Chinabusa - doing a Chinese fairing swap

[Mad Mike]

I was tires of my orange/black Hayabusa and wanted to change to something a little less noticible -- White. I ordered a kit off I ordered my fairings offAliExpress from a store called SportFairings (I have no affilliation), it came by EMS in about 5 weeks. I'm going to share a few things I learned about changing over the fairings:

1) Molded plastic parts for any given bike will all come from one factory who only sells to Chinese exporters -- you can't get the raw kit directly from the factory unless you have someone in China to buy and ship for you. The raw unpainted kit for a 08 and up Hayabusa costs between $140 and $200 CAD depending on whether you get the tail bubble and tank cover options. You will pay about $750CAD for the kit delivered to your door.
2) Read supplier reviews, particularly customer service reviews. The store you are buying from doesn't make the fairings but they are the ones who arrange painting/decals, packaging/shipping and after sale support and service.
3) Don't expect OEM fitment - the kit is close but requires hours of precise measuring and trimming for proper fitment. There will be some gaps and spaces that cannot be corrected, expect less than 100% perfection.
4) When finished few will notice your bike is sporting non-OEM fairings as long as you take time measuring and fitting.

Here's what I started with:

 

[Lightcycle]

I've used cheap China fairings for my track bike. Like you said, the fitment was sorely lacking. Lots of drilling and persuading to get the fairing to line up properly. Still, it served its purpose at a fraction of the cost of OEM and the clearcoated graphics looked better than the plain, matte finish on race bodywork.

Good from afar, but far from good.

 

[Mad Mike]

The Big Box arrives.

All the fairings come in one big box. I'm expecting a full fairing kit + optional windscreen, heat shield, fasteners, painted tail bubble, painted tank cover and 200ml of paint for touchups. . The kit was to be painted pearl white and decaled as per supplied photographs. The carton was in great shape, the individual pieces packaged nicely. There was no damage.

One Big Box!

Nicely Wrapped Parts​

Upon inspection I find:

All fairing parts + tail bubble, tank cover and windshield. No damage - everything foam wrapped and well packed for transport.

• All painted external fairing parts including a tank and rear seat cowl. Paint quality OK but not great (more on that later).
• All black cowling parts including inner dash panels, rad cowling pieces & fender tip
• 2sq' of 2mm foam backed heat shield - garbage!
• Smoked windshield - OK
• No rubber parts - you can recycle most from your original fairings
• No fasteners - you can recycle most from your original fairings, you may need to but plastic fairing push-pins, & windshield bolts.
• No sound insulation - go without (not recommended).

To proceed I needed 16sq' of sound and heat shielding foam and about 20 6mm puch pin fasteners. I bought the UXCELL 394 10mm foil backed insulating foam off Amazon.ca for $30, and 50 6MM push pins off AliExpress for about $3 (vs $2.50 each from a Suzi dealer). you can recycle all other fasteners, grommets and rubber spacers off the old fairing.

 

[Mad Mike]

Paint and finishing:

This was a disappointment -- i was hoping for a lot better, but I also realize these are inexpensive Chinese reporductions so they didn't fall too short of my expectations.

Injection molded parts require prepwork prior to painting. Parts should have been trimmed of flash, openings and sharp edges need to be trimmed and feathered, and any other molding imperfections filled/fixed. Finally, everything must be thoroughly cleaned before painting. These fairings were poorly prepared, the finished edges are rough and there are plenty of minor paint imperfections. Fortunately the plastic and paint on our fairing kit were both white, so I was able were able to fix up most of the issues. My local paint guy did an amazing job natching paint for touchups. If the fairings were painted any other color, you would have to live with these imperfections (or repaint).


I have seen excellent paintwork on Chinese fairings, but these were painted by an amateur and probably not in a booth. Expect paint detailing to take a few hours.

• Chinese painters do not match OEM paint codes, so don't expect to be able to swap a few pieces -- it's all or nothing. I recommend spending the extra for a tank cover (and pillion hump) matching the Chinese paint will be difficult.
• Blemishes - you can see/feel dust grit in a few areas and there are several small blemishes from painting over areas that were not completely degreased.
• Paint runs - fortunately tour fairings are white and the runs are on the lower edges so they are hard to see unless you're searching for them. Would be a problem in any mid or dark color.
• Incomplete coverage of base and pearl - poor depth and some grey blotching is visible in daylight.
• Decals/logos are a combination of masked paint and vinyl cut - a bit amateurish - not a nice as OEM style waterslide decals but OK.
• Painter forgot to decal gas tank cover.

Paint Runs

Grit/Dust under paint

Blotch, incomplete pearl coat

Rough finishing on edges/openings
​

Next time I'll order the fairings unpainted with the decal kit. I'll do the painting and finishing locally to make sure edges are raired correctly and paint comes out with a shop quality finish.

 

[Mad Mike]

Fitment:


These are injection molded parts, the molding quality is much better than compression molded items I have purchased in the past (I'll never buy compression molded parts again). The plastics are a lower grade (less dense, more brittle) than OEM, and but still quite good. Most of the key mounting points are weaker than OEM fairings so you need to be careful not to 'force' any connection, particularly in the nose fairing. The fit of parts is close to OEM, but not close enough for a direct swap so you can't reuse any original parts that are connected to the aftermarket parts.


Chinese fairing sellers always say:

• "Professional installation recommended". Translation: Fairings are not precise replicas, it take considerable time AND skill to fit these fairings to your bike. A complete Hayabusa fairing changeover using OEM parts takes me about 3 hours, this kit took me 10 hours plus the time I needed to source foam and fittings.
  
• "95% OEM fitment" Translation: Every hole, slot, and boss is 5% off -- be prepared to fix 100% of the attachment points.

Considerable measuring, trimming, aligning, and clearancing to make fairings ready for installation - this takes a lot of time. If you plan to have a shop install your fairing kit, budget 4-6 hours of additional labour for fitment prep.

Through holes: must be measured, center-aligned and clearanced. They are all undersized and painted in.

Bosses: All screw bosses need to be drilled out - all are undersized and some are blind. DO NOT DRIVE OEM SCREWS INTO THE AFTERMARKET BOSSES BEFORE CLEARANCE AND UN-BLINDING - YOU WILL SPLIT, BREAK OF OR SEVERELY WEAKEN THE FAIRINGS. I drilled them out to reuse the OEM screws salvaged from the original fairings, if I were to do this again I'd buy smaller screws so I could leave more plastic in the bosses.

Tabs/Slots: There are many interlocking tabs and slots in the front fairing pieces. They are all overpainted and not trimmed of molding flash. Time spent clearancing and trimming mold flashings is worthwhile -- otherwise you will fight with the fairings when installing interlocking parts. Even after clearancing, these parts are still much harder to interlock than OEM parts. (I used the f*&# word a few thousand time while fitting all the front interlocking pieces -- that was after cleaning them up!)

Thruholes: These need to be cleared as most are blind. Caution: Measure and center holes before clearong -- many are not located correctly in tabs.​