04 ZX10R fork question

[Dr Phill]

Hi guys,

I've got an 04 ZX10R and it's starting to get a little bit of mileage on it now (80000k's). For the past month of so the bike has felt different between left and right hand corners. left handers were find and the bike would counter steer, but right handers counter steering just didn't seem to happen and bars would almost turn into the corner. The tires were due for renewal and I thought that this would be the cause (as they'd done 2 track days at QR and lots of commuting).
I just had new tires put on it yesterday and when the front wheel was off we noticed that one of the fork bottoms sat approx 5mm lower than the other one. The forks sit at the same height in the triples so i'm not really sure what is causing this. There appears to be a very slight leak from one of the fork seals but I wouldn't have thought it was bad enough to cause this.

The tires fixed most of the feeling that was there before, but it hasn't stopped it completely. I'm a bit of a newb when it comes to self maintenance but are there any suggestions as to where to go/what to check from here?

Cheers,
Phill

[zenodamper]

Fork oil leak is not going to cause that.

The difference in length will either be down to someone having done something at some stage internally - not necessarily a good thing maybe...

Or it will be because the preloading somewhere is out in one leg - not the external preloading that you alter with the 14mm spanner/socket; but the internal preloading, so either one of the plastic aligning and spacing tubes has splintered/shattered a little/lot, or you have lost coils from one of the spring sets. 2 springs in each leg.

The preloading and length of the springs and spacing involved is what governs the dimensions, apart from if there is something really badly wrong like a cap at the end of the thread, or the stanchion almost screwed right out (also at the end of it thread); or like I said, the other reason where someone has done some sort of modification during its history and something has gone wrong with their work.

Strip everything:

Inner stanchion
Outer slider
Axle holder/foot
Cartridge into all of its sub components (lots of pieces)

Clean thoroughly and lay next to each other, the answer to riddle will then come clear.