turn around

I've moved my front indicators.
Not, As I've seen in some pics, to the inside of the fork legs so that they sit close together. This looks, at first sight, to be a much neater solution but I'm not convinced as to how safe it will be. Would on-coming drivers be able to distinguish between left and right when you're turning? Or would it also necessitate the use of hand signals?
I had toyed with the idea of mounting the turn signals on the handlebars, the way most other models have them. They are usually attached to the handlebar controls. I'm not really happy with that look and the number of people on HD forums asking how to mount them onto the fork legs may show that others agree with me.
All I've done is to move them down the fork leg so that the bracket sits tight against the underside of the lower triple tree. It leaves the forks looking much cleaner and the headlight is now sitting on its own and less cluttered.
I will leave it like this until I decide what to do about the front end. I'm going to replace the rear turn signals with RBS black billet ones but will leave the fronts in chrome until I've decided on black or shiny forks.
Then again, I may splash out on RBS bullet signals. Much smaller but expensive.
But, as they only come in sets of four, back and front have to be purchased at the same time.

raising the bar!

I've been looking at bike lifts recently.
I had planned (other financial commitments stopped me for now) to fit a sissy-bar on detachable side-rails and wanted to do the work myself. That's when I got to thinking about doing other maintenance and the fact that my bike only has a side-stand. This would surely be an obstacle to working on the bike? The angle aside, I don't think I'd be at all comfortable working on my bike in such a precarious position.
That's when I went through some bike forums and started reading what other bikers do to get round this.
I had no idea that hydraulic bike lifts were so common-place or so affordable.
I'm going to do a bit more research for a couple of weeks and then decide which one I'll go for. The front runners are the Clarke CML2 or the Americana 2. Maybe someone reading this would like to post a recommendation!
I'm off work in September, so that will give me time to decide and get it ordered so that delivery will suit my time off.

gloves

I've just received, in the post, my new pair of gloves.

I was looking for gloves which were suitable for riding in the summer (or at least in what passes for summer, here in Scotland!) but didn't want a pair of out and out bike gloves. I prefer the shorter style of glove which will fit under the cuff of my jacket.
So, what I eventually settled on, after a lot of browsing, were black roper gloves by redwing. I've already got a pair of redwing engineer boots and am pleased with the quality, so all that concerned me when I ordered them, from Silvermans, was the sizing. The smallest they do is medium and often I fit into small gloves. Wee hands!
Not to worry though, thanks to good ol' US of A sizing they fit perfectly!
They are extremely well made and comfortable. I'm sure they will also improve in look with weathering. I'll do a review when I've worn them on the bike a couple of times.
Now I'm wondering if I should have gone for the tan, to give me that Dennis Hopper's Billy, look from Easy Rider.

One word of caution though, to anyone considering following my recommendation and buying a pair. When I got them and took them out of the packaging I was about to pull the labels off. I then noticed that the staple which held the main label onto the gloves was a big, beefy one. I had expected one of the light ones which usually fasten labels to clothing and therefore come off with one swift jerk. Not so this garment. Had I yanked this one off I'd most likely have torn the glove! So take care and use a pair of pliers!

Bulldog Bash

I see the annual biker fest run by the Hells Angels went ahead this weekend.
It was attended by more than 25,000 bikers. This, despite the best efforts of Warwickshire Police to have it banned.
The Assistant Chief Constable had claimed that there were public safefty concerns following the murder of Hells Angel Gerry Tobin on his way home from the Bash in 2007 and a fight between rival bike gangs in Birmingham airport. The claim was that these were reasons enough to have this well established bike show cancelled and, more than likely, banned altogether.
No matter what you think of the HA and other bike "gangs" this seems to have been a classic example of heavy-handed policing at best and at worse a direct infringement of the rights of bikers who want to be a bit different from main-stream society.
You don't need to be a 1%er to understand the lure of the "back-patch" and want to feel the freedom that biking brings. All bikers, whether "outlaws" or not, should be worried at these moves.
Well, in the end, the police were wrong and the weekend seems to have been a great success. The Bash has always been a top drag race event and this year's seems to be no exception by the look of the records that were broken.
And, that's on top of the custom bike show!
Check out the website here .