Swingarm bearings

Cigaro · World Chat Champion Joined: 28 Mar 2007 Karma :

Hi,

I've noticed that one of the swingarm bearings on the GN seems to be frozen (can move it a tiny bit but not much) yet the other one seems to spin fine.

Also that the swingarm rattles when shaked - don't know if that means that the bearing is shagged?

Does it need replacing or can it be regreased? How do I get it out?

Cheers.

Robby · Dirty Old Man Joined: 16 May 2002 Karma :

From the symptoms you describe I would renew them. There may be a grease nipple to regrease them, if not you would need to get them mostly apart to clean and regrease.

So replace.

Bearings should be cheap, wemoto or ebay should provide some pattern ones for not much. Fitting shouldn't be difficult, unless suzuki were feeling mean when they designed your swingarm mounting.

The only tip I'll pass on is to thoroughly grease up the new bearings before fitting them, assuming them are open bearings. They will come grease a bit, but to do it properly to need to really work some grease into them. I think I used castrol CL last time, normal yellow grease. For an idea of grease volume, a taper roller bearing for a CBR6 headstock seemed to absorb about a cubic inch of grease. That's a fair bit of lubrication, cooling, and shock absorbency.