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Zumo 660 mounted on RT; pics and updated review

B1Pilot

New member
Hey all:

So i finally got my zumo 660 mounted a week or so ago and took some pictures to show the final solution I came up with.

For my normal day to day riding, I have it mounted with a special RAM ball stem mount custom made by Jim Winchester (example pics and contact info here ).

The mount is stable as all get out and easily wired in. I use the normal length ram connector with the locking hub to make sure no one steals my bracket (though what they would do with it without the actual GPS is beside me). This zumo doesnt need a screw, but instead has a quick action disconnect and a cover for the electrical connections when the GPS is gone.

I think this location is optimal for two reasons: The first is that it has 0 vibration... the screen is prefectly legible at all RPMS. Second its location brings it much closer to your view and reach. You can operate all the functions of the devise smoothly while driving one handed and you are not stretching or shifting your riding position whatsoever. This also places the device in a position where it blocks your view of nothing on the bike (save the key ring). I took the pictures from my eyes view, while sitting on the bike so you can see the POV... all you have to do is shift your eyes down, you dont even have to move your head.

I did have another dilemma in that I sometimes ride with the RT tank bag and thought this position would be too low... When the mount was installed, enough slack on the wires existed such that I could move it to either reservior RAM ball mount, left or right, depending on which hand i liked operating it with. It turns out, that with the 5" Ram arm, it will clear the tank bag just fine as well. The only other adjustment is that it needs to be tilted slightly back. I have included pictures of this for perspective. Now I can use the other RAM mounts for other toys, like my iPhone or cup holder :brow

As for the device itself, I cant rave enough about it. I threw a 16GB memory chip in it for music and audiobooks -- that maps are all on its own 4gb (I think) storage -- with its direct audio wiring for headphones it works perfectly, coordinating GPS and music. My phone is still blu-toothed, and I can pull over to talk, but I havent wired in my helmet mic yet (though their is a port for it). In fact my N103 with blu tooth and such is now a big waste of money as I dont use its speakers or mic anymore. I may try to figure out a solution for this or I may not.

The garmin software continues to be slick as hell... someone posted about not being able to find places correctly on this... I have seen the opposite -- google maps on my iphone is wrong while the gps is right.

Some have made comments that the route selection is not the best. I think that this is because the Garmin will give you the calculated fastest or the calculated shortest (or if you are off road in your GS the direct shot), but it wont figure out that mix of fastest and shortest that you speed to in order to make the best time. But you can put your custom route in the GPS if you want. Also, the GPS will remember (and leave up on the screen, in a complementary color, the way you just came (for about 25 miles or so) so if all else fails you can back track. Finally its trip loggin is fantastic, allowing you to go on a ride, and then download your stats and where you went.. pretty slick. Every day I find out some new feature to the software I didnt know was there.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask!

Chris

Pics are:

1)normal low position, 2)showing mount ball, 3) high position, 4) high position side view

 
Looks like a great set up. I've been thinking about a 660 for my birthday. By the way, I like your back rest. Where did you get it?
 
Rumor has it this is the soon to be Nav IV.
I popped one on my F800ST and it's great, smokes the NavIII on my RT. (Yes, more shame)
Nice clean install B1!
 
So i finally got my zumo 660 mounted a week or so ago and took some pictures to show the final solution I came up with.

For my normal day to day riding, I have it mounted with a special RAM ball stem mount custom made by Jim Winchester (example pics and contact info here ).

Nice job -- I'm using Jim's mount with a 5" RAM arm as well for my 550 -- works great and I can see it even with the tank bag mounted (and unzipped and expanded). The 660 appears to have a bit larger screen than the 550 looking at your photos.
 
Rumor has it this is the soon to be Nav IV.
I popped one on my F800ST and it's great, smokes the NavIII on my RT. (Yes, more shame)

Yeah, the new BMW-branded version has hard buttons on the left - cradle prolly. I saw a picture a week or two ago.

There is also a Harley Davidson-branded version. I saw the box at a dealer a couple of days ago. It wasn't priced. I don't know if that one has hard buttons or not.

