The turns signals on your bike are ones that were built for being flush mount onto fairings or hard luggage cases. They may even just be clearance lights and not turn signals. There are an awful lot of turn signals for sale right now that are just not safe to use.
I converted my bike to a Cafe' racer and I am not satisfied with the turn signals I have used. The stock turn signals are very visable and provide great daytime visibilty....they are a bit too big and bulky for a Cafe' raer.
I bought these from Lockhart-Phillips as they had conventional bulbs and I thought they would be bright enough to be seen. They can be seen in daylight if you are looking at them.....but they are not as bright as the stock ones and in the daytiime they will not get your attention if you are not looking at them. They use the smaller 23W bulb that is a W97...similoar to an 1156 but a smaller glass portion. The bulbs are sideways in the housing and there is no reflector.
I thought maybe the LED lights would work better....they are claimed to be bright and I ordered these. They are not any brighter and much smaller, and cannot be seen any better. I sent them back as they are not safe to use.
At this point I believe the DOT turns signals are necessary for safety. The small turns signals that are being sold are not safely seen in the daylight...they are not bright enough to get a distracted drivers attention. I am going to try and either paint the inside of my current turn signals silver or use some reflective foil to see if that will help. There are some Halogen 50w bulbs that will fit into the sockets.....I am not sure the electrical system could handle the larger load. THe stock bulbs are 23 watt....and the 50 watt Halogens are more than twice the stock size.
Bottom line....get some good DOT turn signals with 1156 bulbs oriented with the glass portion facing back....and a big chrome reflector!
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