Many of you helped me a week or so ago with my chrome slider swap. I have a leak that I am not sure if its the fork seal or not. The oil appears to be leaking fron the top of the upper sliders, I assumed that is the seal was bad it would be running down the lower slider. I did replace the large o-rings seal under the fork caps yesterday and tighned them "gutentight" since I can get a torque wrench in there. Will a seal that is not seated well leak from the top of the upper slider?

Thanks, hate to give up and go to the stealer but also want to be safe about it.

 

Yes it will, did you lubricate the o-rings before you tightned the caps down? If not you may have pinched one.

 

no i put them on dry, I "threaded" them onto the fork cap until seated all the way down then put the cap on.

 

to clarify what I asked in my earlier post, will the oil leaking from seal that went into the lower slider show up on the upper slider? I have never wiped any oil from the lower slider but today on a short 30 mile ride I had a good bit of oil run down the upper slider and it looked like it came from right below the pinch bolt area.

 

I would guess that it's coming from the forkcap and that you may have pinched one of the rubber washers.

 

Take it apart to see where the source is.and to answer your original question,I say it could leak from the top.Thats why there are seals.
If your lucky,thats where it is coming from.

 

I agree with stro1965.

 

If it's not coming from the seal at the top of the slider and it's coming out above that and running down, only other place it could be from is the "O" ring under the fork tube cap. If you wipe the tube down clean, it should be obvious if it is running down or being pushed up from a bad slider seal when you ride again.

This is the part that is confusing in your post "from the top of the upper sliders,"

I am asuming here that you aren't referring to a ring around the fork tube a few inches above where the slider comes to rest that is being pushed up by a leaking seal in the slider.

 

If it appears to be originating from the pinch bolt area, I would suspect steering head bearing grease breaking liquifying from engine heat. Especially if you lubed it while doing your upgrade and did not use a synthetic that will handle the heat. Check the top of the lower triple tree and see if it is oily and if it is I will also go out on a limb and say the your "leak" is on the left side.

 

If your bike has air ride, check the air lines at the top of the forks too. I hit a pothole this summer and blew one of the air ride banjo fittings in the top of the tube, it pumped oil out like crazy on the way home. One of these slightly leaking could lead you to think it's a seal or o-ring.