GRRRRR...
I recently noticed something that made me angry, beyond belief... The beautiful chrome heat shield on my My Hard Krome 3" Big Straights had CRACKED! In doing some web searching, this is a well documented problem, and the manufacturer does nothing whatsoever to remedy the situation. In one case, they offered to sell the guy another pipe to replaced the cracked one (for $200), and then it happened again the exact same way. The next time, he tried for months to get them to do something, but eventually they just stopped responding to him.
A few months ago, I noticed that a riding buddy no longer had his Hard Krome pipes on his bike, and I asked why. He said they bent out of shape so bad that he decided to take them off. They didn't crack, but bending out of shape is just as unacceptable. I searched here on the VTX Cafe, and did not see any reports/complaints about cracked welds and heat shields, but have seen plenty on the other VTX board, and non-VTX boards thru Google searching. Big-X himself was a victim of this issue.
I paid $540+ for these things, back in 2008, and couldn't have been happier with their look and sound. I feel these pipes are one of the things that make my bike MY BIKE. Now I also feel like such a fool, spending all this money on this product, from a company that knows there is a horrible quality issue like this and chooses to do nothing about it. Mine lasted 20k miles or so, before the cracking. I can't believe that I now have to think about SPENDING MORE MONEY, to either replace these with the stock ones (which I no longer have), or a set from another manufacturer! :ranting:
HOW CAN THIS COMPANY STILL BE IN BUSINESS??? How can affected customers (just a few posts here, but Google searching shows that this is definitely not limited to the VTX) have no recourse at all??? This is infuriating to me. Second to my Ultimate Seat, these pipes are the most expensive purchase for my bike... And now I can pretty much ride them until the heat shield cracks completely in two, and then throw them in a dumpster.
NOT MUCH, BUT IT'S SOMETHING...
For a wider audience and hopefully more exposure, I have just created a Facebook page (here), for fellow victims of DG Hard Krome's product failures, and those that want to help support us. Please join the page and post your stories and pictures! Spread the word, so the owners of OTHER BIKES can jump in too. The more attention we bring to this the better!!
![Image]()
I recently noticed something that made me angry, beyond belief... The beautiful chrome heat shield on my My Hard Krome 3" Big Straights had CRACKED! In doing some web searching, this is a well documented problem, and the manufacturer does nothing whatsoever to remedy the situation. In one case, they offered to sell the guy another pipe to replaced the cracked one (for $200), and then it happened again the exact same way. The next time, he tried for months to get them to do something, but eventually they just stopped responding to him.
A few months ago, I noticed that a riding buddy no longer had his Hard Krome pipes on his bike, and I asked why. He said they bent out of shape so bad that he decided to take them off. They didn't crack, but bending out of shape is just as unacceptable. I searched here on the VTX Cafe, and did not see any reports/complaints about cracked welds and heat shields, but have seen plenty on the other VTX board, and non-VTX boards thru Google searching. Big-X himself was a victim of this issue.
I paid $540+ for these things, back in 2008, and couldn't have been happier with their look and sound. I feel these pipes are one of the things that make my bike MY BIKE. Now I also feel like such a fool, spending all this money on this product, from a company that knows there is a horrible quality issue like this and chooses to do nothing about it. Mine lasted 20k miles or so, before the cracking. I can't believe that I now have to think about SPENDING MORE MONEY, to either replace these with the stock ones (which I no longer have), or a set from another manufacturer! :ranting:
HOW CAN THIS COMPANY STILL BE IN BUSINESS??? How can affected customers (just a few posts here, but Google searching shows that this is definitely not limited to the VTX) have no recourse at all??? This is infuriating to me. Second to my Ultimate Seat, these pipes are the most expensive purchase for my bike... And now I can pretty much ride them until the heat shield cracks completely in two, and then throw them in a dumpster.
NOT MUCH, BUT IT'S SOMETHING...
For a wider audience and hopefully more exposure, I have just created a Facebook page (here), for fellow victims of DG Hard Krome's product failures, and those that want to help support us. Please join the page and post your stories and pictures! Spread the word, so the owners of OTHER BIKES can jump in too. The more attention we bring to this the better!!
