All Balls Steering Head Bearing Question

For some odd reason I knew when I issued this post this morning I would get suggestions from left to right and that's fine with me as it is what makes this forum my most favorite one to go to. If I only have 5 minutes of free time I go to this forum to see what's new and interesting because there is a wealth of knowledge here and almost no problem children or guys on ego trips. Clearly you gentlemen have accomplished this task in several ways and they must have all worked because you are here to tell me about it. Thanks to all once again!

Oh and to Warren3200gt: I will bet you all the tea in China that our Wisconsin roads are in worse condition than your UK roads. We can't get them to fill a pothole because our legislators keep stealing from the transportation fund for road repairs, but they want to increase the gas tax! If the State doesn't get federal funding help nothing gets fixed.

Rick H.

Tapered rollers need a little preload. I'd remove all play by feel and then go a smig tighter before locking down the steering neck nut.

As an aside to this project, the one issue I had was when I tightened everything up the fork covers weren't tight and could easily swivel from side to side. In my haste to order parts for this project last July I ordered a new set of fork gaskets which are rather large squared off O-rings that sit around the fork tube on top of triple tree under the fork cover guide. Once the new ones were in place everything tightened down nicely. After 40 some years of being compressed the old fork gaskets were about half the thickness of the new ones.

Rick H.

am wondering if the step where one loosens the upper triple pinch bolts and upper triple crossbolt to allow the stem to move during this adjustment procedure should be mentioned? or maybe it's too obvious for most.

Point taken on your comment, but I am not sure if this is any problem with tapered bearings. They will find their own path as you tighten them down same as a tapered wheel bearing will. In my case I over tightened the stem to make sure the races and bearings were seated and then backed the adjustment off to very loose. I then tightened it up while checking for play in the front end by pulling and pushing on the fork legs. Once the play was eliminated I tightened up the adjustment nut 1/4 turn and left it there. The front end seems solid and yet easy to turn from side to side. The final test will be on the street when weather allows.
Rick H.

I do the steering stem bearing adjustment the same way as Rick explain because the torque of the top steering screw did some final extra pressure through all parts on the top and lower bearing set.

A guy in Germany made same Special under size (- 0,05 mm) outer bearing races that will be glued into the top/lower bearing neck to prevent mis-aligned bearing to the stem position.

Scirocco wrote: A guy in Germany made same Special under size (- 0,05 mm) outer bearing races that will be glued into the top/lower bearing neck to prevent mis-aligned bearing to the stem position.

That's interesting. Do you know what he is using for glue?
Rick H.

Rick H. wrote:

Scirocco wrote: A guy in Germany made same Special under size (- 0,05 mm) outer bearing races that will be glued into the top/lower bearing neck to prevent mis-aligned bearing to the stem position.

That's interesting. Do you know what he is using for glue?
Rick H.

Sound like he's made slack fit races for the frame , fits them in with glue and assembles the bearing and yokes to self align the assembly and then lets the glue set.
Obviously in an attempt to account for any slight misalignment of the bearing bores in the frame.
I think he has too much time on his hands.

[quote="zed1015" post=816678...........I think he has too much time on his hands.[/quote]

WAY too much time! Those bores were already quite precise from the Kawasaki factory. Ed