Hey all, I made a new shifter for my Nightster and wanted to share it with you. I don't really know what its called. Suicide shift, suicide clutch, jockey shift.....idk lol. But, I really like it and so far it's been really easy and fun to ride with. I have not had any trouble taking off, stopping, cornering and even having to make that quick decision to stop or swerve out of the way when I run across the occasional bad driver. I hope all is well for everyone and I really hope you like this "thing" I've made.

I started off with an old beat up pair of 6 inch tall z bars I had laying around. I think they were 30 inches wide but I can't remember for sure.


Heres a close up of the weld that i cut across


Here are a few close ups. What I did here was I re used my stock mid control shifter peg. I took this, flipped it around backwards and put it "up and down." Now at the end of the shifter peg it bulges out to accept your foot peg. I went in to the bottom of the piece of z bar I cut and I sliced out a small curved section to accomodate this bulged area. The stock shifter peg slides right up inside about 1 inch. I drilled a hole in the z bar and bolted it to the shifter peg.


Right now I'm using the stock bolt that holds the foot peg on because I didn't have a same thread bolt and my local hardware store was closed. I'll replace it when I get off work this week.




Here I've put my clutch lever on.






Heres another close up of where the bar meets the stock shifter.


Heres what Ive done with my stock clutch cable for now. It prolly looks worse in this pic than it really is. It is really nice and tucked up close to the bike but as with the replacement bolt, Ive gotta wait until I get off work to fix it and shorten the cable. For right now though, it is working great. The clutch is actually a lot easier to grab than it was when it was on my handlebars.


The next few are my "finished (for now)" product. I adjusted it to where it was most comfy and added a white Shadow Conspiracy bicycle grip from my BMX'ing days lol.








Once again, hope you guys like it and I hope I took some decent pics. It might look really low or short but I found that the height of it is where I rested my hand a lot on rides, so it fits me really comforatably as I kind of slunch over anyway with my drag bars. Thanks for reading!!

 

I was trying this same mod a few months ago, but backed off. Everyone had negatives on it. They said the stock shifter mount can't handle the weight of the handshift. Let's see where this goes.....

 

I was really concerned on that too but just decided to go for it. I researched for literally about 3 months before deciding to try anything at all and actually saw a lot of people using their stock shifter peg to support it. But, as you said, lots of negative feed back. Ive actually seen a lot of negative feedback on even shifters that were set up seperate from the stock peg like the labriola jockey shift. So far, keywords there, the shifter doesnt budge unless I shift it. Now idk if that holds true for everyone or maybe mine is just stiff. I've rode several hours with it and it hasn't moved until I moved it. It hasnt shifted on its own. I let it sit and idle to see if it would and it never budged. I also grabbed the bike and rocked it and shook it, still hasnt budged. Now, I am still concerned about it and am just gonna have to watch it really well to make sure it will be okay. The only real thing with any weight to it is the clutch lever. But mine also might be doing okay so far because it really isnt very tall. Just gonna have to really keep a close eye. Now as far as actual strength of the stock shifter itself. It seems pretty solid and tough. Just gonna be a whole bunch of caution for a while. If things end up not going well Ill definitely let everyone know but "so far" it's working out and I like it so much, I really hope it continues to work out lol. Thanks for the feedback!

 

I've always wondered how one goes about a hard launch with a shifter mounted clutch.

 

My friends dad actually mentioned that right before I started working on this and I said well hell.....I havent even thought about it lol. Well, so far it's not been bad at all. I thought taking off one handed slow, let alone hard, would be scary and even uncomforatable to do but it hasnt been at all. It's weird to say but, Ive taken off one handed in the past and my bars felt real wobbly but, where youre holding on to the lever and still partially supporting that side, it feels real safe. Now keep in mind I said it feels real safe. Id say many people would say it isnt safe at all and I would prolly agree with them but as far as the feeling of it, slow or hard take off, doesnt feel bad at all and actually feels real stable. At least for me anyway. Trial and error. Thanks for the comment!

 

good job! it just becomes 2nd nature.

 

Hey thanks a lot! yeah ive had a few people say they would never go back to a stock set up. I really hope this one continues to work well and doesnt cause problems. So far so good.

 

I like the set up, it look's good and it works. Great Job

 

Hey street fighter i've been running my set up for at least 2 years everyone said the same thing that mount coultn'y handle it.. well mines worked perfect!... and it's a heavy mo fo.





To the OP it looks good but i hate the way the clutch cable looks. good job thought!

 

Thats just cool....