Here is what the Mirror Cowling looks like from the front view. As you can see the mirrors
It’s pretty hard to get excited about something as simple as a motorcycle mirror, but when we came across AeroView Motorsports’ Mirror Cowling for Road Glides, our blood began pumping. Form and function in one easy-to-install product, what’s not to like? It wasn’t until the MOCO came out with the Street Glide did they offer a touring bike that moved the unsightly rabbit ear mirrors off the handlebars and onto the inner fairing. This simple change really helped make the Street Glide the sleek tourer Harley was aiming for.
As a Road Glide enthusiast, Bernard Gibson, owner of AeroView, was disappointed with the mirror options for his bike. Sure there were plenty of aftermarket choices, but none provided the stylish looks to flow with the streamlined design of the shark-nose fairing and provided a more functional viewing area. So he took matters into his own hands and began working on a solution. After coming up with a concept, Bernard turned to his friend Mike Wakeman for the R&D. Mike had been in the motorcycle industry for quite some time as a custom painter, but more importantly, he had an extensive aerospace background.
The Road Glide Mirror Cowling was finally developed in 2011 and the first units went on sale in January of the following year. A totally unique design, the cowling is made of aircraft-grade fiberglass reinforced plastic (FRP), which is hand-laid in the USA. The cowling features two 4-inch convex mirrors with their mounts molded into the inside outer ends of the cowling. The unit is offered in a gel-coat, ready-to-paint finish and is available with or without flush-mounted LED modules to operate as turn signals. The non-lighted version sells for $295 while the lighted version can be had for $395. For an additional cost and cool factor you can even get a unit with a mini video camera molded into it to record all your bagger shenanigans while riding. Both versions come with all necessary mounting hardware and weather stripping, and the lighted version comes with a plug-n-play wiring harness. Installing either version is a breeze and can be done with basic tools in the average home garage. The company currently only offers a Road Glide version, but don’t fret my batwing loving brethren, while visiting the shop for an install article I was informed they are working on a unit for batwing fairings.
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01 The cowling mounts directly over the top of the outer fairing and bottom of the windscreen and utilizes the three stock mounting points in the center. Two new holes at either end of the outer fairing need to be drilled. Before installation, the seven holes on the cowling were drilled out. The mounting points on the cowling are easily identified by their slightly indented patterns. A step drill was used to drill out each point. The holes were drilled out slightly larger than the mounting hardware to allow room for adjustment.
02 Once all the holes were drilled out of the cowling, two pieces of painters tape were applied to the outer edges of the stock fairing. The tape is used to help protect the paint and provide an easy way to line up and mark the new holes to be drilled.
03 With the tape in place, the cowling was mocked up using the three center windscreen mounting points. You may recognize that this is a Klock Werks windscreen—AeroView says its cowling will work with all H-D windscreens and most aftermarket windscreens. Check with them for compatibility.
04 At the outer edges, Bernard and Mike made sure there was some space between the bottom of the mirror and the top of the fairing. This gap is important for mirror adjustment. You only need about a 1/4-inch of space to be able to properly adjust the mirror. As he was adjusting the gap, Mike also made sure to keep the outside edge of the cowling flush with the outer edge of the fairing.
05 Once everything was aligned, a pencil was used to transfer the cowling hole locations onto the tape.