I had an '09 RKC and now own a '12 RK. Having had both bags, I give a slight edge to the hard bags. It's nice to be able to lock them up and while I was never caught in a downpour on the '09, I think the hard bags have to be more resistant to rain & weather. Also, I had a docking station on the '09 so I had the kit that limited opening the lids. One downside, you have to be careful not to scuff the tops of the hard bags getting on & off your scooter.

 

Check this out...I have been in the same situation but Ilove my leather bags...I just want hard bags for when I travel out of state. With these bags all you need is to get someone to paint them and new hardware(you can also get that on ebay)http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...vip=true&rt=nc

 

As others have said, you just need to adjust the brackets. A good tip if you're going to switch back and forth between hard and leather, you can put little tell marks with a sharpie on the bracket and the bike so you know where the brackets need to be for each type of bag. Another good tip is mount the bags with the brackets just loose enough to do fine adjusting of them, then torque down the bracket bolts. My stock seat on my RKC did rub the front inner corner of the lid when you open it but that's because of the way cop bags have hinges.

Also, be careful buying bags on here in the classifieds or elsewhere without the hardware, the hardware is a lot more expensive than you'd think.

Check out cop bag takeoffs. They are cheaper usually than normal bags because a lot of people don't like the look of the pucks but I'm a function over looks guy. You can not beat being able to open them while on the bike, even while moving or simply being able to open them one handed. I thought I'd switch back and forth between the leather and the cop bags I bought until I realized how convenient the cop bags are, which took me about the first 2 uses of the cop bags.

 

https://www.hdforums.com/forum/touri...ags-black.html

 

Yep minor to no adjustment needed. I loved my soft bags but the hard bags are very nice. You can even go to the dealer and pay a little extra (i think it cost me $55) to have the locks on the bags match your ignition key.