How long should fork seals generally last on a street-bike?

I have to ammend my previous post. I was changing the front tire on the ZX11 tonight. One of the legs was drooling, despite the fork gaiters.

It seems that I forgot the biggest cause of failed fork seals: water.

Yup. For those who don't change their own seals, there is a circlip under the dust seal that retains the actual oil seal. What happens is, water gets past the dust seal (from rain or washing), then doesn't escape. The circlip rusts and flakes fall off. Those flakes get wedged into the seal lip and destroy it.

That's the exact failure mode my most recent replacement suffered. And it did it in less than 5K miles. Off to the shop to buy another set of seals tomorrow.

Famous last words.I have to ammend my previous post. I was changing the front tire on the ZX11 tonight. One of the legs was drooling, despite the fork gaiters.Yup. For those who don't change their own seals, there is a circlip under the dust seal that retains the actual oil seal. What happens is, water gets past the dust seal (from rain or washing), then doesn't escape. The circlip rusts and flakes fall off. Those flakes get wedged into the seal lip and destroy it.That's the exact failure mode my most recent replacement suffered. And it did it in less than 5K miles. Off to the shop to buy another set of seals tomorrow.