I bought 36" beachbars to replace the stock Deluxe bars. My bike's at an indy's shop with the tin's off for paint. I thought it would be a good time to have the beachbars put on. He quoted me $290 for new cables and 8 hours labor. That's over $700! WTF. I told him to forget it.

Are the cables that much? Must the all be replaced? 8 hours labor? Am I getting screwed? I really didn't want to do the job myself.

 

HI,

The 8 hours labour is probably about right.

A Buddy and I changed the bars to Apes on my FXD a while back and it took us four evenings to finish the job between us.
He's a truck mechanic by trade and fettles with his (and other peoples) Harleys out of interest and even with his superior product knowledge and accesibility to tools it was a full four evenings.

I bought 2 extended throttle cables, clutch cable, thin(not chubby) apes and braded brake lines from a local dealer and that worked out at about £415 dollars(thats a rough guess based upon my recollection of the costs and also converting it from GBP to USD). The wiring cost was null as there was some wiring harness cabling hanging around.

So based upon what you are telling me - it seems pretty fair.

My new bikes supplier has quoted me circa $1200 to perform a similar task, using chubby apes - so theres another yardstick for you.

My conclusion is (having worked with my friend and learning what to look out for) that its not that complicated a job but its time consuming and unless you've got plently of time and the option of walking away from it when you need a break, its probaly worth paying a slight premium and letting your dealer do it - assuming you've got the cash to spend...

Let us know what you decide and how you get on.......

 

That seems steep to me, both on the cost of the cables and the labor. Price out the cables yourself and see how much you could get them for online. He should be able to get them for a lot less than retail, and there's no way it should take a skilled mechanic 8 hours to do, but that's just my opinion... It's really not that hard of a job to do yourself as long as you take your time...

 

Just had new bars and cables put on the wifes Deluxe. We went with Stock Heritige bars and riser, and Braided cables. Quote was for 1.5 hours of labor...PER CABLE....at 75.00 per hour...thats quite a bit. Parts on that job cost me 400.00...labor was quoted at over 600.00


Most shops have a manual that shows how long each part takes to replace, individually. They then add all those times together to give you a price quote.

I found a friend who did all the work for 200.00 in labor...

 

He's trying to rape you, daylight and in the open.

My stealership charged me 1 hour labor for replacing my white brother's 36" beach bars for the HD ones, they did not just had to wire internally, they changed the risers also (1 1/4"). They wired the stock electrical plus the wires for the spot-lights and the wires for the peanut shape halogen lights (mounted on the engine guard). I did not had to use new wires the stock ones fitted perfectly. Don't even think twice, walk away from that deal.

F*ck him!

 

I called my local dealer who quoted 3.5 hrs labor. I can deal with that. Disappointed in my indy who is usually the better of the 2.

 

It took me 6 hours to put Beach Bars on my Fatty. I ran the wires thru the bars too.
Long time, but to me it beats paying $700 bucks

do some reading on here about disconnecting the wires under the tank first though. Its actually easy work, but you need a second set of hands

 

if your interested in selling your stockbars, let me know

 

8 hours to put bars and cables on, with the tank off already and it will take em 8 hours. No friggin way. Hell , a drunk monkey could do it in an hour or 2. ifn it takes a shop 8 hours to do that, well they got to be big dipshits.[8D]

 

Took me a full three hours to install my beach bars myself, Ive done 'em once before on another scoot, took me twice that time. Most of the time was spent getting the external wires inside the handle bars. Not a hard job to do, just takes some time. Do it yourself unless monies no object.

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