Quote:
Originally Posted by mtbmoose
In the future, I'd recommend that you learn how to take the pivots apart, pry off the seals of the pivot bearings, and push in some fresh grease. Do this every 3-6 months, depending on riding conditions and how aggressive you wash your bike, and you can extend the life of the bearings by 3x-4x.
And look up DIY pivot bearing presses. Lots of good ideas using threaded rods, some washers and nuts, and some sockets. Will do the job nicely at much lower cost. Plenty of YouTube videos on how to press out and press back in bearings, probably even for the model of bike you have.
My first really good full suspension mountain bike was the original Santa Cruz Blur back in 2002. Incredible bike for the time, but it ate bearings at an incredible rate. I quickly learned how to keep them happy using the above service routing. I could service all eight pivot bearings, including disassembly and reassembly of all the pivots (and pulling the cranks) in about 30-40 minutes. It's really not that hard.
Good to hear you'll be back rolling with some new bearings, though!
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Thanks it seems like a good skill to learn. My neighbor does have the tools so I will check if I can borrow it to service bearings. The bike does use Torx+ bits so I need to get some of those.
I was told by the mechanic that spraying with the hose to wash the bike will significantly reduce the bearings' life. And he recommended that I just hand clean the bike using a wet rag.