Re: Fork Stick-shun
Daffe, that's a great question. Note that the telescopic forks have two "bushes". An inner bush and an outer bush. The outer bushing is right behind the dust and oil seals and is at the bottom end of the outer fork tubes. The outer bush glides along the polished EXPOSED chrome coating that you can see, lubricated by the oil held in by the oil seal. The oil seal receives added protection by the dust seal.
Now, the "inner" bushing is at the top of the chromed inner tube. While sitting on the sidestand, this bushing is like 6 or 8 inches from the top of the fork tube. The inner bushing glides along the polished inside of the top fork tube, lubricated by fork oil that happens to be splashed up there.
Now, imagine a few thousand pouns of force acting on the front end when you use the brakes. You've got the mass of the bike pushing on the fork stem, which then transmits the load to the outer tubes and then the bushings (very little contact area!!) and then to the inner fork leg. When you really contemplate the current "state of the art" system, it seems archane when you consider that the design is little changed from when 100hp out of 1200cc was a Big Deal.
Race Tech tries to pimp their fork bushings as "ultra slick" and honestly, I can't say whether they are better or same as the stock ones. BUT I do know that when you replace the oil seals, you use the interference of the bushings to drive out the oil seal, which often ruins OEM bushings and less often ruins the R-T aftermarket bushings.
Oh, and while we're contemplating all that force on the front end, consider how little contact area the steering bearings have and THOSE are getting a lot of force, too.
Ultimately, there's "normal" stiction that you'd feel just after a fork rebuild and then there's not normal stiction that's probably due to fork oil getting old or the bushings getting worn. You DO change your fork oil every 2 years?

(even I don't...)

Chris