Grease every two years

[Guest]

My 1980 550 manual says, in the periodic maintenance schedule, to grease every two years the wheel bearings, speedometer gear housing, steering stem bearings, and "swinging" arm bearings. It does not say how to do this.

It looks like a lot of work to get to the swinging arm bearings. Any advice? Any tips on any of these would be appreciated.

My bike is looking and running good and I have time, but once the snow is gone it's going to be next winter before I take the rear wheel off.

Steve

[BassCliff]

Hi,

Feel free to download a full factory manual from my site. It should help you with those tasks. You'll also find pictorial guides for wheel bearings, front wheel removal (your speedometer gear is on the left side of the axle), etc. Keep us informed.


Thank you for your indulgence,

BassCliff

[SqDancerLynn1]

Steering stem Grease - Requires removal of the forks
Front wheel brgs--- sealed Replace if needed
Swing arm bearings can be greased ! With all the work required I would replace them. With a little work you could install a grease fitting in the swing arm,,

[Steve314159]

Thank you for your replies. I guess I knew there was no easy way to do any of this. I just couldn't figure out why the manual would say grease the swing arm bearings when it looked like you had to take the whole back end apart to do it. I will do all of this next winter. Still have only ridden 1 mile on the resto.

[Clone]

The 83 I have has a zerk on the steering head so I can shoot grease in from there, be careful as to how much you put in as I found out that it will continually leak out on hot days if you put too much in, big blue gobs of grease on the fender are unattractive.
The sealed bearings you buy have very little grease in them, pop off one dust seal and pack them then replace the seal and put them in.
Maybe it is not original but there is a grease zerk on the tube for the swingarm. The biggest pain for me was dismantling the monoshock linkage to lube all the bushings.

[Suzuki_Don]

With a little work you could install a grease fitting in the swing arm,,

Just like this: