Well now my fork is sorted the next thing on the list is to replace the pivot bearings on my 2011 Trance. I'd rather do it myself and have a small budget to buy tools to do it properly. Where can I buy the tools from in NZ? The only places that seems to sell the maestro bearing tool kit are on ebay or giant stores in the UK (which no doubt won't ship here).

Cheers

Call your local Giant dealer.

Best Press is the Wheels MFG bearing press and their extractor set (or Toledo same thing), even better for extraction are the Specilized tools. None of these options are cheap, about $800.00 would cover it.

I have a bearing press kit for a SC Blur I can sell you (im not sure if they are the same sizes though..)

Thanks for the replies. I took Atro's advice and rang round all the local Giant dealers. One can do one for me for a reasonable price that will pay for itself after one round of bearing replacements in our small stable of giant bikes.

How much was it?
Probably not worth it for I only have one Maestro bike.

Just over a couple of hundred. Should have paid for itself after 3 bikes worth I figure then I'm winning from there. The best thing about it is that it will do all giant full suspension bikes so I can do the trance and reign with the same kit.

Id be interested to see how 'special' the press cups are for the Trance lower swingarm bearings - my 07 Trance has loads of weird angles/radiuseses going on around there, and it took a lot of patience/perserverance to extract those bearings using the tried and true 'sockets and threaded rod' method. In the end some well placed rubber washers gave enough friction so the sockets wouldn't slip sideways.

When I rang around the LBSs when I needed to do mine, they all told me 'nah bro we don't have the maestro press - we just use sockets and threaded rod'...

G clamp and an assortment of bits of wood/rubber scraps to prevent ganking stuff. Cost you about $20. Get the bearings from shockcraft (full set for my giant was something like $90 I think?)

I replaced all the bearings on my reign like that. Worked fine.

I did this after a mongolid bike mechanic used his bearing press to replace some, ganked the fuck out of the frame around the small top pivots, didn't replace the bearings that were actually worn out (so it still creaked), and charged me like $250.

When I had a Reign X I made a press out of plastic then sanded the radius to get into the funky radii on the swing arm. Worked mint. I've still got the drawing somewhere if you want it.