Todays motorcycle mechanic trick, lets hear yours 👇

[Dani-itsy]

Doing stuff like this with fluid can be thousands of times safer that with air. We remove old concrete from concrete pumping pipes. Doing that with air can be the equivalent of a small bomb going off. Even at something like 20 bar. While when we use 120 bar high water pressure to push you can just stand right besides it and even hold the concrete cylinder that is being pushed out.

[andrewcarter]

“Grease is cheap” yeah the price on air lately has been so expensive

[ERusstbucket]

As an aircraft mechanic that has to clean a lot of cast and forged aluminum parts, ABSOLUTELY DO NOT EVER use steel wool or stainless steel wool to clean aluminum. Use an abrasive with aluminum oxide, be it emery cloth, sandpaper, scouring pads, or "roloc bristle disc" (my personal preference) for cleaning these.

Steel, stainless steel, or brass wool will leave microscopic particles embedded in the aluminum and cause the entire surface to have galvanic corrosion in a few years. I've seen quite a few fly by night "restorations" end up having all the paint suddenly flake off where steel wool or a contaminated blast cabinet were used to prep the surface, or have only the scoured area of a part have corrosion suddenly appear two years after some self professed "Piper Guru" "meticulously restored" the plane.

If you really want a crash course on cleaning aluminum and preventing corrosion, FAA AC 43.13-1B is free to download and has sections covering this.

[hainhatphung]

If you are using compressed air, aim the caliper down a towel to ease the dropping. It ain't that bad.

[TheGuilleJunco]

I prefer the compressed air. Much cleaner results. Just need to make sure the piston doesn't fly into anyone or anything valuable 😂

[motorcycle_prophet]

Always used compressed air. Just held the caliper a few inches from a work bench so it doesn't become a projectile.

[ne-adv]

Wrap the piston in a shop towel, keep the fingers free, use reduced pressure, and pop it without wasting an entire bearings worth of grease.
Some of us wrench our own bikes, not because we have a business that does it, not because we are creating content that will create revenue, but because we are ass broke and cannot waste anything.

[vincenstuff]

For best lesson-learning, nothing competes with the brake fluid cloud that explodes out of the caliper into your garage and all over every painted surface 😅 do. not. recommend.

[ShortsWayUp]

Instead of compressed air or a grease gun, you can actually use the brake system to hydraulicly push the piston out. Just leave the calliper attached and clamp down the other pistons. Squeeze the brake-lever, and your unclamped piston should come out.

I had a stuck piston on my '97 Yamaha Virago, tried everything to get it out to no avail, since all the guides say to use compressed air and I did not have a compressor. Finally found one guide that mentioned just using the brake-system to press it out, and that worked like a charm.

You'll get a bit of brake-fluid squirting out so you want to be careful where you hold the piston, but other than that it's a really simple way to unstick a piston.

[OskPionier]

Use rag, wrap caliper, compressed air. Why work more cleaning grease....

[mikes]

Yesterday's mechanic-ing tip for old motorcycles. When you clean your carb, put the float back in right side up. Lol
Went through the whole "Ain't got no gas innit." Pulled the carb drain plug, dry. Pulled the bowl. Dry. Uh-oh! ... Forgot the gas was off. Gas flowed and the valve worked. Went to measure the float height. Uhhh. Oh! Well, there's your problem!

[TwisterMa]

Just another way to do it, not the only right way.

[rubenfranco]

Wrap it in a shop rag and use air. That's how real mechanics do it.

[skylertooley]

just use the brake levers pressure. remove caliper, not fluid line. squeeze brake. pop.

[dnltbrca]

i used my shower once. had a standard faucet connector around the house, plugged it into the outlet for the shower hose and because i'm in europe the end was m10 thread, just like the banjo bolt on the caliper. mains water pressure is about 3 bar (45ish psi?) so turning on the water gently pushed even the stuck pistons out. next time i'll use the bleeder to evacuate the air out first.

[samebert]

I've shot pistons across the shop many a time. Generally I'm replacing them anyways so I just launch them out the door and see how far they'll go. Oh and then you don't have to waste cans of brake clean on getting all the GREASE out of your brakes 🙄. If you really want to reuse the pistons then fire them into a piece of cardboard, it's really not that big a deal.

[mrsockyman]

I've just reconnected the brake line and pushed the piston out

[danielvermeulen]

Grease is cheap is such a first world statement 😂

[hotrodmercury]

Currently in A&P school (aircraft mechanic)
Definitely consider taking a corrosion control class one of these days, youll easily learn how to combat this stuff at the source.
Aluminum and steel do not play friendly with eachother after awhile and the corrosion will get worse. A good fellow on here commented, I suggest you do heed that warning for all resto builds. That goes for anyone.

I used to see this a lot with classic RVs, Cars, etc. especially if they sat for a few years, no one bothered to move them or at least release the brakes. Over time the materials corrode and basically cold weld themselves together. They lose brake ability and then owners, not knowing any better, will drain the brake fluid or unhook brake lines allowing contamination.
Try doing this on a 70s GMC camper, that was one hell of a weekend.

[dinosaursr]

If you’ve got to remove the big clutch basket nut and don’t have the proper socket / wrench / special tool to secure the basket throw a big old shop rag into the meshing gears area and it’ll bunch up enough to allow you to loosen the nut. Another trick is when adjusting points and condenser ignition you can use an AM radio tuned between two stations near the condenser. The radio will emit a squawk when the points open. It’ll do as a fast replacement for a timing light bulb.