As per my latest post, I recently received a higher windscreen for my Buell XB12X.
The stock windscreen is low – it puts the slipstream straight in the rider’s stomach or lower chest area. This is perfectly alright for shorter rides – I’ve even seen people entirely remove the windscreen for a more street fighter-like look, but on longer rides or when riding in cold weather, this gets tiring.
Enter the Zero Gravity Touring Windscreen.
It’s only a couple of inches higher than the stock one, but transfers the slipstream to shoulder/helmet level when sitting in an active riding stance, lowering upper body buffeting and making wind noise noticeably quieter. The effect of this is that longer rides become a lot more relaxed, even if it’s not as effective as the barn door of a wind screen that’s mounted on the BMW R1200GS. The difference lies mainly in how you can sit on the bike and still be protected. The larger screen of the GS lets a rider of average height sit upright when riding even at speed. On the other hand: A Buell Ulysses isn’t first and foremost a touring bike, but a sporty bike capable of touring duty. Mounting forward pegs, handlebar risers and sheepskin seat covers goes against everything in the bike’s philosophy, so I simply reject the claims of hard buffeting with the ZG windscreen from riders who’ve done such mods on their bikes – sitting further back naturally puts you in a more turbulent area, and that area naturally lies closer to a smaller screen than it does to a higher one.
Another problem people have written about, is the touring windscreen breaking loose at speed. Some have gone to great lengths to avoid the problem, including mounting large mounting brackets on the flyscreen. I understand the thought, but for now I believe it’s enough to simply use new grommets when fastening the larger windscreen. When testing my setup in controlled circumstances, the windscreen worked perfectly well, albeit with some flexing, in sustained speeds up to 160 km/h. That’s perfectly acceptable when touring. For hooligan duty, it might be safer to go with the lower stock screen, though.
To conclude this post, I’d say that next to the heated grips, this mod is definitely worth it, both for extending the riding season and for making long rides more comfortable.