Check your steering head bearings

During my new sprocket install, I decided to quit putting off pulling the steering head to inspect the bearings. I am very glad I did. The lower bearing had a decent amount of grease, but the top had almost none. If you plan on keeping your WR for a long time, I strongly suggest you tear apart the front end and check yours out as well.

Torn apart


Before regreasing




After regreasing

I looked at doing that when I had the forks out, but got lazy and didn't. It looked like there was signs of grease on the edges of the outer races so I decided to assume that they were greased. Maybe not the best choice from what you're seeing.

I don't mind taking it apart to grease the headset. I mind trying to get the bearings adjusted properly afterwards. With all the cables and crap on a motorcycle it's hard to tell if it's right, or if too tight.

is that a genuine works, factory yamaha bucket your using there... lol

g-train wrote:

is that a genuine works, factory yamaha bucket your using there... lol

No it's factory KTM, right out of the hard parts catalog. Just like mine

Where did you get the radiator cap from??

Looks like I'll be pulling my forks off again and checking the head bearings.

my bike started to squeak when steering to the stop this week, and i don't see any sign of grease around the top bearing. any pointers for doing this?

I had to replace mine within the first year.
Stock there was not enough grease.
I thought I was going to have to do it again and was cursing yamaha bearings.
Realized it was only doing it with the bars far left this time though, turned out it was the wire holder thing had come out a little and was scraping the side of the fork when the bars were turned that far left...

yeah had a look at the head bearings today... yep, dry as a bone... re-packed em, they should last now...

must be a common thing...

Just pulled mine apart, looks identical to yours.

One question...what did you use to re-torque the lowest nut on the steering stem?

The manual lists a very specific torque spec (27ft lb, loosen, then 5ft lb) so somehow I don't think "tightish" is good enough. I used a punch and hammer to loosen the nut, but don't really think the punch would be good enough to tighten it.

Thanks.

kraher.

+1 on steering head bearing condition. My lower was ok, top was nearly dry and after 700 miles of street riding, the top race is already scored a little. Packing the bearings is a good thing!!!

Mine were fine when I had them repacked at ~14k miles.

I'll probably do mine again at 15. They were a bit dry. It was the swingarm that was ugly.

You guys make for a load of work!!!!

We wanted to go on a big Oh ride today but our wild spring weather is still totally sideways. I read about the dry, upper steering head bearings so figured, if ya can't ride 'em, work on 'em...

Both of our steering stems/bearings came out lookin' like this. Not bad but the upper bearing a little dry for me and our ultra dry climate (present spring Wx excepted ) Most of the key tools for disassembly in background. (Not shown: Assemply required the addition of all three of my torque wrenches and a jury rigged crows foot spanner wrench to get the bearing preload correct.)

Stem, bearings and seals fully cleaned with solvent, then warm soapy water, dried with compressed air nozzle and slathered up with white grease. White grease has some specific properties that fit this use to a "T". Not shown: Outer bearing races in the steering head were slathered up with white grease as well.

This job wasn't as time consuming as I expected. Fortunately, I posses all the necessary tools and it helped considerably to hang the handelbars and upper triple clamp from the garage door openner track. (I unplugged the electric garage door openner just in case. )

Started about 0900hrs and both bikes were completed by 1400hrs.
So, 7 hours with some interruptions and a lunch break...

This was a three hour job for me, first time. Probably a 30 min break when I started putting it back together. Both bearings had quite a bit more grease from the factory. The top bearing was more like the bottom bearing on theirs. My bikes a 2015 so I either got lucky or yamahas on it. either way its still only a 3500 mile interval in the regular maintenance schedule.

I have 8000kms on my 2013, mostly off road with lots of bearing destroying pressure washing too, I haven't looked at the steering head bearings yet.

They're tight and move freely like new.

I had to replace the linkage bearings last spring tho.

Its a pretty easy job, you dont have to tear the whole bike apart. I just loosened everything up, and slid the lower fork yoke down complete with legs ect, making the bearings visible. Slather in waterproof grease, and assemble again. 1 hour job, taking your time.

Jens Eskildsen wrote:

Its a pretty easy job, you dont have to tear the whole bike apart. I just loosened everything up, and slid the lower fork yoke down complete with legs ect, making the bearings visible. Slather in waterproof grease, and assemble again. 1 hour job, taking your time.

You should look into the compatibility of different types of grease.... I was going to do it the easy way, but different grease bases don't mix well... I wanted to get as much of the old out as possible for this reason. I forget which ones... http://www.machinerylubrication.com/Read/1865/grease-compatibility - a chart that explains what I'm talking about... I do like cleaning everything, but I think I'll take the easy way now that I have my grease in there. It doesn't make sense. There's a certain gratification from tearing the bike apart to clean everything. And having it covered in mud again within a day... Not so much with the triple tree as there is with the swing arm assembly. I put a coat of protection on all those parts so the next couple washes go much easier....

I wiped the old dirty grease of, as I would expect just about any person would do.
I didnt brakeclean the shit out of every roller, but I think I'll be fine.

But thanks.

No worries. What year bike do you have? Mine was greased more from the factory than any other pic I've seen on herrr... It was assembled in dec 2014 but is a 2015 model.

2008 model, purchased around 2011 by the PO.

I'd hope yours didn't still have only factory grease than...

After replacing the bearings on my KLR, I squeezed about 1/2 a tube of grease into the neck void. It made its way down to the lower bearing on kept it nicely greased for 60K kms
I think you can do this with just the top bearing removed on the WR too.

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Put new bearings (All Balls) on my '08 with 21k miles a couple of months ago.
The notchiness(?) was a lot easier to feel with the front wheel off.

Does anyone know what the SKF bearing code is, or can get dimensions of the bearings for me please?

I’d rather buy the bearings from a reputable bearing company than buy the all balls kit.

My 2020 wr250 @ 450miles and checked and mine too was lack of grease as well . Thanks .