11s front forks

[Cliff]

Like most others, the front forks of my '02 11s are getting very unsightly and it raises the question whether anyone has any success fitting forks other than 11s' - that is, still a boxer but of better quality build & finish?

Cheers

[gus]

Hi
I take it you mean the paint falling off the bottom part of the forks and bottom yoke/bridge?
BMW use a water based eco friendly paint,which means its crap!
I dont think changing forks from another model will help.
What will help is you repainting the fork lowers with some proper paint and applying a clearcoat on top.The same can be done to the lower yoke,although this will have to be removed to do a proper job.The fork lowers can be done in situ if you remove the wheel and brake calipers.Most people have done this when the paint has started to flake after a few years.
gus

[sproggy]

I've just done mine (forks and bridge on an '02 model) with silver plasti-kote - a good match for the original colour and the finish is comparable too. I haven't done enough miles yet to judge how it stands up to stone chips etc but I do know that flies wash off it easily, as does brake dust. I'm sure it'll be tougher than the original paint.

I did mine off the bike - degrease, wire-brush, wet'n'dry, degrease again, plasti-kote primer and then top coat - I think I used 3 coats of primer and 4 or 5 of top coat.

[POB]

sproggy, why make life so difficult?!? Rub down and one coat of silver Smoothrite has been good enough for all my bikes over the years, including a couple of dirt bikes!

[Twodogs]

Yeah i'm with you on that one POB,i did the exact same thing on my lowers and bridge and they came out great (see boxerpix). If i'd had enough time i would taken them off the bike to do but time was against me (its used every day for work),but i'm very pleased with the results.

[sproggy]

sproggy, why make life so difficult?!?

Did I make it sound difficult? It wasn't, and the bike was off the road and the forks removed anyway.

[POB]

Oh, alright then.