My 660 was sent for service a week ago and I just received a replacement. It was the full retail kit, with mounts, cables, software, etc. yet all Garmin wanted me to send them was the defective unit without any of the accessories -- so now I have a bunch of spares for free.
 
thanks for the comments all,


INDAWIN: the back rest is a bakup... I got it from Cee Bailey's. Wasnt sure how I would like it, but really enjoy it. When my top case is on it makes a nice little spot to throw my motofizz bag inbetween, without the lumpiness of leaning on a bag...it also is pretty trick in that it folds forward if need be (you can swing your leg over bike and through it to mount) and it is adjustable and works with all BMW seat heights.

The 660 does in fact have a larger screen than the 550... 70% larger when you add up the pixel count.. this means a wider image that is also much sharper.

the Nav iV is the 660 with side buttons.. some thoughts though.. I dont need any hard buttons as far as I can tell.. maybe a volume button, but this is easily adjusted by hitting the power key briefly than adjusting on the screen.

If you are seriously considering a Garmin, I highly encourage to pay the 30 bucks for an AMA membership and use their discount... I think I saved a couple hundred... however the extra nice part was that since I bought it through AMA it was considered an "employee sale' in as far as customer service went... call Garmin and ask for employee sales, and you will then get customized and much more rapid customer service (mine came with an 09 map disc, but then the 10 came out this month, after I already had the unit.. they sent me a new one free of charge)

Keep in mind that the 660 is not XM capable (but its cheaper at garmin, at others YMMV).. but I woudl easily trade away XM for GPS features such as the by lane view... it is amazing to see... I will take a picture when I am in a cage some time, and the 3d view with building modeling, and a list of other improvement they ahve made to their software over the course of the years between models


B-1
 
B1 - The mount looks great in the center. I am sold on this position for the 550 I'll be installing next weekend.
 
B1 - The mount looks great in the center. I am sold on this position for the 550 I'll be installing next weekend.

Way too low for me. I want to glance at it, not move my head. If I had this bike, it'd go over the instrument cluster.
 
Way too low for me. I want to glance at it, not move my head. If I had this bike, it'd go over the instrument cluster.

I dont move my head at all, just glance down.... the glareshield of a bike only goes so high for a reason, why put anything above it?. the ones mounted high look nice, but suffer from three major flaws in my opinion:

1.) the reach to manipulate the device is entirely to far -- which can be dangerous at full speed.
2.) no matter how solid the migsel or gadget guy or whatever, it still vibrates as the glareshield vibrates. A cursory check of the forums on various sites such as this one, ADV, BMWST, and other will give multiple testimonials to this.
3.) It is hard to do the high mount without making some sort of permanent modification to the glareshield area... as much as I love my bike, it will not be my last BMW, either and I want to sell it clean.

Before I settled on the permanent solution, I tried the GPS in various positions, on battery power only, with the mount's wires not attached and wrapped around the base. If you look at my bike I have RAM balls on both brake and clutch reservoirs, and the center stem. I also did a temp mod to the glareshield as seen in this forum: http://forums.bmwmoa.org/showthread.php?t=36676&highlight=zumo&page=2 This was temporary due to issues discussed but it put the gps up on the glareshield so I could see and manipulate it there without permanently effecting the bike. Out of all these 4 positions, ultimately the one I chose was the best to suit my needs.

The point two-fold; dont do a permanent mount until you have tried it out in the position you think you will use or like, and some others. Second, be wary of critiquing or writing off a setup if you haven't tried it... I learned something about my sight lines from all four, and what types of things would be best at each position. I ended up mounting mine somewhere I didnt think I would originally and am glad I didn't spend the 150 for a migsel mount. I think if anything would change where to put it it would be a persons height and riding posture.

Of course, this is just one guys educated opinion, YMMV

IronMikeAA said:
B1 - The mount looks great in the center. I am sold on this position for the 550 I'll be installing next weekend.
Iron Mike if you want the contact info for the guy who makes the stem mount seen here, PM me...

Cheers!

Chris
 
Hey B1 !

