GT380 Steering head bearings

[badgereng]

Ladies / Gents
The top yoke / upper - upper raceway in my 74 GT380 steering head is buggered and as far as I can see,,,,, they are more rare than rocking horse sh!t.
Has anyone actually fitted a set of taper rollers to a 380 without the need to fettle the stem.
Fettling is part of the game but less fettling is better in my opinion. Sh!t rolls downhill and someone always lives in the valley and I’d rather not pass it on if it’s possible not to do so.
If anyone has fitted tapered sets to an early model 380 I’d be interested to know what manufacturer/supplier you had used.

Thanks for your help.

[sportston]

I have. It was not a straight bolt-on job. It took a lot of grinding to make everything fit. I had to grind the stem and the bearing race to make it sit right. I bought a Pyramid parts kit. I don't recommend using their kit. The height of the bearing is too tall for the bottom seal to fit inside the headstock without serious modification.

[badgereng]

Thanks for the feedback Sportston. Your experience seems to tally with what I’ve read elsewhere.
I think I may just put up with a bit of notchiness (Is that a word?!??) for now until it’s a must be done job….. unless there are some taper sets that are plug and play.

[brains]

i possibly have some outer races in the garage, but it is a long time since i have seen them. i'll try & look tomorrow

[badgereng]

Wow, that would be great Brains if you still have some in decent condition. Many thanks for the offer and good luck with the search.

Pete

[brains]

no luck i'm afraid. two house moves has played havoc. really annoying because a whole lot of new parts for my RG250 were in there too. may have got left in my sons w/shop but he has moved too now so not overly hopeful

[badgereng]

Thanks for looking anyway Brains. Much appreciated.

[sportston]

I think I may just put up with a bit of notchiness (Is that a word?!??).

Yep, notchiness is exactly how I would describe it. Mine were like that when I got the bike. The cup was rusty. Tapers are a much better design.

[dollydog]

i found pyramid bearings too high/thick as well, but i sent for some others which fitted perfectly and sat nicely in the top and bottom of the headstock. i'll go back through my fleabay history and see if i can find them. the steering stem though, all i did was grind a couple of mils down from the lip that the top bearing sits on, then everything was perfect
cheers, dd.
p.s. finding new outer and inner ball races, or even good ones is a pita. taper rollers are really the way to go, even though there are people out there who won't use them.

[badgereng]

Thanks for looking DD, it would be great if you still have the details

[Evans Ward]

I think I have what you need with some stock bearing races off a 4000 mile GT380 that had too many missing parts to restore/ fix back so was parted out. Since we can’t seem to post pics here lately and if you want to see them, send me a PM with your offsite email address. They cleaned up nicely and bearing surfaces are nice and smooth. I am in the US though….

[badgereng]

Thank you, email sent.

Pete

[Evans Ward]

Thank you, email sent.

Pete

Sending you a PM Pete.

Evans