I am tuning up the mountain bike I purchased in 1994, which has the old yellow Rockshox Quadra 21R front suspension fork. I have found a nice video on YouTube which shows how to service the suspension, and replace the elastomers, and also found an elastomer replacement kit for the fork at suspensionforkparts.net.
My concern is, when I unscrew the top plastic nut to remove the old elastomers, that I have found the old elastomers to be very brittle, several of them breaking into pieces upon removal, with brittle chunks still stuck within my fork. I can get the top-most units removed, but I know there is still at least one or two layers of elastomer in the bottom of the fork.
Does anyone have experience removing old brittle pieces of elastomer without damaging the tubes of the fork? My intuition says I should get in there with a long flathead screwdriver and a hammer, but I do not want to damage parts within the bottom of the fork that I cannot see. I also will need to access the very bottom of the fork with a long hex wrench when the elastomers are removed to fully disassemble and service the the bottom shafts. So, I am a bit worried that my screwdriver approach will jam the old elastomer pieces in the bottom of the fork, preventing access to the hex screw.
Thank you in advance for any tips you can offer on safely removing the old brittle elastomers.