Being an old dirt biker, I decided at 3500 miles on the meter that I had better check the pivot points of the rear brake, shift lever, suspension, steering head, etc. Lo and behold, some were bone dry. Here is what I did:

To get at the shift lever pivot, I had to remove the "odd" bolt that you see the cold chisel against (I didn't have the special tool so I broke it loose with the chisel and replaced it with a standard bolt – see below).

[HML: The bolt that Paul cut off requires a Torx T-50 socket, available at Sears, most auto stores, and tools suppliers. You'll need a T-40 and a T-50 for several of the maintenance items on the FJR1300 — you should add them to your toolbox]

There are four allen head bolts to remove plus the bolt I replaced and the pinch bolt arm (at the top of the picture) which connects the linkage to the shift arm.

Behind this bubble is the pivot point which needs good quality water proof grease – here is another look at it from the other side.

There is an allen head cap screw that holds the sift lever in place on the shaft.

I also greased the heim joints on both ends of the shifter rod (here I have pulled the covering boot away to show the joint).

While on this side of the bike I took the pivot bolt for the side stand out and greased it and the sleeve. (they were bone dry from the factory).

Here is the pivot boss for the rear brake. First, remove the brake lever and the pin which connects to the brake master cylinder (see below). Next remove the two allen head bolts holding the bracket to the frame. You can then get in behind and disconnect the return spring and brake light wire. With a little patience you can now remove the brake pivot shaft and apply grease.

I also put some grease on this pin.

In order to grease the steering head bearings, I suspended the front of the bike on my (home made) pipe frame — I used a tie down around the frame member just ahead of the steering head and it just cleared the windshield

Here I have removed the triple clamp – I did have to remove the right brake cylinder to give me enough slack in the brake line and you can see that I have taped it to the right handle bar so it won’t fall on anything (incidentally, that is a rug protecting the tank). Next I unscrewed the lock nut from the steering head stem. Underneath it is a rubber ring and the second nut which applies pressure to the steering head bearings. Since Yamaha is using ball bearings here you tighten this nut just up snug – no preload as the ball bearings will dimple the race. Also you only tighten the lock nut enough to compress the rubber ring partially.

I put the front wheel on this ramp so I could control the lowering of the steering head axle.

I lowered the front wheel just enough to drop the top of the axle below the upper bearing race.

The lower bearing is exposed enough so I could add water proof grease to the bearing.

I repositioned the axle back in place (using my ramp under the front wheel), greased the upper bearing and installed it in place.

With the front end done, I moved the support frame to the back and lifted the rear of the bike high enough so that I could remove the center stand (it’s there on the floor to the left).

It took some “doing” to get the stock bolts out because of interference with the exhaust system (one has to “spring” the exhaust pipe down a smidgen to get the two bottom bolts out).  To fix it so I could take off the center stand with out disturbing the exhaust, I bought two slightly shorter bolts which are now inserted from the inside and one can get standard nuts on (using locktight) without interference with the exhaust pipe.  Once you have the center stand out, it needs grease on the pivot points.

Here you can see the upper pivot bolt which attaches the “rising rate” casting to the frame.  The only way you can get this bolt out (along with the short sleeve) is to first remove the center stand.  Inside this casting are a total of four roller bearings which need to be greased.  In my case, the upper and lower bearings were loose enough that there was discernable play in the rear wheel suspension – I replaced both bearings.

There you have it. I hope my explanation is satisfactory. Cheers - Paul

Copyright © 2002, by H. Marc Lewis. All rights reserved.