For almost all riders, high on the list of mods is the undertail. That stock black plastic fender is just an eyesore. So spend a few hundred bones, and a weekend, to install a beautiful smooth, contoured undertail. And the LAST thing you're going to want to do is to drill holes in it to mount the license plate!
So, as a result, the bulletin boards are always full of guys asking "where do I mount my plate? Some people are very creative, and hang it down - way up beneath the battery box. Some people buy gadgets to flip the plate up at a touch of a button, so that it is invisible. I chose to mount the plate vertically on the left swingarm. All these solutions have one thing in common - they are totally illegal. So you could get ticketed for this. But more likely the state troopers won't bother you, instead you'll just have to UN-do it before you go for your inspection.
I can tell you for sure, this isn't legal in Delaware. In my state you have to :
Well, that pretty much consigns you to drilling your undertail and mounting it the traditional way. But if you have a few years before your next inspection (Delaware allows you 5 years if the bike is new), then you might try something different, as I did. This will only cost you $2 and 30-45 minutes.
There's not much to say here. I just spent $2 to get a 4-foot length of anodized aluminum at the hardware store. Just cut a couple of short pieces - a cheapy jigsaw or even a small hand hacksaw can cut through aluminum very easily. I just held them up to the swingarm with the plate in one hand to see how long they would have to be, and to find the proper location for the mounting holes to be drilled.
It's a pretty brainless procedure. Then spray paint these metal "struts" white to match the hugger.
Notice that the plate is only held in place by the two bolts along the LEFT side of the plate holder. The other two bolts visible along the right side of the chrome plate holder do nothing except hold the license plate in the chrome frame.
Legally, you are required to have a light for the license plate, so I rigged up an LED license plate light from Radiantz. It's easy to connect this light bar to any license frame that you choose. Just drill 3 holes through your license plate frame and mount it as shown. I was able to ground the black wire to one of those bolts, and was pleasantly surprised to see that the light worked, even though the entire plate is only held to the frame of the bike by painted aluminum struts that I made. But it worked fine.
That's nice because it meant I only had to route ONE long wire (the hot wire) from the tail of the bike all the way down to the swingarm. I used some Loctite mounting putty and some "Goop" sealant/adhesive and a few cable ties to hold the wire in place along the frame and keep it hidden from view pretty well.
The white LED IS very bright, but because it is directed ACROSS the plate instead of AT the plate, you can see that it does not do a good job of illuminating the second half of the plate. So after a year, I finally got the $$ to add a second light.
I put this one on the bottom of my license frame. The result is pretty good, and ought to keep the cops from hassling me.
But at this price (about $65
for EACH license plate LED bar), I sure can't recommend this as something everyone would want to do. Now, the good news is that Radiantz has, since then, come to their senses a bit and it seems like they've dramatically reduced their prices - I'm not surprised ! So give them a chance and check their priced updates. The product really is great in appearance.
Like many things in life, you're paying for a super-professional final appearance, and mostly you're paying for convenience. You're paying for TIME. Could you manufacture something like this yourself for much less cost? Sure, but it might take you an entire weekend, cutting drilling and polishing a chrome housing bar like this, then inserting superbright LEDs, adding resistors, and soldering all the connections. And at least in my hands, the final product would never look this good. For me -- it's worth the $ to have TWO free weekends to ride instead of working on a silly license plate illuminator.
As it was, took me about 30 minutes, being VERY careful, to drill the holes, mount this LED bar, and hook up the wiring. Cool !
If their prices have come down, then I'd highly recommend this product. The appearance is first class, and the illumination is excellent. It's way better than I could have ever rigged up myself.
Well, I really liked the vertical mount, but like most cool things on a sportbike, it is illegal. So after 5 years, when I had to get the bike inspected, it had to be undone in order to pass inspection. It was a big hassle, and I didn't want to UN-do it and RE-do it every two years from now on for every state inspection. So I was forced to consider something more..., uh , well, --- LEGAL !
The main legal problems with the vertical swingarm mount and my undertail (in Delaware at least) are:
So it was time for the old swingarm mount to go. I thought long about it, and decided it was time to put the stock turn signals back on, mount the plate under the undertail, and I used the TAZ mount to do it. What's the TAZ mount? It is a clever gadget you can rig up yourself with a $2 piece of aluminum, a tube of "J.B. Weld", and a little bit of time. Read the writeup by my buddy TAZ - at his web site Maximum Lean. He'll show you everything you need to know.
Here is my final result. It's a pretty good look, actually. And it is street legal so I'll never have to UNdo it again just to get through state inspection.
Here are some closeup shots:
Unfortunately the right signal is somewhat hidden by my slip-on tail pipe.
You can see the old ports for my turn signals (on the tailpipe plastic, just below the tail lights on each side) have been closed. I used Bondo© to fill in the holes, then sanded, spray painted the entire undertail white, and sprayed 4 layers of clearcoat over the surface. Then some wet sanding and buffing to get the shine back to the original look. A pretty good result.
I bought a new Radiantz license light, which you see mounted over the plate.
With the stock exhaust, there is plenty of room for the stock turn signals attached to my TAZ mount.
See a little more discussion, and many more pictures, in my discussion on my combination of the TAZ mount and the Mototeck undertail. Again, this combination is not as attractive as the PURE undertail look, but in my neck of the woods, it is required by law.
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