Leaking fork seal. Dangerous??

[gimmefuel]

Hey guys, this kinda sounds like a dumb question but is it safe to ride with a leaky fork seal? My right front fork is leaking and it's gonna be a little while until I can afford to have it fixed and I want to ride! So I thought I would ask you guys and get piece of mind.

[jdm5770]

May depend on just how much it is leaking...post up a pic

[Kreylyn]

Leaky seals will negatively effect the handling of your bike, and are a safety hazard. These are one of the few points that are actaully checked on a state inspection in NC.

I'll say no, it's not safe.

But then neither are motorcycles in general...

Krey

[Kfreak]

Why not just fix them? $15.00 in seals and about 2 hours of your time.

[hardlydangerous]

you will be just fine
just order new ones and change them as soon as possible....

[squiggy]

Depending on how long you wait and how much it leaks you may need to top off the fork oil because the fork oil level also governs the compression stroke.

Less oil means more air which means easier for the fork to compress and potentially bottoming out on the compression stroke.

[streebs93]

Not too much to worry about. Best thing to do is keep a rag on you while you ride so you can wipe down the fork periodically. You want to make sure you keep that fork oil off of your brake rotors and pads. Also, If its leaking really bad, I could run down onto your front tire, which could end up being a BIG problem. Your better off just getting it fixed now because it could make for more costly repairs down the road if you go down on the slick ****...

[md86]

If it dribbles onto your brakes , life COULD suck ..... And yeah , HAVING them changed is a tad pricey . Doing it yourself CAN be tricky , but if you know what you're in for and have some info prior .... I just did one on mine a few weeks ago . Took a couple hours , and woulda taken WAY less if I coulda found my makeshift seal driver , but eh .

[HemiKat]

I rode with mine leakin for awhile... didnt realize how bad it was until I replaced them. If they get really bad it not a good idea. Take the front shocks off your car and see how she handles..... Not fun.

[dragoncutlery]

order the parts dive it sparingly till they come in mine actually got worse on the way to pick up the new ones :P

[Diggity]

I did mine friday - seals and dust covers (wipers?)-- it seems like a big job but its really not...

[chadwc]

I just noticed mine are leaking pretty bad. What parts need to be replaced? just the dust seals and oil seals? How hard is it without the specialty tools?

Looking at the haynes manual it doesnt look like to bad of a job.

[md86]

Dust seals ain't necessary , and the job ain't that hard without specialty tools . Hell , only thing you really need is a seal driver , which you can MAKE with about $1 worth of PVC .... And you don't even NEED that . I did mine without . I wouldn't RECOMMEND it , but it's do-able . But you MAY have a hard time with the M6 allen in the bottom of the fork if it ain't never been removed before .

[chadwc]

Im going to go ahead and fix it myself. looking at this schematic it looks like I need two #7's, and two #5's. anything else? My dust seals look pretty messed up.

http://partsfinder.onlinemicrofiche.com/cheapcycleparts/Suzuki_OEM/SuzukiMC.asp?Type=13&A=58&B=45

I read thru the tutorial at the top of this section and it suggested new crush washers, what # are those in the diagram above?

(edited my post, had the oil seal number mixed up)

[Tmod]

Im going to go ahead and fix it myself. looking at this schematic it looks like I need two #7's, and two #3's. anything else? My dust seals look pretty messed up.

http://partsfinder.onlinemicrofiche.com/cheapcycleparts/Suzuki_OEM/SuzukiMC.asp?Type=13&A=58&B=45

I read thru the tutorial at the top of this section and it suggested new crush washers, what # are those in the diagram above?

#12 is the copper washers but I guess they could be called crush washers as well. If you are doing that you might as well do the fork bushings as well #'s 3 & 19.

Tmod