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[Boshog]

Well joined the crew last night. She has 17,000 miles and looks to be in great shape. Going to ship it home to Colorado where I'll be tweaking to bring out the performance aspects of the bike.

First servicing and adjustments.

Second will be suspension. I've had the same shocks on a Low Rider and did not like them. I'm getting rid of the "slammed" stance and may get a longer set of shocks. Perhaps reworking the forks along with.

Then comes stripping the excess chrome(weight). Crash bars gone, new seat for "me".  I'd like to see what a straight pair or risers feels like as I like leaning into the wind.

Last will be the engine. I'm not wanting to go nuts going for HPs, but I have a 100 hp Road Glide (for sale)  now that this bike needs to smoke (@6000 feet).

Wish me luck and any tips are appreciated.

Pete

[lucille]

Congratulations Boshog!  Good lookin' scooter, and welcome to the forums.
Greg

[TLS105]

Congrats on your FXR3. I love my Blue 3! I am too looking at going to better shocks. Look into JRI shocks, a great performing shock for the money. The stock 12" are Fox and actually decent shocks. Not saying they're the best, but better than others during the time of their production. Make sure you save all your stock parts. As far as the front end is concerned, putting Race Tech Emulators, and a Fork brace is about all you can do with a stock 39mm front end. If you want better than that, you will need to drop some serious dough. The 80" Evo can be a fun powerplant if set up right. If you are taking off the chrome pieces, be sure to save them as the majority of them are now obsolete. Have you owned a FXR before? Once again, congrats and welcome to the family.

Tom

[Ohio phil]

Welcome Bushog,    I also have a fxr3 and love it O and I have a 100 hp road glide, the fxr smokes it through 3 gears these fxr hook up good congratulation have fun

C-YA
Ohiophil

[Boshog]

Thanks guys, now to tell the wife what I've bought!!

 

[Buy early]

Congrats on the new scoot! Enjoy the ride.

[ltank]

Very Nice. Bike! I bought my FXR4 about 5 years ago. Then I told the wife about it in a email while working
Offshore. I bought it online at a Ohio HD dealer,it was shipped to a dealer 80 miles away. My wife and her brother trailered it home and had it waiting for me. To this day she still bitches about it, that I did not include her in the decision ..I hope it goes well for you.Even if it don't.Enjoy the Ride!
Ltank

[FXR2evo99]

Pete,

Here you are...ok....well...look forward to meeting you soon.

Ummmm if you decide that the crash bars are coming OFF and they are actually OEM crash bars I would be interested in taking them off of your hands....if they are after market ones, then I would actually pass...

Welcome to the a great place to chat with other owners.....

Regards,

Tim

[fxr4mikey]

Congrats on your FXR3. I love my Blue 3! I am too looking at going to better shocks. Look into JRI shocks, a great performing shock for the money. The stock 12" are Fox and actually decent shocks. Not saying they're the best, but better than others during the time of their production. Make sure you save all your stock parts. As far as the front end is concerned, putting Race Tech Emulators, and a Fork brace is about all you can do with a stock 39mm front end. If you want better than that, you will need to drop some serious dough. The 80" Evo can be a fun powerplant if set up right. If you are taking off the chrome pieces, be sure to save them as the majority of them are now obsolete. Have you owned a FXR before? Once again, congrats and welcome to the family.

Tom

Tom - how much trouble is it to 'tune' the Race Tech Emulators  ?    What difference is realized by having these installed in the forks?
Each time you open them up to 'tune' the emulators do you have to change the fork oil ?  How much of a pia is this ?

Thanks !

[fxr4mikey]

Congrats on your FXR3. I love my Blue 3! I am too looking at going to better shocks. Look into JRI shocks, a great performing shock for the money. The stock 12" are Fox and actually decent shocks. Not saying they're the best, but better than others during the time of their production. Make sure you save all your stock parts. As far as the front end is concerned, putting Race Tech Emulators, and a Fork brace is about all you can do with a stock 39mm front end. If you want better than that, you will need to drop some serious dough. The 80" Evo can be a fun powerplant if set up right. If you are taking off the chrome pieces, be sure to save them as the majority of them are now obsolete. Have you owned a FXR before? Once again, congrats and welcome to the family.

Tom

I put a fork brace on my FXR4 about 4-5 years ago.  I can't say that ever noticed any difference in the handling.
When I service the forks this fall I do not plan on putting the brace back on - I anticipate that I still will not notice any difference in the handling

[Thermodyne]

Congratulations on the new scooter.  It's really hard to go wrong with an FXR.

As to the power, EVOs like cams and fuel as much as any other Harley, but they really need pistons.  The EVO was designed to run on regular unleaded, which was all there was at most stations back then because of that pesky epa mandate.  So the compression ratio is really low.  The MoCo never changed it when better fuel became the norm.

Cam, pistons, a little head porting/polishing and rejetting the carb will let a streetable EVO make 80/80.

[TLS105]

Tom - how much trouble is it to 'tune' the Race Tech Emulators  ?    What difference is realized by having these installed in the forks?
Each time you open them up to 'tune' the emulators do you have to change the fork oil ?  How much of a pia is this ?

