[TotalPanic]

Hi All,

As some of you might know I had a leaking rear shock on my 2005 Sprint ST. I have bought a second hand shock from ebay for AUD$230 delivered and decided to get it worked on before I put it on the bike. So I have sent it out to local motorcycle suspension specialist to get it re-valved and spring upgraded. It took 4 days and cost me AUD$501 including Eibach 850lb/in spring.

This morning it was time to put the new shock on the bike, and do a few other things while I had the tank off.

Here is how I have done this, and issues with their solutions that I came across.

First thing is to put on gloves Otherwise you will be washing your hands until next service.

Step 1: Remove the seat and seat faring and place bike on centre stand

Step2: Put something under the rear wheel to keep it up. This helps with installation of the new shock, specially if you are working on your own. And no multiple personalities don't help here either

Step3: Remove petrol tank by undoing the bolt/nut at the seat side of the tank. Lift the tank and slid it out of the front mounting hole. Now be careful. There are two tubes on right hand side of the bike that are sort of short and can be pulled off with little effort, so lean the tank onto it's right side and make at least one of them to know where it is mean to reconnect to. Disconnect the electric wires and the petrol tubes (BTW can some on clear this up for me, there are no switch on the tank to stop petrol from pouring out?). I had close to no petrol left in the tank before starting work, so I’m not sure if there will be a big loss of petrol when removing tubes, but a little drips here and there are ok. Now that tank is off, and not leaking fuel, place it on a rug somewhere.

Step4: Remove battery and battery compartment. The rear brake fluid res is connected to the battery cover with a single bolt, but you need to raise the cover to get to it.

Now you should be at this stage

Step5: Undo the top shock mounting bolt

Step6: Undo the lower shock bolt and remove the shock. Now find where did the two spacers fell or god left as you will need them latter on. While there under just a little bit the other mounting bold that connects to the triangle link

this will allow to put the new shock and spacers in without problems. Otherwise you will be just like me spending time trying to push it in without any results.

Step7: Install the new shock, remembering the lower spacer. Do up all the mounting bolts, two at the bottom and one at the top.

Cont in next post....

 

[TotalPanic]

Now that you are at this point you may want to think about changing/checking your air filter and spark plugs, because lets face it you will not be doing all this again any time soon!
In my case, 20000km, I had the air filter looking like this:

and two out of three spark plugs looked not as healthy as I would have liked them to:

Now to open the air filter top cover you have to undo all the screws around the air box including one in middle of the top cover, this one holds the filter it self as well as the cover!

To remove the rest of ait box you need to undo single bolt at the steering wheel side of the box and two bolts on the battery side of the box. When pulling the box off, take care of the air duct on the steering wheel side that goes down into the box. You will see which one i'm talking about when you are doing this.

Now pull out the spark plug cable/cover. Make sure that the rubber seal stays with the plug wire/cover and is not left stack in the spark plug hole.

Replace plugs if needed and re-install everything back.

Job is done and you can set the sag and go for a ride around you local roads to enjoy the need to upgrade your front now


Hope this will help some of you to tackle this job on your own!

Cheers,

GK

 

[oldndumb]

Great write up and good pics!

As to your question re fuel drainage. The Quick Disconnect (QD) has an internal shut off that works automatically when disconnected.

You had the sense to cover several tasks in one write up. Congrats for a job well done.

 

[lctrc]

Excellent write up!

I removed my shock just yesterday to send off for a respring/rebuild. I didn't find that I had to remove the battery though.

The tank is self-sealing when removed - no worries, just a little drip at first out of the fuel hose.

 

[KevyKev]

Nice write-up and pics! I'm betting the plug on the right is the #1 plug (looked just like mine). I noticed in your pics that your coils still have the original weather seals. If you haven't already, next time you change the plugs, upgrade to the newer weather seals for the coils. They "cover" the plug well better and hopefully alleviate some of the water seepage/rust issues with the plugs/wells. Even if they don't work any better, they were only like $9 or $10 dollars for the full set! There are some threads on here with pics too.

Kevin

 

[TotalPanic]

Thanks for the comments.

The petrol tank might be self disabling, but if you turn it up side down and then back - it will leak more fuel.

another question to the experts, does the sprint/shock have a run in period at which the sag will increase and will need more adjustment?

Thanks,
GK

 

[pushr0d]

I don't consider myself an expert, but the force your shock's spring exerts on the suspension should remain constant.

That means the 'sag' will stay the same.

However, a number of other factors, like 'stiction' of the shock piston and the various bushings and joints, may change becuase of weather, the alignment of the planets, etc. That will affect where your bike sits when at rest and when loaded.

 

[ralphus]

+1 With Pushrod

Eibach make very good quality springs therefore I wouldn't expect them to decrease in spring rate over time.

 

[DavoTheGreat]

Reviving an old thread to add some extra information. I replaced the rear shock on my 2008 Sprint ST 1050 today with a Wilbers 641 with remote preload but my bike has ABS and the module looked as though it would be in the way if attempting to lift the shock from under the fuel tank.

As it turns out there's plenty of room to remove the shock by just removing the battery box and not bothering with the fuel tank. I undid the 2 allen bolts that hold the fuel tank support onto the battery box instead of removing the long bolt that holds the tank to the bracket.

Here's a photo taken after I had removed the old shock.



I also found it easier to install the new shock as follows...

Kept the support under the rear wheel during removal though in hindsight I probably should have used something a bit thinner than a length of 4x2 as I had to drive out the bolts with a hammer and screw driver as they were far too tight to just slide out on their own.

I bolted the new shock to the bottom mount first. Then I completely removed the rear wheel support and physically lifted the rear wheel (which in turn lifted up the shock) to then align with the top mount and thread the bolt in. I found this to be much easier.

Cheers,
Dave

 

[pmass]

Reviving an old thread to add some extra information. I replaced the rear shock on my 2008 Sprint ST 1050 today with a Wilbers 641 with remote preload but my bike has ABS and the module looked as though it would be in the way if attempting to lift the shock from under the fuel tank.

As it turns out there's plenty of room to remove the shock by just removing the battery box and not bothering with the fuel tank. I undid the 2 allen bolts that hold the fuel tank support onto the battery box instead of removing the long bolt that holds the tank to the bracket.

Here's a photo taken after I had removed the old shock.



I also found it easier to install the new shock as follows...

Kept the support under the rear wheel during removal though in hindsight I probably should have used something a bit thinner than a length of 4x2 as I had to drive out the bolts with a hammer and screw driver as they were far too tight to just slide out on their own.

I bolted the new shock to the bottom mount first. Then I completely removed the rear wheel support and physically lifted the rear wheel (which in turn lifted up the shock) to then align with the top mount and thread the bolt in. I found this to be much easier.

Cheers,
Dave

Used this method today and worked like a charm. No need to remove the tank completely.

 

[Darrylt]

Easy rear shock replacement

Followed the thread on this for guidance....found it to be relatively easy to do, replaced the seized unit with a working one retrieved from breakers.
Great tips and advise
Cheers, Darrylt