Saving the Marzocchi from fork guard destruction

[Zrt1200]

When I bought my 05 ec200 it needed fork seals and I noticed that the fork guards were wearing pretty hard on the outer fork tube. If let alone it would not belong before these forks would be junk.

What I came up with is a plastic sleeve to lightly press on to the outer fork tube to keep the fork guard from rubbing onto the actual fork. I machined these up out of UHMW plastic and after one 3 hour ride so far so good.

[Neil E.]

Nice work. Did you make some extras? The rubbing and dirt may eventually thin them out. It's nice to have access to machine tools for projects like this.

Newer forks have a groove with a clip ring that takes the wear. The stock clip rings are aluminum and wear away. I made new ones out of stainless and they definitely last longer.

[Zrt1200]

Originally Posted by Neil E.

Nice work. Did you make some extras? The rubbing and dirt may eventually thin them out. It's nice to have access to machine tools for projects like this.

Newer forks have a groove with a clip ring that takes the wear. The stock clip rings are aluminum and wear away. I made new ones out of stainless and they definitely last longer.

Thanks. No I did not make any spares but being I have a Mill & Lathe in my garage I can make them up any time I need. For the life of me I dont understand why they made them like that. The KYB fork guard idea on YZ's & etc is a better way to go.

[shang]

I actually just purchased SKF mud scrapers for this reason. Around $30 and create another seal against dirt entering the fork seal.

Not as cool as your custom sliders, but for the rest of us it's a good solution.

[Harry]

excellent, I love DIY solutions.

[Zrt1200]

Originally Posted by shang

I actually just purchased SKF mud scrapers for this reason. Around $30 and create another seal against dirt entering the fork seal.

Not as cool as your custom sliders, but for the rest of us it's a good solution.

The SKF Mud scrapers will work but they dont make them for the 45mm forks.

[gasgasman]

Les at LT-Racing used to make some nice teflon fork protectors.
They were split at the rear, so you can install them without removing the forks.

[Zrt1200]

Originally Posted by gasgasman

Les at LT-Racing used to make some nice teflon fork protectors.
They were split at the rear, so you can install them without removing the forks.

I contacted Les about these. He did at one time make some. But now there is a Husky bolt on one.

This is a copy of my e-mail coming back from Les at LTracing.... SEE PIC BELOW.


Well, good on you! What you made is called a "rub ring".

I was always amazed how GasGas never supplied a rub ring on their Marzocchi forks, the later models at least had a groove machined in the tube and they used a fat circlip similar to other manufacturers. A lot of this wear can be eliminated by properly shifting the brake line sleeve enough to have more slack in the brake line between the fork guard clamp and the caliper. But, most people don't even notice this until it is too late.

In 2004 and later I sold a boat load of these Marzocchi 45 rub rings that Husqvarna supplied with their bikes as "stock equipment" It was Husqvarna part # 8000 93283, a picture of this part is attached to this e-mail. If I remember correctly, less than $10 each? I also designed and hand machined several sets of these for the 50 mm Zoke twin chamber GasGas fork, they didn't put rub rings on this one either! These were similar to the Husky 45 mm Zoke design. Took awhile to make them and lost bunch of time & money because most people didn't get it, until it was way too late! Jeff who runs the GG rider website has a set of the 50's I made on one of his bikes.

In the end, pretty poor not to have this provision in the first place from the factory, but that's just my opinion!

And from a second e-mail.....

The P/N I used was for '05 TE's, and the 610's/630's all with Marzocchi 45 forks until BMW sold to KTM, so it should cover earlier versions as nothing changed dimensionally all along the line. This part also fit the 46 Ohlins GG, but it was a stretch, I have them fit to a couple of Ohlins I have instead of the circlip.

For the SKF mud scrapers or sliders they offer, the fork MUST have a circlip groove machined into the leg, I don't recall this being done on most GG applications. Later models (like '08? maybe later) had a plastic rub ring but I can't exactly recall the groove dimensions used for the SKF product to fit correctly.

The Husky part was pretty robust, have yet to ever see one wear out for certain.

Les Tinius, LT-Racing
Tel. 360-871-2259
Fax: 360-326-7282
Mail; les@lt-racing.com
Website; www.lt-racing.com


I hope this helps some of you guys as it would have saved some work for me. Al

[GGRider01]

Do you know of any sources for these? I'm looking online now with no results. Hoping they make some for the 48mm marzoccis.

[swazi_matt]

Originally Posted by GGRider01

Do you know of any sources for these? I'm looking online now with no results. Hoping they make some for the 48mm marzoccis.

I saw something on the motocrosscenter website not sure of the size though