DIY Winter Gear for Under $60

[Imacityboy]

Hello fellow ST1300 enthusiasts. This is my first post, and I hope it's useful to someone. I live in New York, so once October hits, it's not long before I'll either have to cough up around $500 for heated jacket and gloves or park the motorcycle until March. I found a few posts online with some pretty good ideas, but almost all of them required having an engineering background, so if someone already had this idea, sorry for reposting. Well, if any of you are in a similar predicament and are on a budget like I am. Here's a simple way to save some money.

I just bought a seat heater for a car and attached it to the liner of my jacket. It costs anywhere from $20 - $40 depending on how fancy you want to get. And it already comes with a controller for the heat. The one I got has a 5-setting knob. I used velcro (which I sewed into the lining to make sure it doesn't come off), and I used a standard SAE connector to power the unit because I already had a connector coming from my battery that I use for my battery tender.
It woks great. I hooked it up to my spare battery and tried it out. I hope the pictures come through.
The biggest issue I had was where to mount the controller, but I figured it out. I'll add an update once I've mounted it. I just finished making the liner a few minutes ago.

 

[Imacityboy]

Thank you fnmag. I noticed that the photos I posted earlier weren't the best, so I took some more and uploaded them. Thanks again. I'll upload pictures of the bike install.

 

[SMSW]

I hope your SAE wiring harness from the battery includes an inline fuse. And for just the heated jacket, it need not be a v. large fuse. (The harness that came w/ my battery tender had no inline fuse - which is why I say this.

 

[flip-flop]

I love this kind of stuff-- awesome....

 

[Al st1100]

One of these days someone will come up with the idea of having wireless power from the bike to the garments
An heated jacket means less stops for warming up and a cuppa

its already out there its called a battery

 

[Al st1100]

I will put this out now Just joking,,,, I know what you mean

 

[Imacityboy]

I hope your SAE wiring harness from the battery includes an inline fuse. And for just the heated jacket, it need not be a v. large fuse. (The harness that came w/ my battery tender had no inline fuse - which is why I say this.

The harness for the heated pads comes with an inline fuze. If you look at the picture that shows the two pads on the back of the jacket, you can see the fuze on the red wire. I was going to mount it on the bike today and take pictures, but it was raining. I'll update with pictures as soon as I install everything. Thanks for the tip.

 

[Imacityboy]

One of these days someone will come up with the idea of having wireless power from the bike to the garments
An heated jacket means less stops for warming up and a cuppa

Haha... I'll work on that next. I need to make sure that the wired version works first. That is my next project though, Husio.

 

[v8-7]

Great idea !

 

[SMSW]

The harness for the heated pads comes with an inline fuze. If you look at the picture that shows the two pads on the back of the jacket, you can see the fuze on the red wire. I was going to mount it on the bike today and take pictures, but it was raining. I'll update with pictures as soon as I install everything. Thanks for the tip.

My suggestion came not from seeing the fuse block but from the general electrical practice of putting a fuse or circuit breaker as close to the source of power as possible. Fuses and breakers (called overcurrent devices) protect the conductors from overheating and damage. If the only fuse in the circuit is way downstream in your jacket, and the wires run under the seat, chafe or pinching the + wire against the frame could result in a short circuit, overheating of the wire, and damage to any other wires/devices touched by this wire. Your jacket's fuse would not blow in this case.

 

[Imacityboy]

I hope your SAE wiring harness from the battery includes an inline fuse. And for just the heated jacket, it need not be a v. large fuse. (The harness that came w/ my battery tender had no inline fuse - which is why I say this.

It does. There are two fuzes involved in the wiring. You can keep both or just use one.

 

[RedMotion]

Welcome to the forum. Nice DIY info. Any idea what the wattage pull range is?

 

[Bikeric]

Welcome to the forum from Cornwall UK! Useful ides you have here.

 

[Obo]

The nice thing about this is you can "build it" to where you'd like the most heat. I have a factory made heated jacket but all the heat is in the front chest area. The back is unheated.