Where did you tap into for the power ? I just got my Zumo 660 last week. I've been playing with arms, and positions for a few days. My older GPS 96C, it only has a power cable, so I ran that to the fuse box under the seat on my R1150RT.

The 660 mount and cables are 'structured' so the audio, mic and etc outputs are pretty close to where the power would be attached. I'm not sure how to run things if I put the power at the fuse box. I think it would force me to run things back under the seat and up the middle to my tankbag.

I'll mention that I'm still in wired mode (aka non-bluetooth) to my Chatterbox X1 and helmet.

Nice job !
 
Bmr shelf for zumo

Have mine mounted on a BMR shelf and it's absolutely awesome:

- mounted high above dash so it's in my field of view with NO head movement
- still close enough to reach for manipulation
 
Way too low for me. I want to glance at it, not move my head. If I had this bike, it'd go over the instrument cluster.

Agreed. I've got my 550 zumo centered above the cluster, in my line of sight, and it is perfect. I use a bracket from a UK company called Motorrad Concepts that I got used from I don't remember where. I'm not sure the company is still in business.
 
Mounting looks great. I have mine mounted with an ARM attachment that connects to a plate that is mounted above my clutch fluid reservior.

The 660 is great, as long as it working. Just had my second 660 (had it 2 months) fail this year. Garmin replaced the 1st one in a timely manner. Both had the same problem and waiting to hear from Garmin on what they are going to do with the second one. Since neither had a lot of time or miles on them and had the same problem, looks like there may be a fatal hardware/firmware/software problem that Garmin needs to address. :banghead
 
+1 on the BMR copilot shelf. I have the 660 on the adjustable gps
bracket in the center (had to make spacers to clear cable conn). The
Escort Redline is to the right and my one-off super bright LED indicator
is on the left. I had a Migsel first but it was much too bouncy.The BMR
has support arms that connect to a hard point at the bottom of the
dash that provides much more stable mounting. The BMR put the GPS
in a very good viewing position...just slightly below line of sight.

Dave Bogue
'08 R1200rt
 
I dont move my head at all, just glance down.... the glareshield of a bike only goes so high for a reason, why put anything above it?. the ones mounted high look nice, but suffer from three major flaws in my opinion:

1.) the reach to manipulate the device is entirely to far -- which can be dangerous at full speed.
2.) no matter how solid the migsel or gadget guy or whatever, it still vibrates as the glareshield vibrates. A cursory check of the forums on various sites such as this one, ADV, BMWST, and other will give multiple testimonials to this.
3.) It is hard to do the high mount without making some sort of permanent modification to the glareshield area... as much as I love my bike, it will not be my last BMW, either and I want to sell it clean.

I had my Zumo 550 mounted low on the R 1200 RT, originally on the BMW brackets that bolt to the handlebar antlers, totally unacceptable for a number of reasons.

1) Too low in the field of view, had to look down to really see it.
2) Positioning the screen at the angle for best viewing made it mostly unreadable due to glare from the sun on anything other than a completely cloudy day.
3) Trying to work the screen buttons was dicey, had to reach down and take my eyes off the road to see the controls, however briefly, not good.
4) Addition of a tankbag made viewing or working the screen impossible unless stopped.

550 is now mounted on a GadgetGuy mount up in direct line of sight next to the V1 above the instrument panel. The entire assembly bolts on using the stock screw holes in the upper fairing cover and there's a steel bracing bracket that goes underneath to stop the vibes, no permanent modifications necessary. A far better solution because...

1) Don't have to take my eyes off the road at all to see the screen
2) Working the control buttons is a breeze and I'm still looking forward through the windscreen at the same time (being 6'2" the reach isn't an issue for me YRMV...)
3) If I expand the tankbag and stuff it full enough to obstruct the view with the current placement of the GPS, I should probably rethink what I've got in the bag and move some S**t around to other places

Oh yeah, unless I lug the engine I can't see any issues with vibration in the current mounting system! I've read some of the comments about vibration on the high mounts and for some of the products out there I would agree it could be a major problem.The GadgetGuy setup is pretty solid in that respect, you'd have to be riding off-road for vibration to be an issue with this setup and I generally don't do that with the RT.

My $.02
 
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