Bleedin seals

Post by **Gwyn** » 21 Sep 2007, 14:42

Just come back from a little road trip and one of the fork seals seam's to be weeping slightly

I have read somwhere that you can use a small sized feeler gauge to clean any sh** out of the seal to stop a small leak. Any info on how to go about this would be much appreciated

Cheers Gwyn

slider · Post by **slider** » 21 Sep 2007, 15:46

never heard of that as a remedy but if its already weeping whats to lose??

Post by **Jonorow** » 21 Sep 2007, 16:49

i think a feeler guage is not flexable enough. what i have heared was a thin plastic film or film negative, and slide it up the fork leg into the seal and slide it around to clean any dirt out from under the seal. but if you havent been doing much dirty riding then the seal has gone. Jon

Slow Hamster · Post by **Slow Hamster** » 21 Sep 2007, 16:51

The idea is that a small bit of muck may have got wedged in the seal.

**Disclaimer**: I read this on the interweb and have never tried it. Please don't blame me if it's rubbish.

Pop the dust cover off and carefully slide the thinnest feeler guage you can find between the fork seal and the stantion to pull any bits of muck out. Be careful not to scratch the stantion.

I've also heard of folks using photographic film instead of feeler guages (and read it in a book on MX riding techniques) as this is less prone to leaving scratches.

Slow Hamster · Post by **Slow Hamster** » 21 Sep 2007, 16:53

Jon beat me to it.

A pox on the people who insist on phoning me at work when I'm trying to muck about on forums.

Post by **Jonorow** » 21 Sep 2007, 21:17

you've got the right name hamster. Slow

shudna · Post by **shudna** » 21 Sep 2007, 22:44

Yes as they say but with a liberal spray of the magic juice---WD40,or similair.
Mine on my KTM leaked slighty,released the air pressure and seem ok now.

Post by **Gwyn** » 22 Sep 2007, 08:56

Thank's for all the info guy's

I got the dust seal's off and used the thinnest feeler gauge i had(about the thickness of a gnats co**). Cleaned quite a bit of st** out of the seal's and all seam's to be ok. I'le take the bike out for a bit of a spin later and let you know whether i'v made things better or worse. What i did notice when i removed one of the dust seals (the one that was weeping slightly) was that it was packed full of grease. I think that when the stansion was warmed up with hard use, the grease was maybe melting and running down the stansion

. The other stansion had no grease packed into the dust seal and is not leaking

.
A test ride will tell. Thanks again. Gwyn

Post by **Gwyn** » 22 Sep 2007, 11:47

It worked, no more seepage (unless i eat a hot curry), jobs a good un