming but it saves the oil seals plus the fork bushings.
The NT hasn't racked up enough miles yet for a fork rebuild but in your experience, how did the bushings look (and at what mileage) when you dismantled your forks on the NT?
I know that after 24k, the bushings are done on my Wing so I completely replace seals and bushings every 24k when I replace the fork fluid. Just wondering if the NT is as rough on the bushings or not.
Thanks!
DirtFlier
Site Supporter
No, the bushings looked fine (no shiny metal showing) when I had the forks apart two weeks ago. This is the third time I've had them apart and doing it this way, allows the bushings to be moved to a different position since they mainly wear in the fore-and-aft locations. My bike has 30k miles.
Wow! Thanks for the info. At 24k, the teflon is completely worn through on the lower bushings on my GL1800 in several spots. Looks like the NT isn't as hard on the bushings which is nice to hear.
Sun Honda finally got the bushings for my fork. I'll take it in next Thursday to let them replace the head-set bearings, seals and bushings, "install" the Triumph gaitors, and mount a new PR3 front tire.
Re: Eww..what's that stank??
I believe the bushings have a Teflon coating. As that wears, it gets deposited in the oil. I'm sure there are other things that wear in there also. How many miles do you have on the forks?
I believe the bushings have a Teflon coating. As that wears, it gets deposited in the oil. I'm sure there are other things that wear in there also. How many miles do you have on the forks?