Cleaning fork stanchions

[Gazz]

Does anyone have any advice for cleaning corrosion from fork stanchions? I have a small bit of surface rust right at the bottom and would like to clean it up before it gets any worse. The bike just passed an MOT yesterday probably because the rust is so low on the forks as not to damage the fork seals, etc.

Also, would a set of gaiters prevent further corrosion or would they just hide possible future problems; out of sight, out of mind and all that?

[Just_James]

If it's only light surface rust you can clean it up with either some fine wire wool or a handful of scrunched up aluminium foil (works very well on chrome).

If it's more heavily rusted with deep pitting then there's no quick fix for it really.
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Current Bikes / Projects: 1999 Rieju RS1 50
Previous bikes - 1986 DT125R (field bike), 1989 KX250, 1980 KX420 (with 500cc big bore), 1992 YZ250, 1988 KX500, 1989 XR250R, 1988 VFR400R NC24, 1999 Cagiva Mito 125, 2008 Rieju RS2 50 , 1993 Honda NSR 125

[Beehive Bedlam]

It will only come back with a vengeance but if you use wire wool make sure it is super fine and use some oil with it to reduce scratches.

[Sid_The_Sloth]

I find autosol and rag works great.
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2013 Honda Shadow VT750C2B Black Spirit, 1994 CBR600 f2

[delsol]

If only light surface rust then another vote for autosol, can take a lot of time depending on how much you have to polish out.

Horizontal and vertical polishing (using your finger tip or thumb tip) to avoid chaneling, the rag needs to be changed to a clean position every time the rubbing surface of the rag turns black, so small amounts of autosol and lots of clean rag, preferably white.

I don't use any steel wool or scotchbrite etc. or anything other than polishing compounds, even fine emery is going to leave scratches that will need to be polished out.

Gaiters ? Yes deffo.

I used autosol on these fork tubes to take out minor imperfections:
https://www.bikechatforums.com/viewtopic.php?t=305725&highlight=