Hey guys, so I'm new to this community and bought my first bike recently (2016 Sportster 48). I really want to change my handle bars from the stock ones to drag bars with preferably no rise. I have a shop that I work in during the day time (not mechanic shop) but I have plenty tools available to me. My question is regarding the cables. The dealer ship I went to told me I'd definitely need to swap my stock ones for shorter cables but I'm finding it hard to imagine there would be such a significant amount of slack if I just kept those. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated 👍🏻

 

Keep your cables, and when you're done you can make the decision about whether the slack bothers you.. but I imagine you'll be fine with them.

 

I agree with the above post. Try it see what you think and go from there

 

I just added drags to my Roadster. The cables where fine with a little rerouting to make them look good. I got the Harley brand drag bars.

 

I installed the same drag bar (HD-brand Sportster drag bar) on my Iron without changing any cables.

The only cable that was really too long is the clutch cable. It loops up far enough for the cable to rest against the headlight. It doesn't cause any issues, just would look a little better if it was couple inches shorter.

The only other minor problem is the banjo fitting of the front brake line. The metal fitting at the end with the 90-deg bend sort of rests against the back of the fork cap. Doesn't hurt anything, just an observation. I like the angle my controls / levers are at but I can't rotate them any further up due to the brake line/fork interference.

 

thanks for the feedback. Does your iron have the mirrors up or hanging down how the 48's come ? That's also been a concer of mine because I'm not sure if I'll also need to relocate my turn signals lower down the fork

 

My mirrors are flipped below the bar which I did for looks and function even before installing the drag bars.

I also previously had relocated my turn signals to the fork to clean up the look a little. I believe the flipped mirror and turn signals can both be done on the bar but looks a little busy to me. I wanted the bars as clean/minimal as possible.

 

Yea I figure if I'm going to have a problem with the turn signals I might as well just order these minimalist wrap around turn signals I found on revzilla https://www.revzilla.com/motorcycle/custom-dynamics-truwrapz-led-turn-signals-for-harley

 

I like the look of those. When I did it I just spent the $30 from the dealership for the adapters to move them to the fork lowers. I may still switch to the TruWrapz some day after I get all my other projects finished (yeah, right...it's never finished)

 

lol I know how you feel bro. I got mine in September and fell in love at the dealers. A week after I spent time looking at other people's Sportsters I had a phone book sized to do list. Thank you for all your feedback though 👍🏻