Help. I am a newbie. I hope someone can help me. I am very frustrated.

I have had many bikes. I just bought my first Harley..a 2012 XL1200C. The issue is the sissy bar that came on the bike.

If you notice the attached pic, you will see 4 exposed nuts.The lower nuts actually press into the stock seat. This is ridiculous. There should be no exposed nuts. It looks horrible. Further, if it was supposed to have nuts they should not touch the seat. The dealer agrees. They (2 people for over an hour) looked on the parts breakdowns and it doesn’t show hardware…or how the sissy barconnects to the fixed plate mounts. Isaid, forget how this bike is. How would you sell me a sissy bar and fixed plate mount and all that you need to put this together. They had no clue. They shrugged their shoulder and gave me a blank stare and I left.

This is not some esoteric part. The Sportster is a common bike and the sissy bar is a common accessory.

I tend to think the sissy bar should not have a through –hole and should be internally threaded. If that is correct the parts breakdown would show screws with no nuts. The parts breakdown does not show hardware. They only show a hardware kit to mount the side plates to the fender…not to mount the sissy bar. Please do not tell me how you would fix it. I know I could reverse the screw and put an acorn nut on the outside but that is not the way it should be. I simply would like to know how this is supposed to be with the correct Harley parts.

Can someone please tell me what the heck is going on here? (I am also starting to doubt that I will feel confident paying the dealerany money (and apparently nothing is inexpensive) for any type of service is they cannot figure out something this basic.)

Thank you!

 

I reversed the bolt from inside to outside. I replace the nuts with 4 pretty chrome cap nut. I bought the chrome nuts from HD dealer here.

 

Thanx. As I said, my fallback is acorn nuts on the outside. But for the 300 dollars the backrest/sissy bar/fixed mounts cost there has to be a Harley engineered solution for this. I simply cannot believe Harley with their attention to detail (and high cost) doesn't have this figured out properly.

 

what brand bar is it ? you have other pix ?

 

dumb question - if you remove one of them nuts an bolts

is there threads on the inside of the bar or just a smooth open hole ?

 

Those nuts won't bother you once you attach a T-Bag or bedroll.

If you still don't want your nuts to show, a machine shop can tap or install threaded inserts in the Sissy bar, to eliminate the nuts.

 

Have you considered adding the detachable version? It's much cleaner in my opinion. Here are some shots with the sissy bar and without. I think HD sells chrome and or black mounts and covers for the hardware when detached. It's mounted on my 2013 XLC.

 

The sissybar should have tapped holes for the bolts to attach to. Someone could have just added longer bolts and nuts because they didn't like thread locker. Pull one of the bolts and see if there are threads in the bar or if it's just a smooth hole, this might help you determine what's going on.

 

I have the same problem. It is even worse with the sundowner seat that I put on to replace the stock seat. I will probably end up just reversin the bolts and nuts for the time being. I will probably end up putting the detachable side plate mounts on it just so I can put a taller backrest on than you can with the rigid plates.