Lowrance Baja mounting advice needed.

[Richie Rich]

Since I was VERY good this year, Santa brought me a Lowrance baja (540c) for my rig. Seems like a pretty cool unit so far, with one exception.

I cannot for the life of me find a proper mount for this big beast of a GPS. The two ideas that I have had so far were to.
1. Fab up some brackets that tie into the dash structure and mount it in front of the center vents.
2. Pole mount coming up from the floor to the right side of the shifters.
3. Mount it to the left of the steering wheel (kinda tight there, so not the best idea).

Please give me some advice on where to mount this thing and what brackets (if any) might be used for an off the shelf solution.

I am NOT taking the head unit out of my dash, I like my stereo where it is. I would also like to keep my rearview mirror, map lights and sunvisors

Also looking for a magnet mount for the antenna. Lowrance says one exists, yet I can't find one anywhere, even on their website. A part# or a link to a site that sells it would be great.

Rig is an 87 Toyota extracab 4x4 with a manual trans and factory center console.

Thanks for your help.

RR

 

[adrenaline503]

Could you please take a picture of your dash?

 

[adventureduo]

We use a Ram-mount in our 80 series Land Cruiser, but like adrenaline said without seeing your current setup... it's hard for us to tell you.

 

[kcowyo]

The two ideas that I have had so far were to.
1. Fab up some brackets that tie into the dash structure and mount it in front of the center vents.
2. Pole mount coming up from the floor to the right side of the shifters.
3. Mount it to the left of the steering wheel (kinda tight there, so not the best idea).

That's three ideas, cochise

I have some pics of the dash of my old '85, which is identical to the '87, I can post later this evening. I've seen those BIG 540's. Mounting it in an 80's Toyota truck will be a challenge.

I'm assuming you've tried in the slightly recessed area on top of the dash where factory inclinometers go...? I can see that big Lowrance not sitting upright in that space with the angle of the windshield behind it. Or maybe you have the inclinometer/altimeter already there...?

A pole mount, drilled into the passenger side of the tranny hump may be your best bet. There are some interesting ideas you could borrow from in a couple of the laptop mount threads here. HenryJ's comes to mind immediately -

 

[ntsqd]

BT, DT with a Lowrance 3000MT in my '84 Xcab. I built a bracket that placed the GPS slightly off-center to the right of the center vents and just high enough at the base for the glovebox door to open. I radically modified it several years ago so I'm going on memory of what I did, but it was something like this:

I anchored it to the 6mm bolt just fwd of the console at the junction of the bottom of the dash and the top-right of the trans tunnel. A tube reached back from there to the right pass seat's left-front mounting bolt, and another tube reached straight up and then level across in front of the dash over to just above the e-brake handle. Only plastic I had to cut was directly above the e-brake handle to access the two bolts holding the near end of it's hanger to the dash. I slid my tab between the dash part and the hanger piece.
The GPS mounted to the structure at the intersection of the top of the vertical piece of tube and the horizontal coming over from the E-brake tab.

In use it worked rather well and did not noticably vibrate, but the passenger's left knee was always in jeopardy of getting clanked on the bracket. I've since cut all of the upper tubes off leaving the seat bolt to lower dash bolt tube and part of the vertical tube. That section I left in has made a really nice place to mount a race radio.

Should I ever decide to use the 3000 in the field again I've found that it will fit behind the transfercase shifter and fwds of the sole cup holder those trucks have well enough for the cup holder to still function. I would build a bracket bridging across the console from one front inner seat mount bolt to the other and the GPS would be tilted to display almost straight up. Not the most ergo, but the best fit I've found.

 

[24HOURSOFNEVADA]

I too used a ram mount for my baja c. It comes off of the center console and works pretty well. It's in my 80 series.

 

[Angel?]

Hi RR,

I wanted a visually clean, functional setup for my Baja installation. I used a Ram Mount system coming up on the right side of the passenger tunnel with the Baja mounted on a swing-arm assembly. I am very happy with the setup - it is the right height, right placement, all controls are visable on the dash, all all controls are reachable on the dash. Here is my setup - the Baja with an amateur radio on the same mount. http://expeditionportal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=9237

Here is the typical basic setup (in this case a current 4Runner) to help you get an understanding of the components. http://www.ram-mount.com/laptop_mount/ramvb138sw1_laptop_desk.htm

A seat-bolt mounting base was not available for my Land Cruiser model, so I took the concept to a local fabricator and we put together a mockup that he used to produce a custom base for me. In place of the laptop tray, I used the laptop tray's ball mount and instead mounted a 2 1/2 inch angle aluminum approximately 9 inches long to the ball (If I was only mounting the Baja, I would have shortened the angle to the width of the Baja's base).

If you have any questions about such a setup, let me know, and I will be happy to share with you what I learned putting it together.

Cheers,
Cal

 

[Richie Rich]

Thanks for all the replies so far. Been a long week at work, have not even seen my rig since last weekend.

Will pull the truck out of the garage and take some interior shots.

Still cannot find a magnet mount for the antenna. Does anyone have a part # for it?

 

[bucyouup68]

 

[Richie Rich]

Update....

Found a home for the GPS, on the console behind the shifters. Viewing angle seems pretty good, access to the controls is great.

Gave up on looking for a magnetic antenna mount and decided to make my own. Used the Lowrance baseplate, a pair of hard drive magnets and some 2 part epoxy.

Still finishing up some wiring and putting the interior back together, will provide some pics when it is done.

 

[Richie Rich]

Got a little carried away, decided to rewire all of the in cab electronics and add a Blue Sea fuse block.

GPS was mounted to the back of the shifter surround. The thin, brittle plastic would have never supported the unit so it was beefed up with a fabbed bracket underneath the surround that ties into the factory mounting bracket.


Unable to find a magnet mount for the antenna, I epoxied magnets from two dead hard drives I had laying around into the factory baseplate.

The finished product.