I’ll be installing an extra 12V power supply on the handlebars to charge my gps, cell phone… I’ll be installing a 12V cigarette lighter outlet and a USB outlet. Not sure if I want to hard wire it to the extra two wires by the head lamp or run the power supply from the battery tender. Taking the outer fairing off is not a big deal, I’ve done that several times before. I don’t want to use the fairing cigarette lighter because I am using that to power my Hog tune amp. Just looking for different opinions.

 

I think i'd wire it to a continually hot connection weither its in the fairing or back to the battery. i wold think that you might want to charge when the bike is off. if you go to an ignition hot wire it will only be hot while running. then again, might be a good thing but i don't think you phone or gps would cause too much draw on the bike battery when off. btw, where did you get the outlet?

 

Haven't bought the outlet yet but Amazon has them cheap. Hope to buy the outlet and ram mounting set up for the gps today.

 

I hard wired my gps to the headlight acc wires, I like that it's switched. All it takes is one time to forget you left something on and you're dealing with a dead battery.

 

I ran a wire from the battery to a relay, which powers the power block (6 lugs). The wire is fused at the battery. Each of the lugs on the power block is fused as well. The relay is wired to the hot side of the headlight so that the block is not powered unless the ignition is on. I use this setup to power my GPS, a GoPro camera, and my auxiliary lights.

You can see the relay at the top, and the power block.

 

On my Sporty I wired my gps into the light circuit, as that was close at hand, so it works with the ignition. On my Glide I added a relay with a fuse, wired from the battery, along the lines of Deucedog, again switched by the ignition. I'm not sure I can see any benefit of a permanently live connection.

 

the live connection worries me. If I accidentally forget to turn off the item I'm charging I could find myself with a dead battery and of course if that did happen it would be on a Sunday in the middle of no where. Looks like I'm using the wires from the head lamp at least the power is off when the bike is off.