HW's Inaugural Maintenance

[Hayabusa Wannabe]

I was wondering the other day how this project was going; what else do you have left to do to it now?

Subtract stripping the bike, pulling the fork, draining the oil, changing the coolant, and swapping the stator cover. Remaining is a lot. I deliberately did not iterate little upgrades I am doing to introduce some surprise to the gang.

I have a tuned fork. This next step has been waiting: install the fork, mount the tires, mount the wheels, and drop the bike to compress the spring to get a shock bolt past the frame to remove it. I wish I would have done that first but there was no indication in anything that I read that some load is required.

 

[sixpack577]

Subtract stripping the bike, pulling the fork, draining the oil, changing the coolant, and swapping the stator cover. Remaining is a lot. I deliberately did not iterate little upgrades I am doing to introduce some surprise to the gang.

I have a tuned fork. This next step has been waiting: install the fork, mount the tires, mount the wheels, and drop the bike to compress the spring to get a shock bolt past the frame to remove it. I wish I would have done that first but there was no indication in anything that I read that some load is required.

Can you not just lower the swingarm down on to a stool, chair, block of wood, or anything to compress the shock?
Or just push the wheel into the swingarm and slide the axle through it, you don't need to reassemble it all.
If there is no tire on the wheel, put a towel down to prevent scratches, but it won't harm the wheel, it is rigid enough not to bend without a tire on it.

 

[Hayabusa Wannabe]

Can you not just lower the swingarm down

I tried this with blocks but the bike is pivoting on the Skylift LOL. Imagine a Three Stooges episode where one tries to compress the back but rotates the bike forward, then back, then forward, scratches their heads, then Moe slaps us all.

The wheels are not bare but have the old tires so I plan to do the tire changes next. It seems to make sense at this point.