Joe Bar
Tuned and Synch'ed
I've been meaning to get round to it for a while , but as the clocks change tonight and British Summer Time officially ends, I set some time aside today and finally installed some Symtec heated grips to the Griso.
I've installed them on a few of my bikes before but the Griso threw up a couple of issues I was ready for. Firstly, there's not many places to install the switch as there's no fairing panel or excess space around the instrument cluster, so a call to a friend who works in an engineering shop had this neat little alloy bracket knocked up, another ten minutes with a rattle can and it was black
Peeling the grips of was pretty straightforward, I just lift the edge with a thin blade screwdriver and give it a good squirt of brake cleaner, a quick twist and a wriggle and they're off. The brake cleaner just evaporates away whilts I got on with sorting the throttle tube. The Griso throttle tube is like a lot of the Aprilia and Triumph ones (I think they're all made by Domino an Italian components company), and has a number of ridges moulded in to prevent the grip rotating on the tube. These prevent the heater pads sitting snugly on the tube, so I shaved most of them off with a sharp blade, leaving just a couple at the point where the element edges don't quite reach. You can just see some of the ones I left on the bootom of the tube in the photo below. With that done, I peeled the backing from the elements and fitted them to the tube / bars.
If you look closely you can see that the heater filament is a little wider on the clutch side than the throttle, this is because the clutch side runs a little hotter to compensate for the heat loss into the bar.
I cut a little groove into the throttle tube grip to give the cable an easier route out, and left enough slack before cable tying it to allow the throttle to full open with a little bit spare. When re-fitting the grips I give them a good squirt of hairspray down the tube, which allows them to slide back on really easy, but soon evaportaes to leave them firmly in place. There's a couple of locators on the throttle side, so made sure to get those lined up as the fit is snugger, and helps prevent the grip rotating on the tube.
As I was mounting the switch on the brake master cylinder perch, I didn't want two lots of wiring running up to it, so I added three extra cables, taped them up and ran them down into the headlamp shell, which I'd drilled to allow the wires to pass. I also tucked all the excess wiring from the heater elements in there as well. Wiring up is pretty simple, earth cable, ignition fed power supply and feeds to the high and low sides of the switch to power the heater elements.
I think the finished article is pretty neat and I'm always impressed with how they look like a factory fit, plus you get to keep the grips of your choice rather than the hard rubber type most heated grips come in. Previous sets have proven very effective and equally reliable, so as it's the first day of winter tomorrow, I'm off out to give them a proper road test.
I've installed them on a few of my bikes before but the Griso threw up a couple of issues I was ready for. Firstly, there's not many places to install the switch as there's no fairing panel or excess space around the instrument cluster, so a call to a friend who works in an engineering shop had this neat little alloy bracket knocked up, another ten minutes with a rattle can and it was black
Peeling the grips of was pretty straightforward, I just lift the edge with a thin blade screwdriver and give it a good squirt of brake cleaner, a quick twist and a wriggle and they're off. The brake cleaner just evaporates away whilts I got on with sorting the throttle tube. The Griso throttle tube is like a lot of the Aprilia and Triumph ones (I think they're all made by Domino an Italian components company), and has a number of ridges moulded in to prevent the grip rotating on the tube. These prevent the heater pads sitting snugly on the tube, so I shaved most of them off with a sharp blade, leaving just a couple at the point where the element edges don't quite reach. You can just see some of the ones I left on the bootom of the tube in the photo below. With that done, I peeled the backing from the elements and fitted them to the tube / bars.
If you look closely you can see that the heater filament is a little wider on the clutch side than the throttle, this is because the clutch side runs a little hotter to compensate for the heat loss into the bar.
I cut a little groove into the throttle tube grip to give the cable an easier route out, and left enough slack before cable tying it to allow the throttle to full open with a little bit spare. When re-fitting the grips I give them a good squirt of hairspray down the tube, which allows them to slide back on really easy, but soon evaportaes to leave them firmly in place. There's a couple of locators on the throttle side, so made sure to get those lined up as the fit is snugger, and helps prevent the grip rotating on the tube.
As I was mounting the switch on the brake master cylinder perch, I didn't want two lots of wiring running up to it, so I added three extra cables, taped them up and ran them down into the headlamp shell, which I'd drilled to allow the wires to pass. I also tucked all the excess wiring from the heater elements in there as well. Wiring up is pretty simple, earth cable, ignition fed power supply and feeds to the high and low sides of the switch to power the heater elements.
I think the finished article is pretty neat and I'm always impressed with how they look like a factory fit, plus you get to keep the grips of your choice rather than the hard rubber type most heated grips come in. Previous sets have proven very effective and equally reliable, so as it's the first day of winter tomorrow, I'm off out to give them a proper road test.