Maintenance - schedule or whenever?
 

Do you follow the owner's manual schedule or just do your maintenance whenever?

Follow MOCO schedule plus some.

remember on american vtwins I have 3 different oils (motor, primary, trans). I change all 3 EVERYTIME regardless.

I usually do more maintenance than the manual requires. My upbringing demands it. My Dad was a pro mechanic for 35 yrs, was my crew cheif racing. It is second nature.

I'm old fashioned. I change the oil every 3 months or 3000 miles whichever comes first.
Everything else I do by schedule or need

I change the oil on my bike every 3000 miles on the dot. I lube the chain regularly, check other stuff when I feel like it

My car sorta whenever I feel like it around 5000 miles

I'm hearing a lot about oil but what about the other stuff, like forks? This is what made me think of this topic...

I was talking with a friend, basically said they will wait until their forks leak before having them serviced. Mine weren't leaking the first time I had them, just felt it was time. I had about 10K miles on the bike. This last time they were definitely not right so I had them done again, just in 1500 miles (last summer versus now).

Mostly follow the schedule...or try to as closely as possible. Oil I change a little more often than recommened..but nothing major.

In terms of seals, its purpose is to prevent fluid from leaking, if its not leaking then I see no reason to mess with it unless it's one of those deals where you are already pulling something apart that would necessitate removal of the part anyway. Just me....

Spoken like a man who knows his shit.

Why mess with something unless its broken? I'll look at the forks to see if there is oil on them, if the bike acts funny I'll look into it. New noises are always worth investigating, and anything that isn't the same as yesterday gets a look at. But i'm not going to tear apart the front end of the bike to change fork seals because I rolled 10k miles

Honestly... that is your stand on forks. Better recheck it.

The reason you tear into a fork that is not leaking is... well actually 2 reasons.

1. To prevent from leaking, as stated.
2. To put in new bushings. At which point you have to pull apart forks anyway, and only a moron would use old parts like seals then.

Don't replace the bushings... well that's not so smart. The bushing is what the leg rides against in the fork lower. Once it wears off its brass its done and will start to eat away the fork lower. Not good. That is why you service your forks before they start leaking.

Need more?

Example... here is the fork bushings on my chopper at 6k miles. I only did them cause they were off the bike anyway. But they weren't due till 10k. You can laready see the worn effect on the bushing.
http://i99.photobucket.com/albums/l3...alsnOil011.jpg

Further, the fork oil was horrible
http://i99.photobucket.com/albums/l3...alsnOil008.jpg

So then new parts and new oil...
http://i99.photobucket.com/albums/l3...alsnOil035.jpg