broken studs on kdx lower right fork leg

Replacing a fork leg! Now wouldn't that be an expensive mistake!

Sounds like quite a few have snapped the front wheel stud on the fork. From other postings I've read, you can just unscrew the stud and get a new one. Search on this forum for a complete lowdown on the exact technique on how to get it out correctly.

My question is though, what did this guy do after breaking the first one? Tighten the rest and kept riding? How did he ever get to the point where he broke 1, then 2, and then 3!!!

I also broke two studs on my KDX's right fork but not while riding. I was just just doing some preventive maintance making sure everything was tightened up before going on the next ride and snap they went. So rather than using studs I purchased two actual bolts with the same thread. They were a little bit longer so I mounted them up with several washers, went out riding and they were just fine.

Very often these studs are snapped off because they are over torqued. Be sure to use an appropriate torque wrench whenever you work on your bike and especially the forks. The max torque on these studs is 87 inch lbs (that's almost nothing) and you need to follow a specific sequence when tightening them. Place the axle clamp on the bike with the arrow pointing up, tighten the upper nuts first then the lower nuts.

If properly torqued it would be very uncommon to snap one of these studs, don't properly torque them and they'll snap . . . sometimes three at a time:(

The snapped studs with just unscrew and can be replaced with new ones.

The studs have been had by others at ACE or NAPA. Although they aren't called out on the parts diagrams, they do have a kawi number.

A search on this site will get you the number. Or, I could just list it here...again?

172G0622

Make sure you put the cap back on right. There should be NO gap at the top...the gap SHOULD be at the bottom. Try to put it together with NO gap, and you'll be breaking summore of them.

Well...at least ONE more;)

The studs will "strecth" before they break. You can check yours by taking the cap and axle off the fork leg, cleaning the studs well with some solvent, and then threading the nuts on by hand. If the nut starts to get harder to turn near the position where it normally seats, then that stud is stretched, weak, and a candidate to break.

My bike was delivered new with studs that were stretched from overtightening, probably by the guy at my dealer who put the bike together. I snapped one while giving the bike a once over by just touching it with a short handled ratchet.


Mine were so bad at delivery that you could acutually see the gaps between threads were stretched on the remaining three studs and the nuts were very hard to turn when doing what I described above.

Canadian Dave: this seems to come up so often, and is such a potential saftey concern, that maybe this topic and what to look for should be on the justkdx site somewhere.

I just became the newest victim tonight! :silly: Wasn't paying attention and snapped one of them. I think I will replace all four of them and the nuts.

I picked some up from lmy local Kawi/Suzuki shop and he had some Suzuki studs that also work so I got four of those. They were saying that I needed a whole new fork leg, until I showed them the part number posted above, and they were happy to see that. They have never seen that part number before (not on the micro fiche) so they said they were going to order a bunch of those in. So the Suzuki part number for the studs is 01421-06208 if anyone needs it.