Whether it?s from decades of neglect or a dutiful service interval of soaking up potholes, the day will come when your suspension pukes its guts out. Rubber seals have a finite lifespan, fluids break down over time and the chrome on your fork tubes and shock shafts will eventually fail and corrode. The telltale sight of a leaking seal brings with it the decision to repair/replace stock components or undertake a major suspension upgrade.

While there?s no shortage of mono-shock conversions and front-end swaps around here, the theme of our everyman Honda CB550F tracker project calls for an accessible and affordable approach?something anyone could accomplish in a weekend to get an old bike on the road again.

Rebuilding Telescopic Motorcycle Forks If you want to play around with old bikes, you?ll either become proficient at rebuilding forks or get used to paying someone else to do it. A neglected classic will almost certainly come with an oil leak on the left side, and you?ll have to tear the fork down completely to fix it. The good news is that it?s not that complicated, because what your classic motorcycle lacks in ride quality, it usually makes up for in simplicity. Every design is a little different, even among telescopic forks, but our Honda CB550F is certainly the easiest rebuild I?ve done. Really, you?ve got six major pieces per side, and driving the new seal in doesn?t require any specialty items.

Disassembly is pretty straightforward, but there are a couple of p...