My Hong Kong fairing review
#1
05-10-2008, 11:41 PM
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My Hong Kong fairing review
Paint 7/10 - Paint is bright, but doesnt seem very thick. However its nice that the vinyl graphics are under the clear coat.
Fit 6/10 - Holes werent drilled out to the right size. Some pieces weren't even drilled out. None of the 'special' factory hardware works with these fairings. The side fairing twist locks are useless, the headlight needs wood screws to hold it in, the black 'under' fairings behind the wheel needed driling and new hardware. The front upper fairings dont mate together very well. The maintenence fairings are both ways. One fits great and lines up well, but the paint and decals dont line up to the lower fairing. The other one fits like crap at the seams, but the paint is good. The tail section is about a disaster. One of the posts broke off immediately because it was 3/4 inch off. Once I got that figured out, nothing really lines up back there. The tabs in the tail broke off, pretty much when I looked hard at them, but thats Honda's poor design. Oh, and the front center fairing doesnt have the holding tabs for the windscreen, so the screen isnt tight to the fairing, its maybe 3/16 inch away.
Plastic quality 8/10 - The plastic is thinner than the stock stuff, but its really not so bad. It's flexible, unlike fiberglass, which is good, because I had to do a lot of pulling to get things on there. The posts in the rear side fairings are weak. They are hollow tubes of about 1/8 inch plastic that glued to the fairing. Wouldnt be that much of a problem but the licking 'nubs' on the end of them are still the stock size which means they are tight. So installing and removing the side fairing puts them to the point of almost breaking. I went ahead and using a Dremel with a sanding wheel, I shaved off about 1/16 inch all the way around all 6 posts. This helps making them easier to remove, without making them fall out.
Shipping 10/10 - Showed up in about 2.5 weeks. They were individually wrapped in bubble wrap and foam wrapping. 2 boxes were shipped. The small one showed up before the big one, it got held up in Customs.
Overall 7/10 - You get what you pay for. I bought the $600 set and that what I got. If I had the disposable income to buy the $1700 dollar set I saw, then I would have.
Would I recommend them? I'd say yes. They look better than broken/scarred fairings. Everyone who has seen the bike says it looks great. Just remember, dont expect a Corvette for the price of a Cobalt.
Other notes -
ebay seller "parttimeshop"
They looked great when they showed up, packed very well. I started looking closer and saw that the paint wasnt prepped for all that well. It has some 'boogies" under it, and there are like 2 runs in it on different pieces. I've already chipped the paint, but its wasnt easy to do. The fairings had a few chips in them when they showed up. I'll be touching them up shortly.
Make sure you own a Dremel before you even order them. Be patient, it took me a total of about 9 hours to get things to be pretty close. I also had to buy about $80 in supplies/hardware to make them work.
I emailed the seller about the right side fairing and maintenence cover not lining up correctly. We'll see what he has to say after the 'holiday' he talked about happens on Monday.
The dont have any heat protection on them, you'll see in the pics I added a bunch of foil tape to the lower fairings. The right side fairing actually touches the exhaust pipe heat shield. In that spot I put about 10 layers of tape to try and protect it from melting.
I'll start attaching some pics, I may need to adjust the sizes of some as I go.
[IMG]local://upfiles/17085/56EC0AADDD1942148B5B4FF08D81CC16.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]local://upfiles/17085/AD88E212AD4848F2B6DCA900F77FD257.jpg[/IMG]
Fit 6/10 - Holes werent drilled out to the right size. Some pieces weren't even drilled out. None of the 'special' factory hardware works with these fairings. The side fairing twist locks are useless, the headlight needs wood screws to hold it in, the black 'under' fairings behind the wheel needed driling and new hardware. The front upper fairings dont mate together very well. The maintenence fairings are both ways. One fits great and lines up well, but the paint and decals dont line up to the lower fairing. The other one fits like crap at the seams, but the paint is good. The tail section is about a disaster. One of the posts broke off immediately because it was 3/4 inch off. Once I got that figured out, nothing really lines up back there. The tabs in the tail broke off, pretty much when I looked hard at them, but thats Honda's poor design. Oh, and the front center fairing doesnt have the holding tabs for the windscreen, so the screen isnt tight to the fairing, its maybe 3/16 inch away.
Plastic quality 8/10 - The plastic is thinner than the stock stuff, but its really not so bad. It's flexible, unlike fiberglass, which is good, because I had to do a lot of pulling to get things on there. The posts in the rear side fairings are weak. They are hollow tubes of about 1/8 inch plastic that glued to the fairing. Wouldnt be that much of a problem but the licking 'nubs' on the end of them are still the stock size which means they are tight. So installing and removing the side fairing puts them to the point of almost breaking. I went ahead and using a Dremel with a sanding wheel, I shaved off about 1/16 inch all the way around all 6 posts. This helps making them easier to remove, without making them fall out.
Shipping 10/10 - Showed up in about 2.5 weeks. They were individually wrapped in bubble wrap and foam wrapping. 2 boxes were shipped. The small one showed up before the big one, it got held up in Customs.
Overall 7/10 - You get what you pay for. I bought the $600 set and that what I got. If I had the disposable income to buy the $1700 dollar set I saw, then I would have.
Would I recommend them? I'd say yes. They look better than broken/scarred fairings. Everyone who has seen the bike says it looks great. Just remember, dont expect a Corvette for the price of a Cobalt.
Other notes -
ebay seller "parttimeshop"
They looked great when they showed up, packed very well. I started looking closer and saw that the paint wasnt prepped for all that well. It has some 'boogies" under it, and there are like 2 runs in it on different pieces. I've already chipped the paint, but its wasnt easy to do. The fairings had a few chips in them when they showed up. I'll be touching them up shortly.
Make sure you own a Dremel before you even order them. Be patient, it took me a total of about 9 hours to get things to be pretty close. I also had to buy about $80 in supplies/hardware to make them work.
I emailed the seller about the right side fairing and maintenence cover not lining up correctly. We'll see what he has to say after the 'holiday' he talked about happens on Monday.
The dont have any heat protection on them, you'll see in the pics I added a bunch of foil tape to the lower fairings. The right side fairing actually touches the exhaust pipe heat shield. In that spot I put about 10 layers of tape to try and protect it from melting.
I'll start attaching some pics, I may need to adjust the sizes of some as I go.
[IMG]local://upfiles/17085/56EC0AADDD1942148B5B4FF08D81CC16.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]local://upfiles/17085/AD88E212AD4848F2B6DCA900F77FD257.jpg[/IMG]
#2
05-10-2008, 11:44 PM
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05-10-2008, 11:47 PM
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05-10-2008, 11:48 PM
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05-10-2008, 11:49 PM
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05-11-2008, 12:21 AM
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05-11-2008, 10:08 AM
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05-11-2008, 10:09 AM
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05-11-2008, 10:35 AM
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