:) It seems such a colossal pain to do the amount of disassembly required to re-grease the steering head and the swing arm.
I mentioned the lack of grease fittings to a friend and he said i had a 'throw away bike'. Ow! that hurt.
Has anyone installed grease fittings on the venerable GS?
What's the story, from the experienced crew here? ;)
Best quick 'n dirty advice I can give you on this is to go to an automotive suspension shop, and get their opinion. If they think it will work, and you decide to do it, remember to put a Zerk in for both the top and bottom bearing on the steering stem, and on BOTH sides of the swingarm (L & R).
You might want to keep the welding to a minimum (because of heat-warping issues), so some space-age epoxy could help.
I've seen this done on OLD racers, with mixed results. One complaint was the amount of grease dripping from the lower triple tree onto the front wheel / tire; NOT a good thing!
Here's another suggestion; throw your "friend" away, and keep the GS
no real practical way to set them up for the stearing bearings, even the custom boys dont have them. you can do it for the swingarm but it will take abit of time and planing to scout, mark, drill and thread in grease fittings
:) Thanks Guys! Good info. I guess i'll just wait till it cools off a little here in Oct. and do the disassembly necessary to grease both the steering head and the swing arm and linkages real well (with lots of high quality grease) and leave them for a couple of years! ;)