Thanks !

Mike,

Race Tech Emulators cannot be tuned, I believe. I believe Tim has these in his Road King so maybe he will chip in. They are a drop in solution to help with bumps, uneven pavement, and brake dive. I have come to the conclusion that since I will be keeping this bike, there is only the right way to go. That would be the AK-20 from the guys at Traxxion. The approximate cost is $1200. You get cartridge style forks in the 39mm. For a little extra they can add adjustment for compression and rebound as well. There is a guy on vtwin forum that did it to his FXR3. He loved the results. I am also going with Traxxion's Bitubos shocks when I get the money. 13" shocks with a piggyback reservoir and compression/rebound/preload adjustments. Around $770 with the CVO discount. Traxxion does require you send the forks back to them every 20K miles for service, however. That would be about every 3-4 years for me. Up to you on what you want to do. If you need more information, send me a PM or call the friendly guys at Traxxion.

Tom

[FXR2evo99]

Race Tech Emulators....

At the end of the day....yes actually I have run these in my 2002 RKC, and they are fixin to come out pretty quickly (August 2013) as I am going to hopefully make my final alteration to that bike with the mono cartridge that Progressive has come out with in the last couple of years.  The cost of these gas filled tubes and sealed cartridges which is combined with a progressive specific spring and 5 oz of your favorite fork oil for lubrication purposes only since the cartridge is "sealed" is right at $248.00 inclusive of shipping with a "limited" lifetime warranty.  Anyway have a couple of guys that have put these into their 2002 RKC and 2005 Road Glide with very positive experiences so I am back to the drawing board with them.  But I digress...since none of this has anything to do with our FXR's except for:

I wouldn't waste my time going through the process of putting the "race tech emulators" in a FXR.  By the way just to be clear they do not make the mono sealed cartridges from Progressive for our FXR's....closest they come to our FXR's is to run 2004 Sportster Front Forks which means changing of the brakes for all of us 1982-1999 FXR, FXR2 and FXR3 owners.
BUT COME TO THINK OF IT, perhaps because of the new tubes you could put them in your FXR4 if you wanted.  I suppose the effort would need to be made to measure everything out to see how close you are to say a dyna fork set up with the length of the FXR4 forks....if one could get a proper set up with those monotube cartridges of the Progressive I would jump on that for only $248.00 or so for sure....one would just need to do the proper research.

Ok...talk about why I wouldn't put in the race tech emulators in my FXR2.  Well the simple reason is thus far with sweeping curves up to 80 miles an hour a oem spring or even a progressive "progressive" spring with proper pre-load with 20 weight fork oil would be just as good as anything else that might find positive when compared to the race tech emulator.  Just not impressed with the results of the race tech emulators....might be fine with the FXR....but given what I am running now I see little reasoning to go beyond a progressive spring, and 20 weight fork oil and proper preload.....in fact all that is in my FXR2 right now is 20W fork oil and the OEM spring.....the FXR front end is much lighter than the heavier touring models.

The emulator itself does get an adjustment....and does need to be adjusted to whatever you decide you want.  But there is very little dialing in.

Over at Harley Tech Talk, there is a 100 post thread that can be found in the Twin Cam Section that expands for a years worth of dialogue that began in Feb of 2012 and ended in April of 2013 discussing the merits of the front forks of the FXDX  Sport which many say is the finest front fork made for an "FX" bike such as our FXR's or Dyna Family bikes....At the end of the thread and the summary pretty much is some guys over there have spent huge dollars trying to improve those forks and they are actually a "cartridged" fork as well....and you can even dial those in.....interesting Thread.  Some guys have put the FXDX-Sport front forks on FXR's and found them to be great as well.  At the end of the day the debates over what to do with those front forks was as confusing as anything else....and some guys were talking about going to Olins front end...which gets you into the $3,500 range....so....give that MOUSE ANOTHER COOKIE.....anyway one if so motivated should spend the 2-3 hours reading those 100 posts which might shed some light on what you could do one's FXR.  All you have to do over there is search FXDX Forks and you should find the topic of discussion I am referring to....just makes sure that the THREAD you begin reading has over 100+ Posts and you will have the right THREAD.


Regards,

Tim

[FXR2evo99]

Mikey....

The brace all be it costs around $200.00 through the engineering corp I purchased mine from.  At the "end of the day" on FORK BRACES, I agree it's hard to tell JUST how much benefit there is when running it, however, I wouldn't take it off to just prove that point....there is some benefit for sure...just probably not $200.00 worth of benefit.

Regards,

Tim

[TLS105]

Thank you for clearing up the Race Tech Emulators Tim; I wasn't 100% sure on the details. A note on Progressive. The have come out with a 39mm monotube drop in for Sportsters, years 2004-2013 I believe. In addition, Work Performance has drop in Fork Cartridges for 39mm that you can adjust. However, adjustments require disassembly of the forks. I prefer not to half ass things and waste money. So, eventually my bike will be set up with the Traxxion kit, which includes compression and rebound, was well as the Bitubo piggyback shocks. Everyone has a budget and that's understandable. Just a little more to think about.

Tom