UK_Paul's - Slingshot Build & Other Adventures -

I'm Paul from the United Kingdom.
AKA. "UK_Paul" (But you all figured that one out already).

I will try and run this thread showing you all, the modifications that I make to the SlingShot and as I'm sitting the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, to most of the people that will see this, I'll also try and give you all a general view of what's going on and places that the SlingShot goes to.

I purchased a SlingShot in November 2016, after first testing one out the previous June, at a motorcycle festival in Ireland. I have been riding a Polaris Victory Vegas motorcycle since 2009 (one of the first few hundred in Europe) and have found it to be a tremendous product, great fun and have had some wonderful times and tours with it over the years.
I was fortunate enough to have a friend, who also rode a Victory, in the US and got to see a SlingShot while it was still in testing, at a test track 2014. We met shortly after this and the discussions started......
I wanted one.

Some years later this came to fruition and I'm now a very happy owner of my own SlingShot, that's not excluding my wife Elaine, who is as keen on it as I am. (Perhaps, more of that in later postings).

The machine, sitting at the dealer's, before dispatch to England.

So.......
Where did it come from and where is it now?

To give you an idear of the places that I'm taling about I have attached a map.
The map below shows the UK. The vehicle originally came from a dealer close to Dungannon, Northern Ireland. (See map insert).
It was then shipped over from Belfast to Stanraer, in Scotland and collected, by myself, near Ross-on-Why, England, very near Wales, less than 5 miles. (That's just above the "S" of Gloucester on the map below).
I then took it for a little spin, down the road and over the boarder.

- So it's managed to visit every country, in the UK, in just one day, before it got home -

We only have 5 distributors for SlingShots, in Britain, so it is difficult to get hold of them. At the time of this posting, only 14 are registered in Britain, and I believe that my one is either #5 or #6 on the road, with all the others either garaged, dealer vehicles or Polaris run demo vehicles.
So it's a pretty rare thing to see one on the road.

Unloading the SlingShot at Ross-on-Wye, England.

More information will follow, shortly........

MiM wrote:This is going to be good!
And I appreciate your writing style...
[/quote]

Thanks MiM.
I'll apologise now for the bad spellings that will come along.
I'm dyslexic and in addition, we also spell some things differently over here, so it's going to happen.

Hopefully I'll keep everyone's interest, as it will probably proved to be a very different route to some of those taken in the US.
I don't know if this site is monitored by Polaris, but be assured that I will "tell it as it is." This may not always be what the manufactures and suppliers will want to see but it will be heart felt and true.

So lets checkout the first things that changed on the SS, even before I got it.......

As can be seen it arrived with a slight variation over the paint scheme.
It's an AMR, full body, graphics kit. I went for the "In Line" option, to both protect and give some additional style, to the design, of the SS.

This was achieved with help of the guys at SlingMods.com. - Polaris Slingshot AMR Graphics Kit - At this point I must give a mention and the biggest of thanks to both Josh & Will, from SlingMods, who both offered some great of help in sorting out what I was after. They helped me decide what options would work best for my requirements and then got my order shipped to the correct locations (NI & England), so that, Lee, my SlingShot dealer was able to fit the graphics kit, in Northern Ireland and the remaining parts came directly to my home location.

Lee Galloway, my dealer at - All Spares ATV - had done a great job at selling the SS and now I was asking him to fit the graphics kit, before delivering it to me. He also deals with Jet Skis and so had his own specialist contact that was able to do this for me. So when it all arrived they set to work fitting it (or perhaps I should say wrapping it) all for me.

It looks like it must have taken more work than I would have originally expected but they did a great job with it and the results certainly set it above that of the standard finish.

Well I did think that it may look a little inconspicuous in just its standard finish and it may not get noticed very much. So the graphics kit was added to get it to attract just a little more attention.

In addition to the above, we are required to have a belt guard fitted, to the final drive, in Europe. Therefore the European models all come with this, as standard, but to take away the great expanse of black plastic at the rear of the SS, I decided to upgrade it to a pre-painted one from Polaris, - Painted Belt Guard Cover - Red Pearl | Polaris Slingshot - matching the red colour scheme. While going down that route, I decided add the red highlighting trim, also from Polaris, for the wheels and mirrors, - Rim and Mirror Decal Kit - Red Pearl | Polaris Slingshot - to finish it all off.

I'm very pleased with all of the results and think that everything compliments each other well and once again, many thanks to all the people that helped make this happen.

Oh......
And these results certainly keep it looking "very understated."

Well how did I get to this point with the SlingShot?

As I have first mentioned in the post, at the beginning of this thread. I have owned a Polaris, Victory Vegas since 2009. - 2017 Victory Vegas Motorcycle -
My wife and I have had a great time with it (she rides a V-Star 950) and we have toured around much of Europe together, with it, eather two up (pillion) or with both bikes.

Some of the places that we have taken it are listed below:
France
Belgium
Ireland
Netherlands
Luxemburg
Switzerland
Italy
Germany
Liechtenstein

Here it is, sitting by our home, all kitted out with Union Flags on, ready for a ride-out, honouring our servicemen, that have lost their lives for our country.
It has been modified, with a new headlight and cowl, digital instruments, revised air filter, straight through exhausts, front and rear cameras, GPS and a plethora of other modifications & additions.

