I just finished my swingarm maintenance. The amazing thing is:
I DIDN'T HAVE TO REMOVE MY EXHAUST!!!
This will save hours of time! Well, now that I got it figured out, it'll save me hours
NEXT time.
I took the lower assembly off the rear shock. The grease in the roller bearings was totally dry. All that was left looked like hard cheese. I scraped the cheese out and put some Mobil 1 Synthetic Grease in there. I kept the lower shock assembly disassembled for the swingarm maintenance.
The swingarm pivot nut is 27mm. I didn't have that, and I didn't feel like waiting for one to ship online. The autoparts store had one, but it was 12 sided. F00k that! Those 12 sided sockets will round out your bolts.
I went to Sears and got a 1 1/16 socket. No big diff from 27mm.
See?
1 1/16 inch = 1.0625 inch
27mm = 1.063 inch
It's a difference of one-thousandth of an inch.
After breaking the torque for the pivot nut, I braced the fork with a rear stand. I then wrapped a towel/rag around my exhaust. I didn't want it to get scraped up. (I'm pretty sure it didn't.) I also zip tied the chain and the rear brake out of the way. When I pulled out the pivot shaft, the whole swingarm didn't come crashing down. It moved maybe an inch. No worries! Also, it's very light.
Inspecting the pivot shaft, I saw dried lube and some corrosion. I couldn't remove it. I saw milky, lumpy lube, and not much of it. The worst part was the smell! I would describe it as "WHALE OIL."
speeew....
Well that whale oil sucked at doing its job, so thanks for nothing, Yamaha.:Flip:
Here's how I avoided taking off the exhaust: I maneuvered the swingarm to be at an angle. Imagine the red circles as the dust covers. The red dotted line is the "plane" of the swingarm.
The left dust cover poked near my left rear set.
The right dust cover was resting on the metal part of the frame that's above the exhaust. It's near where the bracket that holds the overflow/drain tubes are, close to the right rear set. I had to move some of the drain tubes out of the way in order to get more space to work there.
From the left side, I was able to pull out the left dust cover (lots of crap in there, yuck) and then the metal spacer (really an inner tube.) That thing was bone dry. I checked out the left bearing as well. No grease at all. Not even cheese! I was able to clean it all up and re-grease. I put everything back in and started working on the right side.
For the right side, I had much less room. But all I needed to do was remove and clean the right dust cover and clean and re-grease the bearing. It was a tight fit, but I got it done. Moving the drain tubes out of the way really helps. I have small hands, too.
So there you have it. I haven't gone out for a test ride. I still have to do my wheel alignment. Plus other stuff.
I hope this makes the job easier! If you don't re-grease your rear shock and swingarm pivot, you're just riding around with cheese and whale oil.
