Hondaline Heated Grips

[Rotorhead]

I did the installation on my grips last night. I initially purchased the grips (which comes with a wiring harness) and also the special wiring harness designed by Honda for the NT700, at an additional cost of $130.00 The instructions were well written, and the old grips were off and the new ones on in an hour.

Then I started comparing the two wiring harnesses. The schematics were virtually identical, excepting for the very terminal ends where it connects for power. The seperate $130 harness has a plastic two-prong plug-n-play. The one from Hondaline, which came with the grips, had two wire connections, marked Power and Ground. So what I did was splice another 48" of red and black wire, and plugged straight into a powered circuit in my fuse block.

Worked perfectly. So Tuesday, I'll do a return to the dealer of the NT700 harness, and use the money for something else. Total time on this install was about three hours.

 

[Rotorhead]

In the past, I've always tried to save the old grips; never ended up using them again, just something else sitting on the shelf. Last night, I used a skinny 5" flat screw driver, and slipped it up 6 - 8 times on the left side, and that grip slid right off. For the throttle side, I used a razor blade, and it was off and in the can in 30 seconds

 

[MAC]

I talked with a guy at Razee's today that has an NT, so I told him about our site and he will take a look. He also said he was putting on KTM heated grips and they were $ 138.00. At that price even if they say KTM it's a deal. I will wait to see his before I buy.

 

[Phil Tarman]

Do the Warm and Safe heated grips and the KTM grips have the range of heat control that the Hondalines have? That's the thing I have really enjoyed about the Hondalines.

 

[elizilla]

Looks like they are just selling normal Symtec brand heater kits. If you want the variable control, you also need one of the Heat Trollers.

This is the type of grip heater setup I always install. Works great.

 

[MAC]

The KTM has as Andy said = high-off-low. Not sure if that is good or bad. I'll have to wate to see the KTM's installed.

 

[CoolNT]

What are you all using for cement on the new grips? Are you using Honda brand, or some off the shelf? Does it even matter? Thanks.

 

[elizilla]

Sometimes I use hair spray, sometimes I just slosh some isopropyl alcohol in there to lubricate them long enough to slide them on. The hair spray gives you longer to position them before they stop moving. Neither has ever given me trouble, and I have ridden in a lot of heavy all-day rains.

 

[Rotorhead]

I've used hair spray before with good results.

Two weeks ago, I used some gutter and vinyl goop, and the grips are sealed pretty permantently

 

[CoolNT]

Thanks for the inputs.

 

[CoolNT]

I finished installing the HL heated grips last night. The hardest part was the removal of the old left grip. It appears they pretty much used the whole tube (quantity wise) on that grip. I used air (90 psi) and alcohol and it still took me about an hour to remove. In fact, small chunks of the inside of the grip were still stuck to the handle bar.
Now, off to tank pad and wind deflector, waiting on the ambient temp to rise a bit.

 

[CoolNT]

Rode in 40 degree temp and still had to turn the HL heated grips down to medium as they got too hot. They really work very well and keeps the hands nice and toasty. The lower ankle and feet is another story.

 

[Warren]

Rode in 40 degree temp and still had to turn the HL heated grips down to medium as they got too hot. They really work very well and keeps the hands nice and toasty. The lower ankle and feet is another story.

It was 17? this morning and after 15 minutes of riding I had to turn them down to medium and I was not wearing winter gloves. The backs of my hands did get a little cold. I guess thats the downside of heated grips as compared to heated gloves. If you are going to ride where it gets cold the heated grips are a good investment.

 

[vzshadow]

Love my Honda heated grips. Five temperature settings, most are too warm unless it is really cold. Dealer installed them, no charge.

 

[Phil Tarman]

Dealer installed them, no charge

Hmmppff. My dealer charged me about an hour.

 

[vzshadow]

Phil,
You have to befriend your parts and service manager!

 

[Phil Tarman]

When I was negotiating the purchase of my NT, my dealer's sales manager told me he really wanted to give me a good deal because I was a "rider." I had bought my first Concours from them 11 years ago, and they were my "go-to" dealer for looking at bikes. I bought two helmets, a tank bag and a Givi trunk from them when I bought the Connie, but don't remember every buying anything else. I did all my own maintenance on the Connies I had, but I saw the guys at Sun Enterprises 3-4 times a year. Just looking. Pete, the sales manager, said, "We give jerks deals all the time; why shouldn't we give a rider a deal."

The day I went in to make the final deal, his dad had had some emergency surgery and he left me in the hands of a 23-yr-old sport racer. The kid said, "Pete says you've probabaly ridden more miles than all of us put together." I doubted that, but he told me that he'd probably never ridden much over 10,000 miles (all of it on a track) and that there was only one guy on their sales staff who took road trips, so maybe Pete was right. I was at about 180,000 total miles then. Then he asked me what kind of price I needed to do the deal.

I told him that there was a place in Arkansas (Russellville, IIRC) and another in Mississippi that I thought were selling for $100 over dealer invoice. I told him that obviously it would cost me something to get to either of those places, but on the other hand, if I did that, by the time I got home, I'd have a bike that would be broken in.

He said, "let me see what we can do," went and talked to somebody and came back and sold me the bike for $100 over invoice and gave me 15% off any accessories I ordered (I got heated grips, the wind deflectors, a service manual, and the tank pad from them). They also sold me 4 additional years of warranty, LoJack, roadside service, and my first two services for $900. I guess they came out OK. I've since bought two tires from them and paid for one service. I've used the roadside service once (and was impressed with it and the fact that LoJack called me to see if I knew my bike was being moved without the ignition turned on.

I'd use stuff like being willing to travel as a tool. The dealer in Fort Collins where I looked at NTs first acted like they were doing me a deal to come off MRSP by $100 and give me 10% off accessories (but were going to charge me four hours for installing heated grips and the wind deflectors).

 

[SeattleJim]

I'm going to add heated grips to my bike. I was interested in the Hondaline grips except for the cost. According to Honda I need:
Heated Grips $189.99
Attachment Kit $109.95
Accessory Wire Harness $14.95
From the first post it sounds like I don't really need the Attachment Kit. Is it just another wiring harness? Can I just order the Heated Grips? I'm comfortable doing my own wiring and don't need plug-n-play.

I'm also considering the Oxford Heated Grips. They're very highly rated in the last Motorcycle Consumer News and I can get them for around $70 including wiring harness. Anyone have experience with these?

 

[Rotorhead]

My personal experience on this bike is that you don't need either the extra harness or the cigarette lighter. If you had both harnesses ( the one is in the box with the grips ) laying side by side, you would be hard-pressed to see a difference. I returned my $110.oo harness for a refund.

 

[Phil Tarman]

Plus, at least where my dealer installed it, the cigarette lighter is virtually useless.