Hey Everybody,


This'll probably be a lengthy thread, there's a lot to catch up on, but onto business. I'd imagine everyone remembers the first time they took of on their first Harley or any bike for that matter, and that's what this thread is about. So here's the story, I got the itch to get a bike, and I had found one to go look at in North Georgia, man it was perfect, everything I thought I wanted in a Dyna. It was an 05 Superglide, pretty much all stock, had the cast wheels and Gloss Black paint I was looking for so I called the guy and set up a time to come see the bike at the first of the following week. But the weekend prior to going to see the bike, my pops and I took off down to Florida to head down to the boat he keeps in Destin. So as a father and son will do, we got bored and looked for something to do and ended up at the dealership in Fort Walton Beach. About the time we made it to the bikes outside the place and found the Dyna's, a salesman made his way to us. He pointed me in the direction of an 06 Street Bob in the most awful color(at least to me), black denim. Something clicked though and I ended up with the bike. It had 9k miles on the clock and sported a healthy 88 and got it for a smokin' deal (or so i thought lol..), Anyways, three hours later, never having been on a bike, and only having a permit, I made a 30 mile trip back to the marina. Picture time, here's the bike at the dealer.








Man I was happy, I had a bike, it was such a fun ride too, best feeling in the world. I was so happy in fact that I didn't notice the loose right blinker, it ended up falling off somewhere between the dealership and the marina. I should've paid more attention to that, man it was a sign of things to come, but we'll get to that later on. Anyways, I got up early Sunday Morning and took the bike up a scenic highway from Niceville to Freeport, about a 20 mile ride each way. At this point, to me, it was the best decision I ever made, I loved every mile haha. Here's a picture at a stop I made along the way;





Anyways, we got back home to Georgia later that night, and I tucked it away in the garage for the night. The next morning, I fired it up and took off, but only made it about 3 miles before the bike shut off. It finally decided it wanted to run enough to get to work. I made it there and pulled it into the Sign and Graphic shop I work at, and figured I might as well take the time to get rid of the denim while it doesn't run right? So I pulled the tins off and we went to work sticking a little vinyl on it;







I went with almost a root beer color that had a good bit of flake to it, it's really nice in the sun. It was a bit boring but I liked it. While I had the tank off, I took the time to pull the fuel pump and found a nice surprise, apparently a fuel filter isn't recommended by Harley till i think 15K miles? Crazy. So I found my problem, somehow the fuel sock shredded in the tank, and stopped up the filter. Seems ike something that could be easily addressed in Harley's "pre buy inspection" but anyways;





A week goes by, We finish the wrap and I'm back in business. I took off to the house after work, first ride since it pooped out and made it about 5 miles and the most God awful knocking started, continued all the way till i made it to the house. The infamous pulley bolt issue bit me, you could imagine how I was feeling with the bike at this point. Got off the bike at the house and found this;



But at least it looks a little better







At this point I was 100% flipped on the bike and the dealership, everything that went wrong with the bike was inexcusable and should've been gone over before the bike was even sold, but oh well right? Didn't really think much of it, re-torqued the remaining sprocket bolts and rode it. Enjoyed it for I guess another week until we got slow at work and added some more vinyl, ending up with this;








I believe the tank decal we printed for it was from the early 2000's Wide Glides, but I could be wrong on that one; I just found it and liked it, and it was already in a format we could easily changed the colors on and make a quick digital print out of. As with how things have been going with the bike, one step forward seemed to make at something go wrong with it. I was leaving work headed to my dad's auto shop, flipped the blinker on to turn in and the rear wheel locked up. Bet you can guess what it was; if you guessed sprocket bolt, you'd be right. Another bolt caught the swing arm and bent it into a U, but I guess at this point it was my fault for not using lock tight when re-torquing them, regardless, that was the straw that broke the camel's back. I parked the bike till the weekend, the family was headed down to Destin for the annual "Family Vacation", so I loaded up the bike and hauled it back down there. Long story short, I got my bike back after two long weeks, the dealership replaced pretty much everything on the rear end of the bike, even including the right rear blinker that fell off leaving the dealership on their own dime which made me a little happier, but one right still doesn't make you forget the wrongs. Here's the little rant for those of you still reading; assuming its the same at all dealerships, when buying a pre-owned Harley from a dealership, they charged about a grand for "dealer prep", which is funny because after asking the service writer what records they had on the bike, that prep consisted of installing a battery tender lead and changing the oil. That's some real rental car math lol. Moving on past that and fast forwarding a little, I rode the bike for two weeks and enjoyed it, got my trust back in the bike, rode about 300ish miles I think. Rode it just long enough to make it quit once more, the fuel pump dying left me stranded one night headed home. Hauled it to the local dealership here, Great South Harley, and man are they a class act. They got the bike back going quickly and took care of the customer as a dealership should. I rode the bike a month issue free, put a little over a thousand miles on and kept riding it every chance I was able to. At this point, I had owned the bike for a month and a few weeks, three of the week had been spent in the service department, during this time my dad got the bug and found an 09 FXDC, and riding with him has really become one of those things you appreciate.




