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Unread 02-03-2009, 10:54 PM
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Smithers Smithers is offline
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Location: San Luis Obispo, CA
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So I've basically been sitting on this carbon fiber rear cowl for my bike for a few months. I wasn't about to dismantle my bike just to see what it would look like but now that I have taken it apart for the brown connector wiring fix I got a chance to put it on. WOW that carbon fiber is super rigid and strong. My plastic tail easily gives when I stretch it around the rear section but the carbon fiber didn't want to give an inch at all. And I used to think that putting on the stock Aprilia rear cowl was difficult! I was sweating when I was installing the carbon fiber. I had to remove the trunk lock just to have any hope of squeezing on the carbon tail. It was hard as a rock and I felt like it was going to snap when I was trying to get it on!



The holes that all the bolts went through weren't quite as large as the stock plastic cowl. The bolts have shoulders on them which allows you to tighten down the bolts to the max without damaging the cowl attachment locations. Maybe this was also done to be more forgiving on the cowl because of the vibration or even manufacturing tolerances. Either way I used the Dremel to enlarge the mounting holes to make things fit much better and naturally.
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