KDXRIDER.NET

For those of you looking for a alternative to having the steering stem knurled, I may have found a solution. I feel like a bit of a tool posting this, because I am a machinist..... So knurling should be a piece of cake! Yes, but the shop I work at is so busy I've been waiting for 2 months for a lathe to use for an hour!

So, I got thinking about it, and since knurling just displaces metal, why not use a little elbow grease and go to town with a hammer/punch. So I tried making a few punch marks around the O.D of the stem, and sure enough the edges around the indents are raised enough to prevent it from sliding into the lower triple. Later on when I have more time I'll do staggered rows of punch marks, then press it in and report back. But as of now it looks very promising.

Ed5786 wrote:For those of you looking for a alternative to having the steering stem knurled, I may have found a solution. I feel like a bit of a tool posting this, because I am a machinist..... So knurling should be a piece of cake! Yes, but the shop I work at is so busy I've been waiting for 2 months for a lathe to use for an hour!

So, I got thinking about it, and since knurling just displaces metal, why not use a little elbow grease and go to town with a hammer/punch. So I tried making a few punch marks around the O.D of the stem, and sure enough the edges around the indents are raised enough to prevent it from sliding into the lower triple. Later on when I have more time I'll do staggered rows of punch marks, then press it in and report back. But as of now it looks very promising.

that's called "Chinese knurl", because of its low quality finish and lower quality holding power. it lacks the sharp edges of knurl, so it doesn't bite well.

get some loctite 680 , and just glue the stem in place. it takes 12 hours to get 2 tons of shear strength, and fills .o15"

been using it for years here.

:-)

"Chinese Knurl" LOL. That is funny. And I thought I had a bright idea on my hands. It worked out great, and I did use some loctite for added insurance. At first I was going to use loctite only, since the stem is never really dealing with any force or torque, the forks and triples deal with that.