I noticed after a ride last week that there seemed to be a bit of oil on the shaft of my fox rp23 and on the frame. Still not sure if it was shock or over exuberant chain oiling whilst the bike was upside down but just been and had a better look and can see, and feel with my nail, 3 scratch/score lines that go into the shock body, I haven’t disassembled it yet to see how far. Annoyingly I was about to order a new seal kit and do a rebuild.

Is there anything that I can do to minimise these marks, as I say I can feel them, they are not feint but they are also not deep gouges. Or, now it’s scored, is my shock toast, will always now leak, and I just need to go hunt down a new one?

It’s air can lube that’s leaking, not damper fluid.

Remove air can, replace seals, polish out scratches with very fine wet and dry (or a 4 sided nail buffer). If it continues to hold air, problem solved. If not, it needs a new shaft.

Cheers, I wasn’t sure if you could sand them out.. I’ll do some more google searching for advice on sanding and then give that a go.

I think the general idea is to paint some clear laquer onto the scratch first, or even some epoxy, let it set hard, shave the excess off with a very sharp blade then use very fine paper over the area. This fills the scratch. Not that I’ve had a go at it to be honest, so it’s up to you if you want to try it.

Something like this:

Just get it serviced and the damaged part can be replaced. Not a huge job and will be like new rather than putting nail varnish on your shock…

I’ve just done one of my shocks. Not fine scratches but I dropped a spanner and of course it hit the shaft and put a mark in it. I used some loctite super steel which is a 2 pack epoxy type filler then left it couple of days to harden and sanded it down with 1500 grit and used olive oil as a lubricant. Can’t feel the mark now and shock holds air as it should.

Cheers all. I’ve been doing some reading on stanchion repairs, didn’t know it was called that, and I see it’s no real drama especially as the marks on mine are very minor.

I’ll order up a seal kit from somewhere, raid my daughters nail varnish, and do a rebuild. Want to put new bearings in my swing arm as well so a good time to strip everything down.