| Chris had his '05 VTX1800 Honda customized with a ton of trick work. Smoothing the tank for a pop-up cap and Dakota digital gauges to mount on the new fat T-Bars, Supreme Legends forward controls, KewlMetal front forks, Spiegler Lines and A one-off Hotshoe Custom Intake Exhaust system. |
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| I pulled the fuel tank and smoothed off the instrument mounts and changed the fuel cap to a color matched pop-up cap. Then I made a one of a kind intake system and exhaust system from scratch with Chris' style in mind. |
| After 4 months of waiting, we got a big box from Kewl Metal. It was a hefty 60lbs of parts. Lay them out on a blanket and familiarize yourself with the many pages of instructions and parts supplied. Now take a few more minutes and some masking tape to cover the exposed surfaces to protect the chrome and aluminum. Get your bike on a stand and remove the fuel tank. Remove the controls, handle bars, upper tree, front brake calipers, front wheel, turn signals, front brake lines, fork legs and lower fork tree. |
| Now using a hooked end of a drift, catch the edge of the bearing race, strike it with another drift and hammer, if you can't hold the second drift in your teeth and strike it with your free third hand, you may need some help. I use my leg to hold the lower hook, and alternate sided to get out the races top and bottom. |
| Get the drained and cleaned fork leg into a vise by the caliper mounting ears. Heat the aluminum foor untill the Locktite melts and allows you to unscrew the fork tube with a strap wrench. I cleaned the threads, salvaged the o-ring (which wasn't supplied, but took some abuse with the heat) sealed the thtreads with locktite red and liquid teflon sealant. Tighten them into the feet with the axle giving you some extra leverage. These must be tight. We had leaking issues. |
| Not ONly will you need the fairly priced $3299 retail priced Pro-Street Fork Kit, you will need their Headlight bracket, Their Extended cables, Spiegler Custom Length Clutch & Brake Lines. Kewlmetal was kind enough to give us a generous discount in exchange for our patience waiting for the kit, but the customer insisted I pay for half of the extra parts needed to install his front end. I agreed, live and learn, but it won't happen again. The only thing worse to an installer than having to get extra parts, is having to take money from your pocket. |
| Align the notches on the neck alignment bar, hammer the lower tree pivot into place and assemble the fork trees. Lube the supplied o-rings and slip the aluminum covers over the fork legs as you insert them into the fork trees. Now install the fender / brake brackets and fender. Next in is the wheel and brakes. A bead of sealant keeps the fork foot covers quiet and snug. Be ready to cut a few bolts and source a few creative solutions when mounting the fender. |
| You will have to replace your original brake lines at this point, as well as the throttle cables and clitch line. We use Spiegler kits because they have a gorgeous chrome line block to incorporate the linked braking system. The factory line ends are soft and required the use of a pipe wrench to remove. The linking of the Dot 4 front brake system and the SUpreme Legends Forward controls dictated that we convert the system to Dot 5. There is some tweaking required to get the junctions sealed and bled, but Ben got it bled after some patience and hard work. |
| Next came the installation of the Throttle cables, a Pro-One turn signal bar and a Dakota Digital HLY-7000 Gauge. This was a lot of shrink wrap and soldering work.It is a unique gauge for the metric market since it has a low fuel light and a check engin light as well as the regular features like a tachometer, a speedo that reads the Honda sender and lots more. |
| Before |