mylovelyhorse
Registered user
Over a month ago the F800GS failed its MOT because the steering head bearings were notchy and the front brakes were binding. I decided that I'd do almost all the repairs myself over a few weekends. It hasn't quite worked out as I'd thought.
Firstly I removed the front brake pads, setting them and associated pins etc. aside for re-use. Next the calipers came off. Because of the braided hoses I couldn't pinch off the brake hoses to prevent leaks so I wrapped the ends of the hoses in several small plastic bags and zip-tied them shut. The calipers went off for a thorough rebuild, new pistons and seals etc. I'm more comfortable with an expert doing the actual calipers than me.
Front wheel out, the next job was to dismount the handlebars and partially dismantle the fairing in order to get the forks out. They were set aside for a thorough cleaning and onward with removing the yokes so I could remove the existing steering head bearings. The top set came off really easily. The inner race of the lower set were so effing difficult I ended up using a Dremel to cut it off the stem. That's after a week of daily soaking with GT85, use of a blowtorch, a cutting disk on an angle grinder and a steel chisel. I reckon that despite having had a number of bearing changes at the dealers, that bottom one may well be the original - it was fair welded into place.
Still, I had a valid excuse to buy an angle grinder and then a Dremel & tool acquisition is never a bad thing, so it wasn't all bad
Seeing as I could easily do so, I fitted a new set of wheel bearings. The ones in there seemed OK still, but after 55k there's no harm in popping in a new set. The retaining circlip on one side (why only one side?) was a pain to remove with my very shonky old circlip pliers so I nipped down to my local Screwfix and got a new set for £notalot. After that the wheel bearings themselves came out pretty easily. As the replacements had been in the freezer for a week by this point, the new ones went in easily too.
I got the new steering head bearings in place after a bit of messing about. Getting the new outer race into place on the underside of the steering head was a bit iffy. The bike was up on a pair of axle stands propped under the sump guard. I felt a bit insecure going under the slightly wobbly front end to bang it into place...
After I'd cleaned up the forks and all the other removed bits and bobs, I applied the full tube of grease that came with the bearings to the upper and lower inner races and refitted the stem & yokes. Next the handlebars went back on and the forks went in one by one. They are supposed to be 7.9mm proud of the top yoke. Ha! They got what I thought looked right
Once the front end was back together (except the calipers) I got the bike out of the garage and gave the back end a right good cleaning. Back in the garage I put it on the centre stand ready to overhaul the rear end. As you'll know the GS is mildly front heavy. This was a right old pain in the wossnames when I was working on the front end but very handy indeed for the back.
Out came the rear wheel, spaces, sprocket carrier and brake assembly. Onto the floor fell the chain so task #1 was to use a couple of zip ties to hold that up and contained. Next I started a thorough degreasing of the underside of the swinging arm & all the bits that are really hard to get to with the wheel in. I used up an awful lot of cleaning solution and cloths on that, I can tell you.
Out came a couple of circlips. I don't know why these things aren't stainless steel but there you go. Both had corroded badly, one was really rusted in and I had to soak it in penetrating fluid (I prefer GT85 to WD40 but you get the idea) for a fair while before it would come out. I guess this is what happens when you clean the rear wheel hub with a pressure washer, folks! Much more of a pain was that I couldn't get any of the three rear wheel bearings out. The one on the sprocket carrier was especially rusted into place.
Out came the can of GT85 again and onto the bench went the sprocket carrier for a week of daily soakings. I tried heating it with a blow torch. No movement, although I discovered that remnants of GT85 will burn quite amusingly. I took some advice and got a heat gun to warm the carrier more effectively. No movement. Eventually I took it to the local place that does tyres for us. His 30 tonne press got the fscker out
All the while the rear wheel had been on some blocks of wood (to avoid damaging the rear disk) and I'd been spraying the much less corroded but still stuck bearings daily. I've used up a whole can of GT85 now! These bearings did come out, after a fair bit of toeing about. I haven't got a proper tool for this sort of thing and they're a bit expensive so I used an old, disposable long screwdriver against the back of the inner race to push them out. Once the first set had given in the others were easy. I cleaned the hub up and used some really fine emery cloth to just smooth down the bearing receiving surfaces & the groove for the circlip (again, why only one side?). The new bearings went in easily, as did the new circlip.
