A few months ago I began thinking about a new front end for my '00 FXDL. This came about because I was so impressed with the Ohlins rear shocks I recently put on the bike, and wanted a front end to match the performance.

Some brief background. The bike had a 39mm narrow glide front end with Custom Cycle Engineering triple trees and fork truss. It also had Progressive Fork Springs.

I spoke with Howard at Motorcyclemetal.com who told me about the Ohlins FGK 205 30mm Cartridges, which with some work on his end would work with Harley's 49mm front end. Since I had a 39mm front end, we would need to do a conversion to the 49mm mid glide. Howard did all the machine work and between us we gathered all the parts, including dyna triple trees, Nightrod Special lower forks, fork tubes, new 1" hub and axle (old wheel hub was 3/4"), custom fender brackets, Ohlins FGK cartridges, fork springs, etc. If your bike already has a 49mm front end you're way ahead of the game!

The cool thing about the Ohlins cartridges are that they are fully adjustable; the right fork for the rebound and the left fork for compression.

Once the build from Howard's end was complete, Rosa's Cycles, who did all the performance work on my bike, did the install and setup of the new front end.

My initial impression when I took it for my first ride was, the ride is amazing! Andrew Rosa, who test rode it said it was incredible the way bike handles on rutted and pot holed roads, and he was 100% right. It was amazing how the front end just soaked up the irregularities. The front end also gave the bike a real precision feel.

Over the weekend I put on about 150 miles and can report the following: Control over uneven roads is amazing, as is tight turn and sweeping turn responsiveness. On hard braking, front end dive is very controlled. Stability up to 120 MPH (the fastest I went) was great, especially since the bike previously used to get a front end wobble, usually around 100MPH. Overall, the comfort and performance is just awesome and I couldn't be more impressed.

 

Looks good and sounds like you have a nice setup. Eventually I will get their. Now you just need to chrome the rear shock and spring. Hahaha

 

I'm impressed!



Your bike is where I'd like mine to be heading, although you have a good balance of looks and performance to back it up! Nicely done and thanks for the review! I was wondering what to do with the front end, although I'm sure that is not a cheaper option looking at the rest of your build.

 

how come you have yellow rear shocks, looks like a ricer

 

thats how ohlins make them.

 

I can answer for him. It is the brutal look of performance. Ohlins piggy back shocks. Very high end. The boy isn't suffering in the economic slowdown.
Cheers.

 

Exactly! I think they are actually cool as hell looking, it means that bike is BUSINESS.

It's one of the only tip offs to what lays under the rider. I'd personally go black just to have the ultimate sleeper, but I dig what he's got going!

 

I got black springs! But the yellow rezzies set it off quite nice!

 

Sounds like you spent a lot of money and time to re-invent the FXDX front end.

 

Don't think so; the FXDX is just another skinny 39mm front end with adjustable pre-load, comp and rebound. It's a little "light" for a 100+hp 600+lb bike...I know for sure...even with a good fork brace, I'd prefer something with less flex at speed and under load.