MCN Fleet: KTM Super Duke GT finds its way home

This weekend should hopefully see me pointing the angular nose of the Super Duke GT south, making the short hop across the Channel (well, under it) before embarking on the schlep back to the country of it’s birth.

The return of MotoGP to the Red Bull Ring in the hills of Austria seemed like a perfect excuse to let the KTM go home for a weekend, meaning that 2000 miles of European tarmac beckon – before watching the best race series in the world from the decidedly orange backdrop of the KTM fanstand. And with KTM planning to roll their new RC16 MotoGP bike out for a few laps, it really does look like the perfect storm.

Of course, I’ve got to get there first, and having never ridden to Austria, let alone threaded my way through the mountains to the Red Bull Ring, I figured it’d make sense to break out my trusty Garmin, and fit it to the GT.

I used to hate sat nav, thinking it was essentially an affront to my map reading ability, and manhood, but having been repeatedly bailed out in far-flung corners of mainland Europe and the UK over the years, I knew I’d be an idiot not to go prepared.

KTM kindly fitted their universal baseplate to the bike when it was in for its first service (available at your local dealer for £72.26), so all I had to do was fit my Garmin zumo350LM’s well-used hotshoe to it, and trail the wires back to the battery. Of course on modern bikes, with their mm-perfect fit for all panels and fastidious hiding of other gubbins with gapless density, this isn’t always as easy as it sounds.

With the hotshoe loosely in place, I could see that the loom was going to be the perfect length, and set about trying to identify a route through from the headstock to the battery without having to strip the tank and side panels off. Given more time, that’s what I’d have done, but starting the job at gone 11:30pm had me searching for a faster route.

Whilst looking up its flanks, I moved a torch around at the headstock looking for a position where a lot of light could be seen through the guts of the GT. With a likely route established, I then fed a large cable tie through the gap, giving it a good wiggle to try and establish if there was much room to play with. Satisfied after a few attempts that I’d found the most gappy route, I then taped the sat nav loom to the end of the cable tie, and pulled it back out the way it had come, pulling the loom through the otherwise unnavigable maze. 

With it routed safely through the headstock and fork, cable tied to prevent it flailing around and getting damaged, I plugged it into the back of the hotshoe, then whipped the GT’s screen off to properly attach it to the base plate. Two minutes later the screen was back on, and all I had to do was connect the power leads. After a minor bit of routing fiddling, I connected the leads to the battery, and clipped the Garmin into the mount, rewarded by it instantly booting up with the magic little lightning bolt in the corner confirming that it was being powered by the bike, and the screen confirming that it’d taken me almost an hour to fit. Perfect.

Now all I’ve got to do is plumb in the coordinates, and get on with it. 

See more updates about the KTM 1290 Super Duke GT.

 

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