Link to the camara setup on the Vegas.
- Innovv motorcycle camera | motorcycle dashcam | motorcycle dvr -

It has been a great project and has given me great enjoyment (and still does), along with introducing me to very many new friends, from all over the world.
5263.bmp
Hence my Avatar

I was a very active member on a forum - TheVOG.net - that was originally created by a journalist (Andy Pagh) who was widely published in a number of US papers and even had his own spot on NBC, known as "The Gadget Guru."
-

-
(Interesting old TV clip - Times have now changed, so much).

The same guy also created either this or "the other forum." (I don't know which one - Both have aspects of his design). However the forum that he first created has been sold at least two times since 2014 and it no longer has any connection with him.
I became good friends with Andy, we met up when I was in the US. Both of us had a very keen interest in the new vehicle that Polaris was making and between us both we had discovered a reasonable amount about it. I'd got hold of pictures and information, while Andy had even managed to see it in the flesh, on a test track. Therefore, when we met, this was a red-hot topic of conversation, between the two of us. I wanted to know even more.

As time proceeded I discovered more and the small spark had started a fire.
Unfortunately the release of the SlingShot was still some way off.

So I would have to wait.....

What happened next then?...
It a bit of a long story, but stay with me and it will all unfold.

Time went on, all the Polaris teasers came and went, (perhaps a few too many,) then the SlingShot was released in the States. Great! The reception was good and it was generally well received. So the next step was to mention it to my wife Elaine.

I had previously told Elaine all about the SlingShot and it had come up in conversation with us both, from Polaris staff, at shows and meetings in the UK. Everyone had sung its praise, but it still wasn't available in the Europe and Elaine wasn't particularly impressed with it's looks.
The typical comment was; "It looks a bit ugly" or "Where would we put it?" It looked like my luck was out.

The SlingShot then made its way into the UK and it was time to see it in the flesh. The first time was, on the Polaris stand, at a motorcycle show, in Birmingham (England). Polaris were trying to keep the stand split into two separate sections. One for Victory & another area for Indian. The SlingShot was slipped in between the two sections, but looked like it may have been a Victory at heart. In retrospect this may have assisted marketing, had Polaris wanted to market it as a "Victory - Specialist Vehicle." However better people than I make those decisions and it was therefore branded "Polaris" along with all the ATV's. The show model looked good but it was clamouring with teenagers that just wanted to jump all over it, without any hope of owning one, for at least another 10 years.

After the brief glimpse at the motorcycle show, my next encounter was to be when a distributor had one on his stand at the "10th Annual Irish BikeFest."
This is a great show, held on the first weekend in June, each year. Elaine and I had visited it before, having a brilliant time with such friendly people giving off stacks of genuine Irish hospitality. The next festival was coming around. Elaine & I had decided to take our bikes with us. As it was such a great event, I'd decided to organise a ride over, from the UK, to the Emerald Isle; in 2016 and bring many other Victory & Indian motorcyclists along with us.
- https://www.facebook.com/events/925168020899590/ -
This all came together very well and subsequently proved to be the biggest single meeting of UK based, Victory & Indian riders, in 2016!

Now the bad news...

In the preceding months before the Irish BikeFest. I'd been feeling unwell...
February came around and I was about to board a long hall flight out to Australia. I noticed that I'd put on weight and my legs & ankles were getting swollen, as if I'd already been on a long flight. We reached Australia and I was pleased to get a pre-release view of the Victory Octane, that was about to have its release, onto the market. You may say "A long way for just a look at a bike!"

Well it was actually a trip back to see Elaine's family, (yes, she's an Aussie). But when I set myself a target, (and the target, this time, was to see the new bike) I'm just extremely good at talking my way into places, that perhaps I shouldn't be.

The trip continued for about 3 weeks or so. It was 40'C (105'F) at times and I was shivering. By the time we were heading back to the UK, I couldn't climb a set of stairs, without getting out of breath. Things were looking bad...

Upon return to the UK, my first action, the following morning, was a trip to the doctor.
From the doctor's, I didn't return home, I went straight into hospital and stayed in it for about a month...

MUTIPLE ORGAN FAILURE!!!
A virus had been attacking me.
It turns out that, amongst other things, I had experienced: Heart failure, Liver failure, Pneumonia, Kidney failure, Anaemia and loads of other bad stuff. The virus ended up nesting itself in my Prostrate gland and sat there for months before it was finally killed.

When I came out of hospital, I was a bit of a wreck. Elaine & I didn't know if I'd ever get to ride my bike again. I was fine in a car, sitting down and not traveling too far but it was a lot harder to ride a motorcycle. Over time we discussed what options we may have. Elaine suggested that if my health didn't improve then "perhaps we should get a Trike." Meanwhile my doctor was working away at getting me fit enough to go out to the Irish BikeFest and ride my Victory.

The Irish BikeFest was getting closer but my health wasn't good enough to ride all the way to Ireland and then back again. In fact, it wasn't even good enough to ride into my local town and back again. The decision was then made that we would take the car and tow, just the one motorcycle, in a trailer, behind it.
The doctor adjusted my medication and worked really hard at getting me fit.

By this time I was fearful that I'd never be fit enough to ride properly again and we were both seriously considering what options we had. The general view was that the bike may have to go and we would seriously consider moving onto a Trike. I had now put the idea of the SlingShot on the back burner, but Elaine certainly didn't seem that she would be interested in riding it, together with me, even if we had one.

Things were perhaps, now, looking very bad, for the SlingShot...