A lot of new Street Glide owners are enamored with being able to play tunes on their new ride and for the first few weeks, the stock stereo seems like a pretty nice setup. If you're like me though, you can't leave much stock for very long and that includes the stereo. The stock stereo was decent, but I wanted a stereo that JAMMED!

A bit of research led me to find the Arc Audio KS 125.2 mini-amp and the 6.5" speaker upgrades as being a strong upgrade to the stock unit, so I quickly shelled out the bucks and got to work. Below is a write up of the install and things to watch out for during the installation. My supplier forgot to include the directions to install, so a few things were a bit more difficult than they should have been but all in all it ended up being very simple. Let's get to it.

Running the Power

I thought the toughest part of the install was going to be running the power cables from the battery up front to the amp but it turned out to be very simple. Our test bike is a 2009 Street Glide and HD had the foresight to have no fuel tank crossover on this model, so removing the stock tank was a snap. The instructions called for zip tying the harness to the factory harness, but taking the tank off was so easy that it made more sense to just run the power through the factory loom.

Remove the seat and the fuel tank. Both come off easily on a 2009 model. The battery is under the tray shown in the picture and you will need access to the battery terminals to make the connections for the main amp wiring harness.

Once you have accessed the battery, unsnap the cover that covers the harness. It's very simple and will allow you to run the harness through the main loom, protected from everything that it may come in contact with.

Unsnap the cover. This looks intimidating but it really isn't. Run the amp wiring harness through this channel with the terminated ends (the ones with the rings) on the battery end of the bike. Remove the fuse from the harness at this point. Feed the rest of the harness up through into the front fairing.

Make sure and remove the 25 amp fuse from the harness right now and make the connection to the battery. Double check that you have red to positive and black to negative. Don't ask me how I know....again make sure you have NO FUSE in the harness at this point. Once you have a good connection to the battery, you can reinstall the ECM and the harness cover. Do not install the seat as you will need to access the fuse once done.

At this point you can button it back up, reinstall the harness cover and replace the ECM and tray. You can also reinstall the fuel tank as well.

Mount the Amplifier

Now you are ready to mount the amp. This is very simple as well. Prepare the bottom of the amp and the top of the stereo by wiping it down with alcohol of some kind to make sure it is very clean and grease free. Then install one of the velcro pads to the bottom of the amp. You will mount the amp on the top of the stereo as I show in the picture below. You need to mount it so that the Arc Audio badge could be read if I were sitting on the bike looking over the windshield. If you are looking at it from the front, then the amp will look upside down and the fuse will be to your left.

The Arc Audio amp mounts right on top of the stock stereo head unit. Push it back as far as you can so the fairing won't interfere. Mine fit flush against the stereo head unit and had plenty of clearance.

Wiring the Amp

The wiring of the amp couldn't be easier so I am going to be a little bit abrupt here. The first thing you need to do is connect the power that you ran from the battery to the amplifier. Take care to route it so it's neat and orderly and cut to the proper length once you have it done. Then you take the Orange "Turn On" wire and connect it to the amplifier in the appropriate port and then run it to the unused electrical outlet on the headlight harness. This is a spare power tap and it's switched power so it's perfect for what you need.

Now the 2009 Street Glide couldn't be easier on wiring the speaker feeds into the amp. You can plug the supplied 5 wire harness into the right side (as you are facing the front of the bike) and then one at a time remove the wires from the left speaker and plug into the appropriate colored wire for the left and then the same for the right. There is no cutting or splicing, just remove from the stock speakers and plug into the harness on both the left and right. The last thing you need to do is ground this harness, which you have a number of options, just make sure that you find a clean and solid ground.

Install the Speaker Rings

Now it's time to install the speaker rings. This was very confusing to me as I had no instructions, so pay attention and it's super simple. Remove the stock speakers from the stock locations. Remove the "grill" material from the front and place on the stock speaker rings on the flat side. The flat side will face the fairing. I repeat, the flat side faces the fairing.

The flat side goes against the fiaring with the widest part of the oval towards the top. Make sure you place the mesh speaker grill between the ring and the fairing as well. You utilize the supplied bevel head screws to attach the ring with the top left being a long bevel head and the top right being a short bevel head. You will only use 3 screws to attach the ring, just like the OEM setup.

Ok now with the ring on, it's time to mount the speakers.

Make sure you mount the speaker so that the wiring does not interfere with the fairing support bracket at the bottom. I mounted mine at the 9 o-clock position as you can see in the photo. Start by mounting the 3rd screw through the fairing bracket and speaker to hold it in place but do not tighten. Position the speaker so it's clear and not rubbing anything and then you simply zip the pan head screws through one of the speaker holes into the ring. The rings do NOT have predrilled holes, so you cut your own. This threw me for a loop so be clear, you will be making your own holes.

Wire up the Speakers

Ok, now you have one speaker installed.....the procedure is the same on the other side. Double check all your screws and make sure they are snug. Now it's time to wire them up. This is easy as well, simply take the supplied speaker wire and plug into the speakers and then cut to length for a neat installation. Make sure you cut and splice and insert into the appropriate + or - port on the amp and tighten the screws. Do this for both sides and you are done!

Here is a completed shot before tidying up the wires and making everything neat and orderly. Double check your connections, grounds, wiring and make sure everything is snug.

Your installation should be nearly complete at this point. Install the 25 amp fuse into the harness back at the battery and power it up to see if everything works. Before you button up the fairing you will need to tune the amplifier for best performance. I will cover that in another article and shoot a few videos so you can hear the sound for yourself.

I will editorialize a little bit and simply say that this upgrade is AWESOME! The Arc Audio Mini-amp 125.2 is a little monster of an amplifier and will give as good as it gets. Once I got it dialed in, it sounds amazing and instead of being able to hear the radio at 75 mph, I can JAM to the radio at 75 mph with or without pipes.

I definitely recommend this setup.