When I bought my bike new I ordered the matching tourpak etc but had it made detachable so I could take it off. I have never done so. I decided to do it a week ago but never gave a thought to the antenna. It's attached to the tourpak rather than in the factory spot where it comes through the hole in the fender.

The dealership recommended putting the antenna mount that goes at the bottom of the fender area with the short antenna. They had to order it for me. It seemed logical but in just checking the shorter antenna that I bought it will still hit the tourpak even if mounted at the bottom.

I don't want to have to rerun the cable every time I put the tourpak on or off. What is the solution to this? The 'short' antenna is still a pretty good length and is not real flexible. Is there an even shorter one that works? I don't really want to go with the hidden antenna as my experience with these has not been good. Is there another solution?

 

I dont know why some folks have issues with the hidden antenna, but because of exactly the same thing your going thru, I put the Ebay special $18.00 hidden ant in my fairing. It rocks! No issues at all, and really cleans up the rear.

 

Not really understanding your question, I have two antenna mounting locations, the one on the tour pak when it's on the bike and the one on the fender when the tour pak is off. When the tour pak is removed I just take the antenna off the tour pak and screw it into the location on the fender. Oh and the kit should have come with antenna relocation bracket maybe it's already there usuall left side near rear fender

 

Go with the in-fairing hidden antenna, solves every problem you have. Reception may be a few percent less, trust me, you won't notice. The a** pain of an external antenna will never end for you.

 

Here are three ideas:

1. Hide a shortened antenna inside the fairing. Just re-route the antenna wiring from the head unit, or buy a new harness and leave the stock setup alone. Here's a photo I saved from an earlier thread:



2. This Ebay seller has had good feedback for his internal antenna.

3. Hide the stock antenna along the fender rail, as described here.

 

antennas do not work as well under the fairing.

1.) they need to be vertical to work best ( maybe in town, but in the boonies...nuttin')

2.) they need a "ground plane" with a good electrical ground, the ground plane can be the road

3.) use the ant relocation kit that comes with the detach kit, put on a $8 pepboys stubby- you may see at the base of the antenna I have a black rubber fender washer to conceal the hardware

...and leave it there the tour pak clears it when mounted ( I stripped the antenna cable out of the factory harness and ran it directly to the fender location-)



"active" antenna kits are likely to just pick up ignition and spurious noise

mike

 

I did the hidden antenna for this exact reason and living up here in cheyenne there isnt really much "city" area around and i have never had any issue.

 

Same here. I bought a detachable TP for my SG and everything was there. I unscrew the cable from the fixed mount on the bike when I remove the TP and that is where the antenna screws on then.

 

I asked 'em at the dealership (i know, i know) if I could just remove the antenna from the tourpak and put it in the original spot through the fender and was told I could not. My understanding was because the wiring for the antenna could only go to one place or the other (the tourpak or the fender) and not to both (kinda hard to explain but I hope that makes sense).

Based on these responses I'll look at it a bit closer. Admittedly I've never checked the wiring for the antenna because i had them install it all. I remember they had some sort of issue when they added the tourpak. They had to order or make some sort of harness. Maybe this is where the problem is.

Thanks for the responses

 

There should be an antenna mount on your bike, and an antenna mount on the Tour Pak. Not sure how, but both mounts have wires running to, and connect to, your radio and all that jazz. When they installed your Tour Pak, they shouldn't have removed the original antenna mount on the bike. It should be down low between your fender and your saddlebag. The 'antenna' itself should unscrew from the Tour Pak mount, and then screw into the bike mount.

Seperate related topic on the hidden antenna. I *think* HD just released a new hidden antenna mount today. I was looking at them online the last few days, and I couldn't find it by the picture. Then I realized the famouns *New* in front of the item and it looks completely different. Looked like two solid antenna's coming off a center piece, now it looks like two long wires coming off the center piece. The description no longer says anything about reduced reception (though I'm sure there is). If you've installed one, take a look and let me/us know.