Now this is the part where things go pretty quickly, no more issues, no more fighting the bike. I found a set of 13 Spoke Mags that were takeoffs from an 05 Superglide, and a week later they got delivered to my neighbors house by the man in the brown truck (Let me tell you, that was a little scary seeing delivered and not being able to find my wheels). Got them out of the box, and went to cleaning 12 years worth of nastiness off of them, you'd be surprised at how well a Scotch-Brite pad and Mother Polish will cut.






In the time that it took me to get them cleaned up, a pair of switchblades from an 08+ Low Rider popped up and shortly thereafter showed up to me, so the 13 spokes received a good cleaning and found a new home somewhere out in California. I thought that mounting an 08+ 25mm axle wheel to my 06 1" axled bike would be an ordeal but it went smooth. If anyone wants any information or part numbers on bearings, spacers, and crush sleeves I'd be more than happy to provide them. I also got a Villian2Hero T Sport Fairing and got it on the bike a little before the wheels, and ended up like this (pics are in order);

 

So now that I had the bike headed in the direction that I wanted it, everything was great. I started looking into suspension, I knew i wanted Ohlins and after scouring the forums I kept seeing Howard's name from Motorcycle Metal pop up. I ended up with a set of 13-3/8 S36E's set up from Howard. now that they settled in they're awesome, which leaves the front with more to be desired but that's my next big thing. I apologize for the garage being a mess and the bad picture quality;






So now we're back to the current, the last thing I've done since then was ditching the V&H's for a Thunder Header. Kind've unbelievable the difference it made, the bike seemed smoother, but I'd guess that's just the nature of going from a 2-2 with no back pressure to a 2-1 with back pressure.




So that's where I am so far, I will continue to update the thread as things change and are added. Thank you for viewing!

 

Looks real good, I would never guess that was wrap, congrats!

 

Looks good there sir... Those rims make it...
Now question about the vinyl? What's the life on it?
Nice alternative to paint.. And now you have done your bike thoughts on doing others?

 

Same dealership I got mine at. Glad my ordeal wasn't as bad!

 

Life on the vinyl heavily depends on how it's taken care of, most wrap manufactures rate their products at I believe 3 years on the removability, but that's just their number. Depends on if it's garaged and taken care off with washing and dealing with a wax or vinyl product, or if it spends most of its time outside. On my bike, I'd expect really as long as I want with it just because it stays inside and gets waxed frequently. It's just all in the care of it, like anything really. And we've done a few at the sign shop, it's not really a common thing but we've had a few, mainly sportbikes, but we did do a pretty sweet Street Glide a few months back.

 

I'm glad for you, I wouldn't wish it on anyone. I left out a lot of the details on it but it was an absolute cluster. Learned my lesson.

 

Bike looks fantastic!!! Would love to know more about the vinyl wrap process, where to find it and how much it costs to do a project like this.

 

Wow! That root beer color is insane!! What’s the actual color or paint code?

 

The process is pretty much the same as paint, pull the bike apart and clean the parts just like you would to paint, but as long as your surface is smooth there's really no prep. Most sign and graphic shops are capable of this, it's really not that bad once you figure out how the vinyl wants to live in situations. I wish I could give a guess on pricing, but I'm not all that familiar with the pricing. I would guess 800ish, maybe more maybe less. But they're a ton less downtime compared to paint, whatever is under the wrap is protected, and removal is super easy with a quality vinyl. All in all, I maybe have 4-5 hours in wrapping the bike from start to finish.