Bonneville America Forums Forums Technical Forums Performance Mods The 15 Minute Job

Yeeep, ordered me a set of Jim's spacers to raise my bars a little and figured after doing all the work on my Trophy this would be a piece of cake. The nut on the bolt holding the risers to the triple clamp on the right came off with no problem at all but the left hand one was waaay tighter and I rounded it off - wasn't paying attention and used a 12-point socket instead of a 6 point. 3 and 1/2 hours later (nut breaker, drill, vice gips, hammer and screw driver, etc..) I had it off. Victory was short lived. I installed the spacers and went to put the bars back on and - hey, wait why won't these bars go back on???? Ahhhh, I see, at full lock to the right the throttle cables are as tight as bow strings. Gotta re-route those cables before I go riding anywhere. The longest 15 minute job on my life is still not done.
Can't wait to install my Easy Brackets next week. I'm sure it's just a 15 minute job.

Anyone else have a "15 minute job" story?

Keith

Oh, when you said 15 minute job I thought you were talking about.........

Here's a quick fix until you can re-route your cables.

Go full lock left and you should be able to pop the cables out of that wire/cable keeper thingie. Will be a lot looser...

Holy s*** Keith - reading your post it sounded like you were describing my 15 minute job! Same problem with the left side and sounds like the same solution with about the same tools. I ended up drilling out the head of the bolt inside the stock risers until I was able to POUND the headless thing out the bottom. Felt like a total moron; glad nobody was watching. Did get the spacers and the bars on OK, though. What a cluster. I am happy with the results but I wonder if I should be allowed to handle tools around the BA.....

I cant even seem to get my chain adjusted in fifteen minutes. I takes me longer than that just to get started and then im never satisfied with the results. Course I sit and ponder the situation alot. And one other note. A twelve point wrench has no business on anything other than a twelve point nut. I tell myself this every time I round of another nut. I think trimuph uses a lot of one time only fastner's.

I had the tight throttle cable problem also. All I had to do was move the cables to the top side of the big blob of wiring harness on the front of the frame...
Problem went away.
I spent more time rigging something up to suspend the bars from the ceiling in the garage than I did installing the spacers. Once the rigging was done, it was a 17.5 minute job. (15 min. for non-smokers....)

15 minutes! It takes me 15 minutes just to get my heart started in the morning.

Hey Jazz, the EZ brackets are very simple. My advice would be to have a few flat washers handy. I had to use a couple under the front (I think) posts to get the slots to line up correctly. The posts go on fine, but the brackets themselves are finikey about going on unless the posts are exactly the same distance apart, ya know? No biggie tho!!

Thanks guys, I'm glad I'm not the only one that has had this problem. I've fiddled with the cables a little but I'm still not happy so I'll reroute them when I get a chance.

Thanks for the EZ Bracket advice too. The first question mark with those is are they going to show up??? I ordered them from Brent and he doesn't stock the lugs for the rack/sissy bar setup so he had them drop shipped from EZ Bracket. The rest of the stuff I ordered from him came in a few days with a note on the invoice that said "Drop Shipped". I'm always a little leary when I'm paying one company and counting on another to actually deliver the product. I'd be a lot more concerned if I hadn't spoken with Brent and read so many good things about his customer service. It's more likely EZ Bracket would fumble the ball if anything.

You're absolutely right about that. If you get antsy, give EZ a call and let em know, but I wouldn't worry too much about it.

you can call ez directly. thet're great to deal with as well. the 'issue' with ez brackets aint the docking posts, it's mounting the infernal brackets to your bags. while ultimately a highly satisfactory product, putting it together was quite a pita.

Amen to that! The "Easy" barckets are not as their name states. The easy part is when you're done and want them on/off. Getting the posts lined up was a pita as was putting them suckers on the bags. I ended up getting a bunch of new SS nuts, bolts and fender washers so as not to deal with rusty hardware down the road, so to speak. I would recommend doing the same as the steel parts will rust on you after awhile and you'll have to replace them again. But that's only for the folks that don't live in Phoenix, San Diego and all the other warm dry spots that keep busting my nads.

speaking of buggered-up bolt heads (not to be confused w/ dolt head, of whom i was at 5 quarts of vodka a week for years), has anyone used that don vila sears buggered-up bolt extractor from sears?
for 20 bucks it wd. be worth a try.
cat
buggered-up bolt extractor from don Vila

Well I'll be. The left hand one on Vera was waaay tighter and I rounded it off too. I used a cold chisel and hammer. Got it off with no nicks to triple tree. grrrrr.

I had to re-route the throttle cables, but most members that have installed the spacers had mentioned it so it wasn't a big surprise. Seems like any 15 minute job turns out to be an hour or more. I just can't take it apart and put it back together since I like to clean up the area and check things out...

I have soft bags, so I have a piece of 1/8 plywood inside each (no metal working tools or I would have used sheet AL) and I bolted right thru the bags/wood, then riveted the wood around the inside of the bags. Holds real good. DEFINITELY a longish install... SO worth it tho.