What Maintenance Should I Do To My Bike?

[andrea]

Can anyone tell me what basic maintenance a bike needs? I oil the chain and check the tyre pressures once a week.

What else should i be doing?

[Wafer_Thin_Ham]

Wash it. You should check the chain for tension if you do more than about 500 a week. Give your oil and coolant a quick glance. Thats all i do. O and check the lights work.
____________________
My Flickr

[TheShaggyDA]

For daily checks, remember "POWER" - Petrol, Oil, Water, Electrics, Rubber. Once a week, check the brakes, chain and suspension. Anything else is down to the bike's service intervals really - idle speed, sparkplug gap, air filter, oil filter, oil change, cable lube, carb synch, tappets, bearings, battery. Most of the jobs are quite straightforward, it's worth getting a Haynes manual and tackling the simpler ones yourself. Once you've done it a couple of times, you'll get the confidence to do ever increasingly difficult items. Your first oil change should pay for the cost of the manual over getting a dealer to do it
____________________
Current: CB500 Previous: CB100N, CB250RS, XJ900F, GT550, GPZ750R/1000RX, AJS M16, R100RT, Enfield Bullet

[i:6e3bfc7581]But still I fear and still I dare not laugh at the madman...[/i:6e3bfc7581]

[kawakid]

[Finglonga]

[sickpup]

Remember when you did your CBT and one of the modules was about maintenance? all that.

[wilbur]

[bin]

As already said...tyres, pressures should be checked before every trip....tread depth and condition looking for cuts blebs uneven wear take out any stones and look for nails etc.
____________________
...its what you make of it...
...Silver Suzuki gsx1400...

[kawakid]

[quote="popwud"]As already said...tyres, pressures should be checked before every trip[quote]

I ride daily, this would add at least 5 minutes to my journey.

I only do this once a week.

(Plus I have to have the car handy as I plug the pump in to the car cigarette lighter socket).

[Gazdaman]

What's wrong with a footpump you girl!

And once a week is good enough for pressures, but don't let them drop, you'd be amazed what difference a few PSi can make.

Gaz

[mr.z]

Pressures depend on the bike really, my first cx would drop the pressure a few psi every couple of weeks, this one theres no loss, even after a few months.. (shame i can't say the same about the front suspension )

Its worth doing allot of work yourself because you can know its been done right, not by some twat trying to get your bike out the way to get to the 10 others booked in, the result being a half empty sump, or screwdrivered fork legs e.t.c.

At the same time one of the reasons i chose the bike i did becuase its a pleasure to work on, if i had a modern bike i'd most likely get somebody else (that i knew personally) to sort it..
____________________
>RidingSkills<->Tech Tips<->MyBikes<

[Blau Zedong]

With a modern bike you are tied to dealers in some ways due to all the electronic fluff on them. I'm of the opinion of mr.z, I choose bikes which never need to go near a dealer as i consider them all useless untill one proves me otherwise, which I'm still waiting for.
____________________
18:54:48 Rob Fzs: jews don't give away stuff for free

18:54:59 Rob Fzs: unless its their clothes/ hair/ golden teeth

[the grim reaper]

The only thing I use dealers for are the parts that David Silver doesn't stock or that I can't get from the supplier direct. Which ain't a lot, to be honest.

A mechanic who does an oil change for £30 all in is worth knowing, IMO.

Cheers

Grim
____________________
Adverts don't always work: Remember that advert, where the army are running across the desert and they have a wounded man on a stretcher. They get to a ravine, the bridge is down and a caption pops up that says, 'What are you thinking?'. I don't know about you but I was thinking, 'Christ, I'm glad I'm not in the f***ing army'.