What do you do when you've held the titles "World's Faster Bagger," and "King of the Kustom Baggers," taken the custom bagger scene by storm with innovative products like the Flare Wind Screen, and built some of the cleanest baggers the industry has ever seen? For Brian Klock of Klock Werks (KW) in Mitchell, South Dakota, the answer is simple; start designing parts and accessories to turn Softails into baggers.
Turning a Softail into a bagger is not all that new, especially with all the bolt-on batwing fairings that are on the market. And Brian knew this, that's why he decided to take things in a different direction and design a kit that would allow people to bolt a Road Glide fairing onto Softails. "I am really lucky to be where I am. I mean I'm in a small town with a population of 500 people on the southeast edge of South Dakota. When I started out I was pretty much stuck with whatever people brought into my shop. I worked on everything that came through my doors, Sportsters, Dynas, Softails, whatever. But my dad and his friends all had baggers so I had a lot of time to work on and experiment with them," Brian told us. "So back in 2006 when I was on the Biker Build Off, everyone else was building these radical ground-up customs and I just showed up with what I knew and was familiar with, a clean bagger." And it's around that point that Brian helped show the masses that baggers aren't just "Geezer Glides" but that they can actually have class and custom styling.
Back in 2005, KW friend Chris Shelton purchased a brand-new '05 Fat Boy and slowly customized it at the shop over the years. As the bagger craze continued to boom, Chris hit up Brian and KW GM Dan Cheeseman about turning his Fat Boy into a full-on bagger. "I really liked the look of the Road Glide," Chris said. Being a fan of the Road Glide as well, Brian took Chris' comment and ran with it. "I wanted to utilize the feeling you get from sitting 'in' a bike rather than 'on' it like the standard FLH platform," Brian said. "I like the stability of a fixed fairing and the modern Road Glide look. Why not on a Softail Chassis?"
So the bike was rolled into the back of the shop and the transformation began. After studying the neck and downtube area of the Softail frame, the KW team figured out it could easily fit a Road Glide fairing to the frame. "We developed some brackets and utilized the top engine guard mount and drilled through the fork stops at the top of the neck to mount the bracket that holds the fairing. It worked so easily we've developed a kit called the Softour, which will allow people to install the Road Glide fairing on '00-and-later Softails. The kit consists of the brackets, an upper fork tin, hardware and the instructions. You have to get the fairing from Harley or a salvage yard." The way the fairing sits on the frame, it's got a slight downward tilt to it which not only helps give the bike a more aggressive look but still provides protection from the wind and stability, according to Brian.
Some of the men behind the...
Some of the men behind the build (left to right): Dan Cheeseman, Klock Werks GM; Chris Shelton, bike owner; Brian Klock.
With the fairing taken care of, the team moved onto the rest of the transformation, which included a blacked-out frontend with KW Blind Axle, 18-inch Renegade Cheyenne Multi-piece wheels, and a KW Level front fender followed up by the company's Benchmark rear fender. Up top a set of KW Mentele bars were installed along with the company's dash relocation kit, which is a stretched dash unit that eliminates the location of the stock ignition switch. The switch is relocated to the horn mount via a billet bracket/housing. You can't call it a bagger without bags, so the KW team used a Cycle Visions Bagger Tail kit to install a set of hard bags on the bike. To keep it clean, they fabricated a set of custom bag fillers to fill in the gaps between the bags and fender. The KW crew also installed its WFB 2-into-1 Doubleback exhaust. However, since the exhaust is designed for bagger applications, they fabricated custom brackets to make it work on the Softail. A mix of other KW parts; Undercover Floorboard covers, flush-mount spade taillight and turn signals, and of course a Flare Windshield, along with Jaybrake Floorborads and hand controls, a Cycle Visions Illumabezel, and a Drag Specialties seat finished off the build.
"When I told people what we were doing, everyone thought it would be too much or too difficult," Chris said. "But that all changed after it came back from paint. Now everyone thinks it's a Road Glide. Stand next to it and it's a scaled-down, sit-in-it version and makes for a great bike with the smooth Twin Cam B powerplant. It looks stock, but sometimes that's the hardest part, making custom simple."
Jaybrake's new Trac Boards...
Jaybrake's new Trac Boards floorboards feature spikes that protrude through the top of the rubber. For a unique look Jaybrake offers the boards in several spike designs, these are called the Vortex.
Here's KW's 8-inch Dark Smoke...
Here's KW's 8-inch Dark Smoke FLARE Windshield. Wind-tunnel-tested (see KW Flare Windshield article on hotbikeweb.com), the Flare Windshield has been a big hit amongst bagger owners. Brian estimates they've sold upwards of 50,000 units since it debuted in 2008.
The brackets that the KW team...
The brackets that the KW team designed allow you to bolt up a Road Glide fairing to '00-and-later Softails.The brackets that the KW team designed allow you to bolt up a Road Glide fairing to '00-and-later Softails.
"When I told people what we...
"When I told people what we were doing, everyone thought it would be too much or too difficult."