Inner fairing panels- with or without?

Ndfrc

Ndfrc

Joined
Dec 17, 2025
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Age
68
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Jacksonville, FL
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Many
I do see references to folks that have ran without the inner faring panels but I can’t seem to gauge functionality.. practicality.
I lean towards better air flow for the motor, don’t know what that does for the rider. It does make assembly ‘complete’ but not easy to reinstall, it could backwards any designed flow which put them there to begin with. Sure, creative fastening would be in order.. not to say we couldn’t do better. Maybe, maybe not.. so the question is.. has anyone tried? Thoughts? Opinions? With or without?
 
Ndfrc said:
I do see references to folks that have ran without the inner faring panels but I can’t seem to gauge functionality.. practicality.
I lean towards better air flow for the motor, don’t know what that does for the rider. It does make assembly ‘complete’ but not easy to reinstall, it could backwards any designed flow which put them there to begin with. Sure, creative fastening would be in order.. not to say we couldn’t do better. Maybe, maybe not.. so the question is.. has anyone tried? Thoughts? Opinions? With or without?
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I am now on my third ST1300 and, on the first one, I followed avidly all the posts about heat control. I went the route of almost complete removal of the inner panels and, the end result, no noticable difference! With the second and third ST I live with the slight discomfort of THE HEAT and anyway, here in temperate UK, it's not too much of a problem. Also, I always ride with my 'Stich which is an effective barrier.
 
My thoughts for the 1300 are "panels with." You want that airflow directed thru the rad. The heat is still going to be there both ways, so there's not much to do about it and the other issue is the outlet side. It's limited to venting out the side spots and the frame and tank will get hot anyway, from either the hot air in there or from convection, radiated heat or from metal parts touching hot engine metal parts.
 
I tried with and without and while I noticed no difference to me, as the rider, I did notice that when riding in stop and go city riding, the electric fans came on much more without the inner panels present. I guess when at slower speeds, the rad relied on those panels to "funnel" as much air as possible when in motion. At the end of the day, while the fans did their job and there was no danger of overheating, fans running more and forcing more hot air through the hot rad and under the bodywork likely negated any perceived cooling benefit from removing the panels.
 
You have the front wheel and fender blocking off all airflow to the radiator, and now with the inner cowls removed, you have Nothing directing air flow into the radiator!
You have large open areas directing the air past the hot exhaust and engine hitting a trapped dead end by the aluminum frame which becomes a heat sink.
While riders may not “feel” the air heat, you’re not doing your engine or wire harness any favors, and are slowly starting to make things crispy and damage stuff.
This is why folks noticed that their fans come on more.
The radiator can't do its job.
If you check temp readings with an IR heat gun, you will see much higher readings on the engine without the cowls.
Kinda like when your dads car use to overheat and he rolled all the windows down, to let the heat escape, and turned the fan on high to try and pull the heat through and away
:rofl1:
 
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Much appreciate the solid responses!
I am going to camp out in the ‘engineers know better’ on this one…. WHAT?!, who said smart engineer?! Isn’t there some snooping around on here?! 🤣
 
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