Anybody who's changed their fork oil know how to remove shock caps for refilling?

[Semi-retired]

I've drained the old oil.....purchased the new.....got myself a nice 60cc veterinarian's syringe and a beautiful, made-to-measure plastic tube that fits ON the syringe and IN the hole at the top of the shock where I removed the schrader valves (the ones with the valve stems for pumping in the 4-6lb, whatever air pressure).......but do you think that oil is going in there!!!??? NOT ON YOUR LIFE!!!

 

So, that's it. I'm taking charge of the situation and WILL remove the top of the shocks and simply POUR that oil in those suckers.............just as soon as one of you guys tells me how to get the caps off the shocks!

 

Anyone........anyone.......???

[ragtop69gs]

To get the caps off you need to loosen the upper tree pinch bolts.

[Marcarl]

To get the caps off you need to loosen the upper tree pinch bolts.

 

Now how did you find that out???

[Semi-retired]

To get the caps off you need to loosen the upper tree pinch bolts.

 

Yes, Jay...as Carl ponders......wondering where you heard that, because I don't think it's correct.

 

I read somewhere that you can just "put an open-end wrench to them".....which I DID (a 19mm) and they did come loose.

 

The problem is, I could hear the springs "below" turning in the fork body (which made me start thinking about them blowing across the room and how hard it would be to push and thread them back in at the same time)....AND the caps were looking as though the fairing might interfere with their removal before being totally unthreaded......so, I stopped.

 

So......I Chose another route. Tightened the cap I'd loosened, then just removed the valve-stems from the Schrader valves......poured the new fork oil into the body of my bicycle pump and "pumped" it into the forks, slowly, giving time for the oil to run down into the shock bodies before removing the pump hose.

 

I think that did the trick. I'll know for sure tomorrow when I put the front wheel back on....lower the bike off the jack....put a few pounds of air into the forks.....then bounce up and down on the front end!!

[djh3]

Its a slow process to get oil in. You have to remember to get XX amount of fluid in, that much air has to come out. And if you dont have a vent for that air it aint goin in.

[Marcarl]

Hey Mike,,,, pump the shocks before you put the air in.

[Semi-retired]

Hey Mike,,,, pump the shocks before you put the air in.

Good call, Carl.........will do......thanks! (And thanks for all your moral support yesterday.......and same thing to Freebird! Sometimes these 869lb monsters can be intimidating.)

[Semi-retired]

Its a slow process to get oil in. You have to remember to get XX amount of fluid in, that much air has to come out. And if you dont have a vent for that air it aint goin in.

Yeah.......that's what had ME spooked about the process, too. Initially, it doesn't seem to make sense that you should be able to "displace" air with oil......unless you've got a "bleeder" hole or "way out" for the air that's already in there.

 

However, chatting with Marcarl about it, we both concluded (correctly, as it turns out) that while you're pumping in the oil (with a tire pump in my case), yes, you ARE creating pressure while you pump in the oil........but, it DOES go in.

 

So, what you do is, pump the oil IN......(and you can actually get about 250cc, around half of the 553 cc in... at one time.) Then you just wait 15 or 20 seconds while the oil drains down lower inside the fork before you remove the pump hose to allow the air pressure out. I would guess by the phhhhhttttt that came out, that the pressure had probably built up to about 6 or 8 psi while pumping in the oil. So, once the pressure is released, you can reconnect whatever device (pump or syringe) you're using and go through the process once or twice more to get the remainder of the oil in.

 

I performed the whole "pump and release" procedure with the valve stems OUT of the Schrader valves (therefore I didn't have to press on them to release the pressure between "loads".....it just came whooshing out when I unclamped the pump hose) but I imagine it could have been done equally effectively with the valve stems IN.

 

Still have to put my wheel back on this morning.....pump the front end up and down....then add some air, to see how things are working......but, I know ONE thing for sure: that oil is IN THERE.......cause it's not all over my garage floor!! :-)

[djh3]

Valve core out is best. Less restriction to flow of oil. Plus you dont have to hold them down any way to bleed air out or get oil in. Sure is a dang small hole to work with though. I thought about pulling them out (the brass looking piece) and hope had a bigger hole to bleed thru.

[BratmanXj]

I used a mighty-vac with an inline canister to add about 100cc a shot. Pull about 4-5 psi of vacuum on the front forks, invert the canister and let the vacuum pull the oil into the front forks through the (de-cored) schrader valve