Next I turned my attention to the sprocket carrier assembly. First I un-bolted the sprocket from the carrier. Both sprocket and carrier got a good clean - you can imagine how much gunk was on them. Then I used my new heat gun to thoroughly warm up the centre of the sprocket carrier. The new bearing came out of the freezer and popped right into place. After this I cleaned up the rear wheel - I'd forgotten how good WD40 on a rag is at removing oily residues. The old cush rubbers were a bit rubbish so I invested in a new set. I applied a smear of grease to the top lip and side of each rubber where the splines on the sprocket carrier go just to make reassembly a bit easier and in went the sprocket carrier assembly.
Then rear brake caliper (pads removed) got a good going over. I used proper brake cleaner spray & a scrubbing brush for this. At least this caliper is in good order - probably because I rarely use the rear brake. I cleaned up the back surfaces of the pads (which were relatively new), pad retaining pin and the various spring plates and got ready to reassemble.
And so after winding the wheel adjustment bolts all the way in (I want to set if from fresh) and with the axle cleaned and greased, I set about re-inserting the rear wheel. I got it all in (what a pain that is) and then I remembered that the caliper won't go back onto the mounting plate with the wheel in place so out it all came again. I slathered the back of the pads with copper grease, popped them into the caliper, fitted the retaining pin and slid the caliper onto the sliding plate. Then I put the wheel back in and this time the (freshly greased) axle went in and stayed there. For the first time in ages the GS has 2 wheels.
Tonight I shall clean & lightly lube the chain, refit the Scotoiler hose and injector, set the rear wheel alignment and chain tension and fit the chain guard. At that point all I'll need is the front calipers and it'll be MOT time
But I've not got the front calipers back as yet. The place doing the refurb haven't got any pistons that will fit and Brembo won't supply them. They're having to have them made and for no obvious reason that seems to be taking a VERY long time. So far that's been sort of to my advantage but now I have a pretty much ready bike that just needs the front brakes...
Firstly I removed the front brake pads, setting them and associated pins etc. aside for re-use. Next the calipers came off. Because of the braided hoses I couldn't pinch off the brake hoses to prevent leaks so I wrapped the ends of the hoses in several small plastic bags and zip-tied them shut. The calipers went off for a thorough rebuild, new pistons and seals etc. I'm more comfortable with an expert doing the actual calipers than me.
Front wheel out, the next job was to dismount the handlebars and partially dismantle the fairing in order to get the forks out. They were set aside for a thorough cleaning and onward with removing the yokes so I could remove the existing steering head bearings. The top set came off really easily. The inner race of the lower set were so effing difficult I ended up using a Dremel to cut it off the stem. That's after a week of daily soaking with GT85, use of a blowtorch, a cutting disk on an angle grinder and a steel chisel. I reckon that despite having had a number of bearing changes at the dealers, that bottom one may well be the original - it was fair welded into place.
Still, I had a valid excuse to buy an angle grinder and then a Dremel & tool acquisition is never a bad thing, so it wasn't all bad
Seeing as I could easily do so, I fitted a new set of wheel bearings. The ones in there seemed OK still, but after 55k there's no harm in popping in a new set. The retaining circlip on one side (why only one side?) was a pain to remove with my very shonky old circlip pliers so I nipped down to my local Screwfix and got a new set for £notalot. After that the wheel bearings themselves came out pretty easily. As the replacements had been in the freezer for a week by this point, the new ones went in easily too.
I got the new steering head bearings in place after a bit of messing about. Getting the new outer race into place on the underside of the steering head was a bit iffy. The bike was up on a pair of axle stands propped under the sump guard. I felt a bit insecure going under the slightly wobbly front end to bang it into place...
