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Dont you love them??

One of the fork seals has gone on my bike, today i went about taking the fork leg off for the local bike shop. Everything went fine and dandy untill i come to undo the 4 bolts, or in my case, allen bolts that hold the carbon fibre mudguard in place. Got the allen key on, didnt even budge, gave it some more and still didnt move. Tried a nice quick sharp tug to see if i could 'shock it off' and the giraffe rounded out! :smt013 The next three also followed suit :smt013

So, i want to get the leg in the shop tonight, im sat out in the rain with a tool set but nothing that really going to help me remove the bolts. Tried some of my Torx bits no luck, dont have a drill either. Ok, i hate the thought of cutting the mudguard, there must be some other way. Mole grips, except theres not eoungh protruding to get a grip

f*** IT! Got the cutters out and started hacking away That cost me 80 quid when i bought it, and it was made by ART too, so no chance of getting another.

I did finally manage to get the bolts out tho with the mole grips but my god they were in there, nice white/green powder came out with them too, so im guessing the stainless steel and aluminium have reacted and corroded themselves to one another. Strange thing is i only had them out a year ago to do the fork seals, and i usually stick a good dollop of copper grease

Pissed off i am tonight

bugger

ahh man that's harsh. But it looks like you could fit it again. It won't be perfect, but will do. And at least you'll have new fork seals. Look at the positives! lol
My rear mudguard did the same. And like you I gave it a good helping of grease not long before.

Anyway, 400's have more character with scars. It's like the Millennium Falcon - it's tatty, but still fast.

Best buy a drill though for future. Even a sh*t B&Q 99p special will do most jobs. (so long as it's not battery).

Yeah its not all bad, as you say it will go back on again its just bloody irritating i had to ruin a perfectly good piece of bodywork. Lesson learnt tho, im using bolts next time!

A bit of heat from a mini blowtorch on the alloy usually works for me.

Rob, how are holding the front up ? i see bricks, can you explain and post a pic please fella

Cheers

The green white powder is the remains of your copper grease............................... copper oxide is green....................go look at a copper dome on a church or public building it's green........................

You had three metals in there copper. stainless and aluminium....................a bad mixture I suspect.Throw in a bit of road grime AND winter salt and it is no surprise that the bolts siezed could even be that you created a little battery in there and had some electrolitic action going on........................regular waterproof grease would have been a better choice

cargo wrote:The green white powder is the remains of your copper grease............................... copper oxide is green....................go look at a copper dome on a church or public building it's green........................

You had three metals in there copper. stainless and aluminium....................a bad mixture I suspect.Throw in a bit of road grime AND winter salt and it is no surprise that the bolts siezed could even be that you created a little battery in there and had some electrolitic action going on........................regular waterproof grease would have been a better choice

+1

i use moly grease on parts like that .... well i do now .... been there with the swearing and snapping too many times.

the downpipes are sat on top of a pile of bricks while the back end is proped up with a paddock stand to stop it falling over Was going to borrow Carlingboy's set of paddock stands, but he sold em with his bike

I suspected that the two metals produced what is called the 'seebeck effect' in electronics. Two differing metals produce an electric current (due to spare electrons filling spare holes in the other metal), and in this case caused the buggers to seize together, thats why they dont mix ally and stainless ends on brake lines, isnt it. Right you are that copper turns green cargo, didnt occur to me at the time that thats what the green was, but of course thats exactly what it is!

You mention molly greae, i do have some, at my mums, which i drove to monday night and got back incredibly late (and ended up with 4 hours sleep), which i saw while there, and didnt think to bring here. Homer bloody Simpson!

Live n learn, live n learn.