2005 H-D Road Glide
There is a misnomer with some of the motorcycle public that owners of mom-and-pop custom-motorcycle shops customize their own rides all the time and ride everywhere. This is not the case with Scot, Mercedes and Randy, owners of Redhill Motorcycle Werx in Lyons, Colorado. They would love to have the time to go on all the local rides and spend hours customizing their own rides, but typically they only get to go on a few rides a year and try to squeeze out a few changes on their rides before Sturgis. Sturgis is a mere 350 miles away, so they ride up there every year. This year, co-owner Randy Hocker wanted to do some customization to his Road Glide before the ride. He bought it in 2005 and had a few ideas, but they needed to be items that he could knock out after work when all the paying customers' work was done. The first thing he did was order an FBI kit that included the fender, swingarm with bearings installed, transmission offset kit, spacers, brackets, gaskets and hardware. Randy opted for the turn signals to be mounted in the fender spacers and for the taillight and the license plate to be frenched into the rear fender, so all he would need to do is plug them in and be done with it. He also ordered up a front fender, since he was going to swap out his front wheel for a 21. This was going to be a quick and inexpensive way to make his Road Glide stand out from the pack. He decided that since he was going to have to go into the tranny to replace the mainshaft to accommodate the larger rear tire, he would throw in a Baker six-speed transmission for highway riding.
The FBI kit arrived, and everything fit perfectly; the crew at Redhill got to work, because they only had a couple of weeks until Sturgis. Randy had ordered Performance Machine Domino contrast-cut wheels, a 21x3-inch for the front and 17x6-inch for the rear. He replaced the front caliper and rotor as well with PMs, and everything matched. Randy didn't have time to go into the motor, but he knew that he wasn't getting the fullest potential out of his motor with the stock EFI system. He had heard that ThunderMax had a pretty good system and decided to try one out. The concept made sense for all the high-altitude riding he was doing; it was a true closed-loop system with wide-band oxygen sensors that are constantly analyzing fuel and air needs, which makes for best power no matter the altitude. With the wide-tire addition, he was going to have to look for some new pipes that were two-into-ones. The Bassanis looked like a good fit, and when he bolted them on, he found out that they didn't just fit the bike but also performed very well.
Things were starting to take shape; everything got mocked up and looked great. Next he had to send out the FBI fiberglass parts to get painted by Motorsport Concepts in Thornton, Colorado. It was an easy paint match: Harley-Davidson Yellow Pearl. While the fiberglass was being painted, Randy, Scot and the crew were wrapping up customer builds and fixes before their trip up to the Black Hills. There were always a number of things that had to be done last minute, and it looked as if Randy's Road Glide's final assembly was going to be one of the last things to happen before they headed off, because customers always come first. The crew spent many a long night getting this bike put together before Sturgis, but in the end, it was well worth it.
The trip to Sturgis was great. They went up through Wyoming and headed into South Dakota knowing that this wasn't a ground-up custom, but it showed other riders that you could do a lot with a bagger to improve the looks while keeping it fairly stock. Randy still has plans of lowering it and taking off the stock pillow seat, but overall he is very happy with the look of his FLTR. He estimates that it would cost around $9K to do these upgrades yourself, which is a small price to pay to make your bike stand out in a crowd. You can see more of Redhill at www.redhillmotorcyclewerx.com.
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