Ruddick - Thompson Web Site

2003 Service

This page is dedicated to this years service on my Suzuki Bandit. The service is told in a few pic's with comment from yours truly. The yearly service is one of the aspects of having a motorbike I enjoy and doing it yourself is about half the cost. The secret is to know your limitations. Don't try to do anything your not confident about because if you make a mistake it will probably cost you more in time and money in the long run. This years service was a major one and I done it over a couple of days. I haven't shown pictures of the oil change, brake pads check etc as I forgot to take them, (what a daft trout). Nuff said here's the evidence.

Here's the first picture to get us going. As you can see the Tank has been removed and I'm tinkering away, spanner in hand. It almost looks as if I know what I'm doing.

This picture shows me setting up the manometer to synchronize the carburetors, (the manometer is the black plastic thing dangling from the handle bars). This was the first time I had done this job so it was the most enjoyable. You only need to do this every two years so I'll probably forget how to do it the next time around. (or with a bit luck have a new bike if I can persuade Trudi that its absolutely necessary that I have one).

This picture is inside the valve cover. It was taken when I was checking the valve clearances, (intake valves = 0.10 to 0.15mm, exhaust valves 0.18 to 0.23mm is now etched on my mind forever, well a day or two anyway).

The last picture shows the valve cover being prepared to be bolted back into position. The new seal has been fitted around the rim. It was quite awkward to re-fit it as I had left the motorbikes half fairing in place but I got there in the end.