| Author | Message | ||
     Jdugger |
Who's got 'em? | ||
| Xl1200r |
Why? | ||
| Jdugger |
Mine are kinda getting sticky and old at 40,000 miles. Figured I'd upgrade since I'm going to be replacing them anyway. Ever ridden a bike with a tapered bearing? Smoooooooooth. | ||
| Xl1200r |
I know going to tapered bearings was the hop setup back in the day (like on my '64 Sportster)... I just kind of assumed that all bikes already had them. | ||
| Hughlysses |
I assume you mean tapered roller bearings as opposed to ball bearings. I'm pretty sure your bike's already got them. I did a conversion on my 1983 Honda Ascot, but I think anything newer than about 1990 already has tapered roller bearings on the steering stem. Maybe you just need new bearings and races. | ||
| Stevej |
a lot of manufacturers are going back to ball bearings for the head stock as they say it provides smoother steering. I have ridden two bikes one with one setup and the other with the other and could not tell any difference. The older bikes all had them I think, I know my old 73' Kaw Z1 900 had them and I converted it over to tapered rollers and man you should have seen all those balls falling out when I pulled the lower tree and stem out. one of them got lost but it turned up resting on top of one of the 4-1 head pipes. | ||
| Avc8130 |
According to the owners manual the 1125 has sealed ball bearings in the steering head. ac | ||
| Ccryder |
Nope there are still a mix. My 04' ST1300 had ball bearings and I replaced them with tapered roller, could not tell any difference. My 00' X1 at 20,000 miles started getting where it didn't want to turn. I jacked up the front end and you could really tell that they had brinneled. A new set cured all those issues. In my experience you can usually tell when they start going bad. |
