When Pippa went for her MOT the other day, she got an advisory that her suspension linkage bush would need replacing soon. Basically the swingarm should only have very little up-and-down movement when the bike is on the centre stand. And Pippa’s seemed a bit loose. Something to sort while still in the comfort of our own garage we thought.

provisions for a hards day’s work 🙂

But of course there are three bushes, not just one. To replace all including the relevant pin-bearings costs more than 100 quid! So the trusted Motorworks expert recommended to take the bolts out of the bushes one by one and see which is still jiggling around more than it should. Easier said than done! So Pippa propped up with some stones, and the bolts cleaned a bit so we can actually see what we are unscrewing!

So we took the entire sort of triangular part that contains the three bushes off the bike

and degreased and cleaned and cleaned and cleaned everything.

Thing is, it all looked fine to us. A quick chat with Dave Wilkins confirmed we should check that the bushes are unmarked and smooth (Aidan polished them and they were perfect and shiny), and that all the little pins are still round and in their place (which they were). A good re-grease with some lithium grease should do the trick.

A quick trip to Halfords across the road and £6.95 later we smeared as much grease as would fit on the bearings and bushes and put it all back together. Did we imagine it or did the swingarm now move a tiny bit less? Oh well, it did look all good and healthy on the inside so we’ll leave it for now. It’s not moving that much so no point throwing lots of money at it now… we’ll deal with it when it comes 🙂

We then performed the same procedure on Seven. A lot of cleaning, greasing and tightening bolts later Seven’s swingarm did not move at all. Result 🙂