Jan 19, 2016

Flipped / upside down mirrors on Yamaha Bolt


Upside down mirrors on Yamaha Bolt
Upside down mirrors on Yamaha Bolt
To my eye the stock mirrors look goofy when the the stock bars are raised as much as they have now with the 5.5" pullback risers. Not really a big deal, but since the fix cost less than $20, I thought it would be worth it.




How did I flip the mirrors?

I ordered a couple of aluminium mirror clamps (for 1" bars and with M10 regular threads) from ebay. I first tried to mount the clamps between the grip and the lever by moving the lewers inward a bit. This worked well for the right side but was a no go on the left. The mirror clamp prevented the clutch lever from moving freely.

1" mirror clamps with M10 threads

Yamaha Bolt stock mirrors

I then proceeded to mount the clamps just below the bend on the bars. The mirrors are tiny bit too much on the inside, but it would seem that the view is still very good. I get a small amount of my sides on the inner corner of the mirror, but the mirrors are still giving me a less obstructed view than before. My hands or shoulders aren't visible in the mirrors at all.*

* DISCLAIMER, the mirrors have not been tested on the road yet as there is currently snow on the ground. I will update this post once I get to try the mirrors on the road.

UPDATE
They work!
I can see a little bit of my sides from the inside corners of the mirrors, but I would call this a success. If you can come up with mirrors that have say 2" longer angled stems, the better, but in my opinion the mirrors are totally ok like this. I like that the mirrors are visually (vertically) very close to the bars.

Mirrors clear the tank with a wide margin
 



For the mirrors to clear the tank, I needed to remove the angled extensions from the stems. This was good also because now the mirror stems had two regular threads on both stems instead of the lefty thread Yamaha has on the other side.

The rather short stems and angled mounting clamps make the mirrors look less noticeable and blend in nicely with the bars.

Yamaha Bolt with flipped mirrors
Yamaha Bolt with flipped mirrors