There's some things that get overlooked on most bikes that can make a huge difference to your riding pleasure, and generally stop things from rotting.
Most of them involve grease, chain lube, and a 10mm sockets and ring spanners. Sometimes a screwdriver.
1. Lubing hand control pivot bolts. Your brake and clutch levers probably get used more than any other moving part except your throttle. Lubing the pivot bolts mean you can be more delicate with your control inputs, through a greater range of motion. These parts often don't get lubed in the factory. Typically these bolts are a 10mm head, have a sleeve that passes through the lever and pivot and can't be overtightened because the sleeve is what the nut locks against. Be aware that your levers will fall out when you take this bolt out. That's normal. Clean it up because it will be full of crap and give the mating surfaces on the lever and the pivot that is still attached to the handle bar a good clean. Meths will do the trick. Liberally coat the pivot bolt sleeve and mating surfaces with grease and reassemble. Squeeze the levers a few times and wipe off the excess grease that oozes out. They'll feel really good to use now.
2. Gear linkages. If you have rose joint type gear lever linkages, simply squirt some chain lube under the rubber covers. Try and direct the spray into the joint itself.
3. Pillion footpegs. These often just sit there doing nothing, and sometimes won't move when you go to use them, even on comparatively new bikes. A lot of the ones I've seen lately have a spring and a ball bearing that locks into a detente on a plate when you fold them up. The ball bearing is pushed partly into the hole by the spring and the ball bearing and spring are generally not corrosion resistant. Again, this is an opportunity to lube the footpeg pivot bolt when you disassemble the footpeg but be careful to catch the wee ball bearing and spring when you slide the footpeg out of the mount. Clean the spring and ball bearing up with CRC or a graphite lube spray and put them carefully to one side. Clean up the mating faces, washers, and plates that make up the footpeg mount, but remember to take note of how it all goes back together and make sure you do one at a time so you can use the other footpeg as a guide for reassembly.
4. Lube your control cables. Throttle, Choke, and Clutch. ANyone know how to do this? I have one of those cable lubing tools, that I bought in a fit of non-cable-lubing-guilt and would really appreciate it if someone could show me how to use the stupid thing. It's too small to be a useful paperweight.
Always use what looks like too much grease. You can always wipe the excess off.
I can't believe how much better the brakes and clutch feel on the Katana, what with Nudemetalz showing me how to bleed them (and doing most of the work - you should have seen the air in there!) and then me lubing all the lever pivots.
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Originally Posted by Jim2
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