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New conversion, first outing
I picked up my '04 GL1800 Hannigan conversion yesterday afternoon and will take my wife on our first outing shortly. I put 70,000 miles on the bike since purchasing it used in 2010 and my wife and I have had many nice trips, but a half ton of bike in stop-and-go traffic concerned her (and me) greatly. After significant research, I settled on a Hannigan conversion and Mark Cole of Cycle Specialties in Portland, Oregon did a spectacular job in the rendering of the addition of a 'training wheel' to the Magenta Metalic Marvel.
The visual of the Magenta and black and brushed aluminium wheels front and back is quite lovely. The comment of my neighbor who was a custom car and bike painter: 'The whole assembly looks like the bike was originally built that way' is a compliment to Hannigan's styling prowess. (My wife followed me most of the way home and told me she likes the rear lighting a lot - "It has a great looking butt!".
It will take some time to become accustomed to feeling I should have a seat belt, but I'll learn. My ride home on back roads was instructional and the ride quality was amazingly refined. I knew lumps and bumps were there, I "encountered them", but didn't really "feel" them. The 180 kit looks awesome, but it will, again, take time to get used to the difference in steering effort required, although I've been told by those with experience the 5.25* rake helps a lot.
The modification of changing the tour-pac and whale tail light bars to Kury 4-function bars with braking anticipators makes the rear highly visible when stopping/turning and SoCal's new front turn smoked lenses with running light "white" LED that flashes amber, along with all lamps changed out to LED adds to make the visual impact greater. Existing FutureVision 50W.
projector driving and 35W low beam projectors, 35W HID low beams, 50W quartz-halogen high beam on modulator and LED Kury fogs gets the attention of those in front of me.
I rarely have cars trying to 'bad-turn' in front of me!! (Burned retinas, I expect!).
Paint color match is a bit off, but that issue is in the process of discussion - phone-tag is a challenge. In general the quality is very good.
This is also my commute vehicle, so I'm looking forward to find what the difference in fuel economy is for my 50 mile-a-day is. I'll be better able to find what my now-range of 11-gallons will be. I had RoadSmith's fuel aux.tank tank inlet installed, so fuel transfer in motion should be a breeze.
I expect my first "Mother of God, what have I done?" to become "How cool is this!
", and, camping with my darling in our Leisure
Lite will be the icing on relaxation!
I've been reading this forum for some time now, and expect to give updates as time and motivation allow.
Originally Posted by knob