After I'd cleaned up the forks and all the other removed bits and bobs, I applied the full tube of grease that came with the bearings to the upper and lower inner races and refitted the stem & yokes. Next the handlebars went back on and the forks went in one by one. They are supposed to be 7.9mm proud of the top yoke. Ha! They got what I thought looked right
Once the front end was back together (except the calipers) I got the bike out of the garage and gave the back end a right good cleaning. Back in the garage I put it on the centre stand ready to overhaul the rear end. As you'll know the GS is mildly front heavy. This was a right old pain in the wossnames when I was working on the front end but very handy indeed for the back.
Out came the rear wheel, spaces, sprocket carrier and brake assembly. Onto the floor fell the chain so task #1 was to use a couple of zip ties to hold that up and contained. Next I started a thorough degreasing of the underside of the swinging arm & all the bits that are really hard to get to with the wheel in. I used up an awful lot of cleaning solution and cloths on that, I can tell you.
Out came a couple of circlips. I don't know why these things aren't stainless steel but there you go. Both had corroded badly, one was really rusted in and I had to soak it in penetrating fluid (I prefer GT85 to WD40 but you get the idea) for a fair while before it would come out. I guess this is what happens when you clean the rear wheel hub with a pressure washer, folks! Much more of a pain was that I couldn't get any of the three rear wheel bearings out. The one on the sprocket carrier was especially rusted into place.
Out came the can of GT85 again and onto the bench went the sprocket carrier for a week of daily soakings. I tried heating it with a blow torch. No movement, although I discovered that remnants of GT85 will burn quite amusingly. I took some advice and got a heat gun to warm the carrier more effectively. No movement. Eventually I took it to the local place that does tyres for us. His 30 tonne press got the fscker out
All the while the rear wheel had been on some blocks of wood (to avoid damaging the rear disk) and I'd been spraying the much less corroded but still stuck bearings daily. I've used up a whole can of GT85 now! These bearings did come out, after a fair bit of toeing about. I haven't got a proper tool for this sort of thing and they're a bit expensive so I used an old, disposable long screwdriver against the back of the inner race to push them out. Once the first set had given in the others were easy. I cleaned the hub up and used some really fine emery cloth to just smooth down the bearing receiving surfaces & the groove for the circlip (again, why only one side?). The new bearings went in easily, as did the new circlip.
Next I turned my attention to the sprocket carrier assembly. First I un-bolted the sprocket from the carrier. Both sprocket and carrier got a good clean - you can imagine how much gunk was on them. Then I used my new heat gun to thoroughly warm up the centre of the sprocket carrier. The new bearing came out of the freezer and popped right into place. After this I cleaned up the rear wheel - I'd forgotten how good WD40 on a rag is at removing oily residues. The old cush rubbers were a bit rubbish so I invested in a new set. I applied a smear of grease to the top lip and side of each rubber where the splines on the sprocket carrier go just to make reassembly a bit easier and in went the sprocket carrier assembly.
Then rear brake caliper (pads removed) got a good going over. I used proper brake cleaner spray & a scrubbing brush for this. At least this caliper is in good order - probably because I rarely use the rear brake. I cleaned up the back surfaces of the pads (which were relatively new), pad retaining pin and the various spring plates and got ready to reassemble.
And so after winding the wheel adjustment bolts all the way in (I want to set if from fresh) and with the axle cleaned and greased, I set about re-inserting the rear wheel. I got it all in (what a pain that is) and then I remembered that the caliper won't go back onto the mounting plate with the wheel in place so out it all came again. I slathered the back of the pads with copper grease, popped them into the caliper, fitted the retaining pin and slid the caliper onto the sliding plate. Then I put the wheel back in and this time the (freshly greased) axle went in and stayed there. For the first time in ages the GS has 2 wheels.
Tonight I shall clean & lightly lube the chain, refit the Scotoiler hose and injector, set the rear wheel alignment and chain tension and fit the chain guard. At that point all I'll need is the front calipers and it'll be MOT time
But I've not got the front calipers back as yet. The place doing the refurb haven't got any pistons that will fit and Brembo won't supply them. They're having to have them made and for no obvious reason that seems to be taking a VERY long time. So far that's been sort of to my advantage but now I have a pretty much ready bike that just needs the front brakes...
