Steering Race Special Tool?

Anyone have a trick to get the steering stem bearing races back in without the $150 special tool? I made the removal tool out of heavy gauge copper tubing, but I don't want to just tap them back in and risk damage, unless that's what everyone else is doing?

Thanks

Throw the race in the freezer and let it cold soak - Then you should be able to tap it in alot easier - worked on my old R75/5, but with the xr650r alumimum frame you'll need to do it fairly quick.

Will post when I do.

Thanks guys. I ended up using a large nut/bolt and ginormous washers over the old races. Worked perfectly. The old races were a perfect fit over the new ones for obvious reasons and were still above the recess when the new ones bottomed out flush.

A lot cheaper than a $150 tool! Cost me about $6 at Osh.

Monterey is a great place.

Bump wrote:Monterey is a great place.

Yeah, it is a pretty nice place to live. A lot more to explore than you'd think. And only a couple of hours over to the Sierra NF for some good single track.

I have some friends who used to go about an hour or two south of there and do some wild pig hunting. I'm not really big on hunting (I don't trust other hunters unless I am 2x the distance they can shoot) but they always were trying to get me to go riding while they hunting. I kept telling them I can't ride 1300 feet per second.

There's some great diving there. Took some guitar lessons from Bruce Forman over in Carmel Valley. Nice guy considering his resume. He did that guitar work for Million Dollar baby. Gave me a copy of a book he wrote. Quite a character.

There's just a lot of cool stuff going on in that area. SF thinks it's cool. But that Monterey area IS cool.

Yep, I agree with ya'. Amazing how different it can be from Santa Cruz, too. A short drive to the north and it might as well be a different planet. I'm a big surfer and I hate the crowds and attitude up there. Better diving at this end, as you said, too. My wife took some guitar lessons from him as well a few years back. Big Sur makes for some nice tarmac rides with coffee at Nepenthe making for a nice break.

the Mexican food at El Torito there?