Winter bike maintenance

You know the drill, it's generally pretty quiet in the racing calendar over winter, so the downtime is a good opportunity for some much needed bike maintenance.

I spent some of the weekend finding out what needs to be done:

• Air filter needs cleaning
• Spark plug needs cleaning
• Gearbox oil needs changing
• Electric start needs a service
• One of the fork seals needs re-seating
• The gear lever needs replacing
• The clutch perch needs fixing
• The side-stand washer/spacer needs replacing
• Throttle grips need replacing
• There's an electrical fault that needs fixing
• Battery needs charging
• Rear mudguard sub-frame mounts need drilling out and tapping
• Frame needs painting in some places
• Lower shock bearing needs replacing
• Suspension needs a service
• Needs new tyres and mousses
• Needs new chain
• Needs new brake pads front and rear
• Ideally needs a new piston as it's now at 180 hours (it had a full rebuild at 120) 
• The whole bike needs a good thorough strip-down, clean and re-greasing

Then I set to work on a couple of those - I've already recharged the battery and serviced the electric start. More soon when I get a chance to work on it!