Breaking The Wind

I may have mentioned previously that the new bike has a smaller and lower fairing than the Electra Glide did.  Additionally, the windshield on the new bike is shorter than even the aftermarket one I had on the EG.  Combined, this means my head gets buffeted unmercifully at even moderate speeds, let along high speeds.  This was causing me neck and back pain from fighting the wind, not to mention the wind noise left my ears ringing for hours afterward - even after wearing ear plugs!

Something had to be done to break up the wind stream.

Enter Jan and Steve.  I'd noticed that they had aftermarket windshields on their Street Glides which seemed to make a big difference, so a quick email over to Jan and I had the info I needed; it's called The Flare, and it's made by Klock Werks.  It's got an interesting design - the sides dip a bit, about halfway up, and the front/middle "flares" straight upward.  What this does is funnel some of the wind off to the sides while the front/middle claims to really damper the wind coming over the top.

Ok, let's give it a try.  I went on-line and found the right model for the bike.  Going on Jan's advice, I went with the 6.5 inch, dark smoke version.  Delivery said it would be in a week - which brought me to last night.

Arriving home - no package.  Wait - it's been raining all day long, maybe the deliver guy was smart this time around and put it into the porch?

Ta da!  A box from Klock Werks!  Thank you delivery guy (or gal!)!

Opening the box, I found an extremely well wrapped windshield.  A+ job on the packaging, I'll give them that.  But in looking at it, it seemed pretty short, and I wondered if I'd gotten the right size...should I have gone with the next larger one?

Here's the stock windshield, laid on top of the Klock Werks one.  There's about 3 inches of additional height there, so that will help some at least...

Installation took about 30 seconds - it's a windshield!  Only three bolts!  Although something interesting I did find; the middle bolt is about 2.5 inches long.  (If you click on the pic above, you can see the bolts on the right side of the picture.)  The longer bolt is needed as it threads down the center post of the new fairing vent - the same vent that has proven to be worthless with alleviating wind buffeting.

Anyway - installed!  I tried to snap a couple of pics from an angle that would give you a good idea of what this thing looks like...

As you can see from the second pic, it was still raining pretty well so testing this thing would have to wait until this morning.

So how did it perform?

Pulling out of my driveway at 5:30 in the morning, I keep the throttle rather low so as to not annoy the neighbors.  As I proceed into the wooded section and was able to open things up a bit more, I noticed there seemed like a fair amount of wind passing by on either side of my head - obviously from the little dips in the side of the windshield, but it wasn't a bad thing, just noticeable.

The true test came when I finally reached the long stretch of open road in Medfield.  The speed limit is 55, which - on an early morning, devoid of other traffic, basically means; "Go as fast as you're willing to pay for, if you get radar'd."  Which this morning meant 90mph.  Certainly a decent test, even if only for about a mile and a half (before the speed limit drops back down again).

I have to say that I noticed a marked improvement with the wind shear.  The noise was considerably less, and my head didn't feel like it was being shoved all around.  I'm impressed!

I'll be able to do the full-on test this Saturday morning when I'm back on 495 and hammering toward the Cape again (big charity run going on).  But suffice to say, I think I'm going to continue to be impressed.

Ride Hard, Break Wind!