Fork oil seal replacement job, bushing replacement too?

I have a 2012 with 69K miles and just completed this job yesterday. I had a slight leak on one side. I figured as long as I was disassembling the forks to replace the seals I should just replace the bushings regardless of their wear status.

Turned out the visible wear was not much on the existing bushings and the slight free play I could detect when moving the fork tube and leg was not changed with new bushings.

As a result I would not recommend replacement at 25k miles.

My neighbor who has extensive dirt bike experience says don’t bother taking the fork completely apart to pull the seal. He says it was common for them to drive a screw into the seals and pull them out without disassembly and then drive the new seal in.

MNrider said:

I have a 2012 with 69K miles and just completed this job yesterday. I had a slight leak on one side. I figured as long as I was disassembling the forks to replace the seals I should just replace the bushings regardless of their wear status.

Turned out the visible wear was not much on the existing bushings and the slight free play I could detect when moving the fork tube and leg was not changed with new bushings.

As a result I would not recommend replacement at 25k miles.

My neighbor who has extensive dirt bike experience says don’t bother taking the fork completely apart to pull the seal. He says it was common for them to drive a screw into the seals and pull them out without disassembly and then drive the new seal in.

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Thanks for the info, appreciate the time and money savings.

****** Kong said:

Just to clarify, I've already purchased and used the Seal Mate tool a couple times, but these seals on my '12 still leak after a ride and just need to be replaced. My question is, should I also order a bushing replacement kit as well, or would I be good just replacing the oil seals? Only have~25k on the clock.

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Yes

Around 60,000k's those bushings DO need replacing. What happens when they wear is the bottom of the steel fork rod will start machining the inside of the aluminum fork tubes.

That's not really repairable so catching it before the wear happens is a good idea.

If you are going to do the work yourself, you may want to look at the advice shared in Doing the fork seals on my 2013 DL650 right now and Replacing Front Fork Oil Seals

I change my fork oil every 20,000 kilometres and the oil comes out nearly clean so will continue using the still original seals (@137,000km) until something leaks, but if the Vstrom is as good as my 1982 Honda CX500 EC which is still using the original fork seals and bushes at 268,000km, the Vstrom will never need a seal service at the current rate of use.

****** Kong said:

Just to clarify, I've already purchased and used the Seal Mate tool a couple times, but these seals on my '12 still leak after a ride and just need to be replaced. My question is, should I also order a bushing replacement kit as well, or would I be good just replacing the oil seals? Only have~25k on the clock.

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I would disassemble the forks (one at a time!) so that you can thoroughly clean the insides of the lowers, especially on a 10 year-old bike, 25k miles notwithstanding. Your bike has spent more time sitting than being ridden over time and there will be a little or a lot of syrupy sludge at the bottom of the fork legs. I rebuilt mine at 26k and I had one upper guide bushing with some questionable wear, but the others looked serviceable.

With the fork disassembled, clean the initial oil off of the upper and lower legs with an engine degreaser. I followed up with a boiling water bath, same as you would cleaning a rifle barrel. Wipe down immediately and follow up with a hair drier or heat gun set low to dry up the nooks and crannies. The four OEM bushings (2 each fork) total about $75, OEM seals another $50. I've used OEM parts for forks on my '17 DL650 and both of my Kawasakis, as I found Leak Proof brand seals weren't, YRMV.

Just repeating a lot of the above here, almost. Disassembly is good, get the sludge out of the bottom, be thorough.

Pony up for the OEM seals.

Regarding bushings, you just can't know til you look. I've done dozens of moto forks and many hundreds of mountain bike forks (my job). Mileage/age is not a reliable predictor. I've seen lots where 3 bushings look new and 1 is long overdue for replacement. Or vice-versa. No shortcuts. Err on the side of new parts.

NRIA Feel the fork tubes, If there is a ding as in impact deformation it will cause a ring like a moon crater. You can use a fine sharpening stone to file away the crater rim