Do you HAVE to take apart the fork to change seal?

My forks have solid caps. Air would be hard to apply. Finding 175 psi shop air would be problematic as well. And yeah, I can see where releasing the drain screw before pressure was bled off could be interesting,.

Getting 175psi is not so hard....go to a bicycle shop and get a shock pump. The cost around $50 and can get up to 300 psi.

Thanks will remember the bike pump idea. But still getting air to the forks remains problematic. I probably will just take them apart if the cleaning the junk out of between the fork tube and seal doesn't work.

If you end up taking them apart, draining the oil at the little oil screw doesn't work very good. Instead remove the forks from the motorcycle, remove the caps, then dump out the oil. You could dump the oil without remove the fork springs & other internals, then rinse the innards with some solvent. After adding the solvent, reinstall the caps so you can rotate the forks to get a good rinsing. Doing the forks can be one of the worst jobs, but rinsing should make it less so. Even then, it can still be a mess, so have plenty of rags & newspaper at hand.

The mess is probably the reason for a shop estimate of $200.00 to replace the stinking fork seals.

Yeah, really, the work is pretty easy. It's the oil covering everything that sucks. Pumping the oil out of the drain screw is messy, like mentioned, unless you have a really good way to catch it. It dribbles out and shoots out depending on what you're doing.

An update....I thought I would try using a thin piece of plastic and cutting myself a seal cleaner. The problem is the leaking seal is hard and I can't slip the tool in between the seal and the fork tube. I am pretty sure there is junk affecting the seal. When I pulled the rubber fork cover up, on the leaky side there was a bunch of junk down inside with the C ring and the washer. Actually it was nasty. The other side the non leaking side was clean under the boot.

I've never paid to much attention to the forks as long as there were no leaks. In my travels in the FSM, I discover the fork oil should be changed every 60000 miles. I also purchased a set of progressive fork springs to be included on the seal change.

My question is this: what are people using to measure the fork oil level when adding new fork oil? Thanks, Tim

Z1Driver wrote: .....................
I've never paid to much attention to the forks as long as there were no leaks. In my travels in the FSM, I discover the fork oil should be changed every 60000 miles. ....................

My question is this: what are people using to measure the fork oil level when adding new fork oil? Thanks, Tim

Fork oil should be changed every 6,000 miles, not every 60,000 miles.

I made a simple measuring rod for adjusting the fork oil level in my bike. See images below. Ed

Amazingly Ed, I came up with an almost identical set up. Then I thought perhaps my invention would displace too much oil. So now what I'm thinking is making a vacuum hose the correct length and use a Mity Vac to suck the oil level to the correct level. This would mean of course and over fill to start with. Another friend suggested going to a Junk Yard and picking a long engine oil or transmission oil dip stick. Still trying to figure that one out. I like the idea of using a washer to keep the what ever from going down the tube. The 60000 was a typo, I meant 6000 miles.

The FSM for my C14 doesn't suggest changing fork oil. I had it do when she went in for a valve adjust and some other things I wanted done. The service manager said the only time they had heard of changing the fork oil on a C14 was when it had a seal leak.

I also know the old forks can have some pretty nasty looking fork oil where as I was told the fork oil in the 14 was still pretty clean.

Suzuki sells a neat tool for setting the level of your fork oil. You overfill the fork leg slightly, insert tool set at the prescribed oil level, and suck the excess oil out!!! Quick and easy way of setting your fork oil level. Fork leg should be perpendicular to the ground for a super accurate measurement.

Looks like Pro Motion and a couple of others make something very similar for less than $20.00. I think my trying to figure it out has ended. Thanks Tim

OK I give up...what size socket is used to hold the nut on the inside so the Allen bolt can be removed? Forks are off. oil dumped out. Now trying to finish disassembly. I've tried everything from 12 to 19 with no joy. I can see the darn nut but nothing seems to want to fit.