What are you guys torquing your 3 bat wing fairing windshield bolts to? I am now going on my 3rd windshield. This small spider crack seams to appear after riding for a while at either one of the two end bolts. Then it just progesses from there. I've checked fairing brackets for the infamous cracked brackets, ensured I don't over torque. Hell, I've tried going from the recommended 20 to 30 inch pounds to 15. Still ends up eventually cracking. The rubber strip is in place and so are the rubber bolt gromets. I am getting ready to put on another shield, a Klock Werks, and don't want to lose yet another. Can't go any lower than 15 inch pounds. I can practically turn them out with my bare fingers. Any less and I'll have to use Loctitie to keep them in. But then I'm sure I'd end up with the damn blind nuts just twisting out of the fairing when I try to remove them next time.

 

I have a Road King but I presume the fairing shields would be designed the same. When I got my Memphis Shades it came with some sort of grommets that are designed to eliminate the problem you are having. I just today put an LRS shield on and used the grommets from the MS shield.

 

I torque all 7 of them by feel. First I screw them in so that they just seated. Next I incrementally tighten them one by one a little at a time. I am trying to pull both sides of the clamshell together, evenly. I use a straight driver with a T27 bit. I feel like a wrench of any kind can deliver too much force when dealing with plastic parts. Then after a short ride I will check them and tighten as needed.

It would be interesting to know what 3 windshields have cracked. All stock?

 

Me too.

 

2 stock and one Harley Windsplitter. I went to get another 7" windsplitter which worked good, but they ended up selling me a 6.5 Klock Werks. I hope it works as good. It's 1/2 shorter, but I didn't like the 8" look.

 

The Klock Werks should not crack, I just put one on mine. The LRS which I had on, and liked a lot, cracked right up the center. Make sure you have the windshield pushed down all the way allowing the screw hole nubs to engage in the rounded opening at the bottom of the shield.

When you put on the Klock Werks you will notice it is a bit tougher to install. What I did was get the 2 outer holes lined up and the screws started a few turns, then push the center of the shield down until the center hole pops over the nub.

 

Book calls for 25 to 30 inch lbs. on an 11 model. I would think the same for an 09

 

I torque by feel and sight. Just enough to be tight and not too much that the painted bodywork is will deform. Sometimes published torques will deform the bodywork.

 

I think that I will also loosen not only the three windshield bolts, but also the two bolts down lower on the fairing so that I have a lot of room to play and wiggle things around. Somebody else told me I should be doing this any way?

 

And when yer a retard like me, and tighten them according to ''feeeeyul", you'll strip the metal ferul thing right outta the plastic mold. Thank goodness for JB Weld. I 've had to repair two of them this way, which seems to be a pretty good fix.