sprocket i/o

Stock footpeg vs Fastway Evolution II F4

I feel a little wrong about writing a review for a piece of hardware no longer available for sale, but I like it that much. When I bought my bike, the first peice of farkle I bought was the Fastway Evolution II F4 Footpegs ($99). When I read the instructions however, I put them back in the box for another time. The ‘multi-tool’ it talked about did not come with my box, and I did not have a vise at the time. Now that I’ve been maintaining the motorcycle, I’ve got a vise in the garage, and I decided to give installation a shot while I was taking a week-long rest from riding. Yesterday I finally got to give them a test-ride over various conditions: city, highway, dirt, even curb jumping.

So far as installation goes, once using the vise to set the collar in properly, I was still pretty confused about how the spring was supposed to go in. The diagram was very unhelpful, and the spring was quite different than the one on my bike. I happened on a post showing how it was installed on a BMW 1150GS and applied it to my bike. As you can see from the photo, the spring setup is actually quite simple.. I’m just that retarded.

The Fastway Evolution II footpegs are a little over twice the width of the stock pegs. The F4 model ships with built-in screws, which has now been replaced by the F5, which comes with new screws that can be plugged-in (and interchanged with the F3 and F6 screws). The screws on the F4 give a lot of grip, but are still very comfortable.

On the dirt, the Evo II footpegs are very confidence inspiring. They give a fantastic amount of grip, and the enhanced width is fantastic for standing on. You feel really planted. You don’t feel like there is any chance of your feet slipping off when jumping curbs or what not.

On the highway, the Evo II footpegs are also very comfortable. It’s been so long since I took the rubber-strips off my stock pegs to remember, but it’s at least a few times better than my stock pegs with the rubber removed. To test grip while I was on the interstate I tried to slide my feet back and forth on the pegs, and they didn’t budge.

City driving is where the Evo II footpegs seem to be at a slight disadvantage for me. In increasing the width of the footpeg, you decrease the space between the footpeg and the shifter. For upshifts, I have to plan a little further in advance to make sure I can get my foot in position in time. I also found that I was missing a few downshifts, in particular, the shift from 2nd to 1st. I can only assume this is due to the decreased leverage, which I’ve solved by giving my foot a more authoritative downward motion. Using the rear brake actually feels better on the Evo II footpegs than the stock ones, however.

Overall, I’m pretty happy about the purchase. Not only do the Fastway footpegs look better than the stock, but overall, they feel better too.