Center stand not "standing".

[Billmc]

I know this must have been covered somewhere in here before now but I cannot find anything.

The center-stand on my '87 does a couple of things badly:
1. When fully lowered, neither of the wheels are off the ground.
2. On attempting to retract(and I'm sure this must be related to #1), I have to pull the stand with my foot toward the rear a couple of inches before it will retract by spring tension.
There doesn't seem to be any play in the stand bushings or collar but I may not know what they are supposed to feel like. The stand does not appear to be bent or out of whack either as both foot pads hit the ground at the same time.

Any ideas what's going on? Should I take it off and check for alignment/play/wear or something else?

[montmil]

You might want to inspect both the ground contact points for excessive loss of metal. Over time, concrete does a good job of grinding off the rounded portion of the contact patch. My R100S was a bitch to get on and off the c'stand. There were open holes worn through at the contact points. Stand off, weld weld, grind grind, all better now.

Also, inspect the stand to chassis contact points. Both of them. That's the other problematic wear area.

When you remove the stand for possible rehab and are ready to refit, you'll be faced with stretching the springs to catch their anchor points. All but impossible unless you stick washers or pennies between the coils which will lengthen the spring and reduce the amount of blood loss.

[Barry]

Not familiar with an 87 but in general airhead stands wear at the tips of the stand where they meet the frame stops and need building up with weld as a repair.   There should be several previous threads on this with photo's. Make sure you search "all posts".

The behaviour on retraction sounds like it may be  normal in that when deploying the stand if you push it down to the ground it's supposed to stay there and will not spring back up unless given a nudge.  Just an airhead quirk.

[Billmc]

Thanks guys, I will check out your suggestions and see what I can see.
The ground contact area looks round with no wear-through but I'm not sure about the upper contact points, and +1  for the tip on the spring. Its also So much easier to insert those spacers with the spring extended.

Was thinking about cutting a 1/4 section of 1"dia. steel pipe and welding it on to the ground contact patch as a sort of new 'shoe' if you think that's a viable solution.

[Barry]

Was thinking about cutting a 1/4 section of 1"dia. steel pipe and welding it on to the ground contact patch as a sort of new 'shoe' if you think that's a viable solution

I did that to mine not to increase height but as a preventative measure to stop the tubes wearing through. I used thin wall stainless steel  which is tough and will not rust where the paint is removed.