Kawasaki KZ650 cafe-racer. Front fork.

After I finished with front fender, I decided to tidy front end. I started from front fork. It’s 41mm fully adjustable (spring preload, compression damping and rebound damping) front fork from 1995 Kawasaki ZX6R. I already modified it to fit Honda CBX550 front wheel >>

This time I had to sandpaper and polish outer  tubes before I could repack front fork with new bushings, oil and dust seals and so on and so forth. Thus, firstly I disassembled it:

Then I cleaned insides of outer tubes and completely sealed them, as I didn’t wish to get channels  of rebound damping adjuster to be filled with abrasive compound.

I also sealed the very rebound  adjuster and pin that pressed into the body of tube and fixed this adjuster. The pin is made of steel and is zinc plated. If I left it uncovered I could sandpaper pin by the chance; and bare steel, as it’s well known,  is vulnerable to rust.

During sandpapering I also rounded all edges on outer tube. Then I polished tubes. Even if  I didn’t make front fork to look more vintage,  I definitely improved its design.  But let’s proceed to photos. I’ll post them in pairs “before and after”, to eliminate the difference caused by my work. We’ll start with couple of general views:

Kawasaki front fork Kawasaki front forkThen let’s continue with more close photos.

Kawasaki front fork Kawasaki front fork Kawasaki front forkOn photo below you may see the pin of rebound adjuster I  mentioned earlier. I left area around it untouched. However, as you also may see, I removed protrusions that fix position of speedometer gear housing, as I  don’t need in them.

Kawasaki front forkAnd sure, here are some additional photos:

Kawasaki front fork Kawasaki front fork Kawasaki front fork Kawasaki front forkUnfortunately, it turned out that I  didn’t order new copper washers and new oil seal snap rings in advance, so it would be good two weeks before I  would assemble front fork.

 

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1 Comment

  1. Claw

    Gazzz Garage
    Polishing&Custom
    WorkS
    🙂

    Reply

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