# Fork Maintenance with chain lube?



## joytron (Sep 5, 2010)

So just got a new bike and as determined here I need to lube the fork and spring. I have some boeing t-9 chain lube, will that work or do I need to buy fork grease?


----------



## rkj__ (Feb 29, 2004)

What fork do you have?


----------



## joytron (Sep 5, 2010)

the rock shox judy 3. in the maintenance manual it did not say anything aobut what product to use, only that the fork needed to be lubed and the spring to be greased. I only assumed the terms were synonomous.


----------



## AndrwSwitch (Nov 8, 2007)

Typically in a suspension fork you'd use grease on things like the stanchions and oil in any kind of oil bath the fork might have. If there are no oil baths, just grease everything.

Use a rubber-safe, water proof grease that doesn't contain lithium. You should be able to find something at your hardware store if you don't have anything kicking around. Oil is a tougher question when it comes up. Motor oil is supposed to have the potential to damage the seals in the fork. A lot of people use motorcycle shock oil. Real World Cycling recommends gear oil, which is probably available at a larger hardware store.

I wouldn't use the Boeshield stuff. Solvents and rubber don't play well together, and in the description they say it dries to a wax - you want something that stays gooey for inside a fork. Bear in mind that while you can lube a chain every ride or once a week or whatever, rebuilding a fork is a much less frequent process. Hopefully it's also cleaner inside.


----------



## zebrahum (Jun 29, 2005)

My advice is to get some Buzzy's Slick Honey. It's a little more expensive than something you'd find at the auto parts store, but you will be able to be certain that it will work with suspension. Google says the 2oz container is $7. You can coat the spring throughly with slick honey (clean the old crap off first). You can also use it to lube the stanchions and dust seals, just lift up the fork boots and spread it on the visible portion of the stanchions above the dust seals and cycle the fork a few times. When you feel you've lubed enough, wipe all the slick honey you can see off of the stanchions to prevent dust and dirt from sticking to the fork and reinstall the fork boots.

I don't really believe that oiling the fork seals does a ton of help, but if I were to do it, I would probably try using Tri-flow drip.


----------

