Power Rail adds 12V accessory bar to ATVs

Product designed to meet consumer wants, increase dealership sales

With 30 years in business, Southern Audio Services isn’t a new company, but its latest brand Power Rail is so fresh that products just began shipping in August.

Power Rail is a natural offshoot of SAS’ flagship Bazooka brand, which is a line of speakers for motorcycles, cars, boats and the home. 

“We were coming out with those speakers, and I realized it was a really good solution for an ATV, so to figure out how to do the wire management and get them mounted and make them work on an ATV, I came up with the idea of a telescoping rail. And through that development process and talking with family members who are avid ATVers and friends and local ATV shops, we developed all the other features and functions to make the Power Rail a product in and of itself,” Jon Jordan, president and CEO of SAS, explained to Powersports Business at the Tucker Rocky Brand Expo in July.

Power Rail

The Power Rail is a telescoping 12-volt accessory rail that stretches from 32 to 56 inches and fits nearly every make and model of ATV and side-by-side.

“The bracket easily attaches to the Can-Am LinQ System, so I can telescope and lock it into their LinQ on their flat racks. We also have a provision for the Polaris Lock & Ride, so I can bring it out and lock it on any Polaris bike. So basically there’s not any bike on the market for the most part that we can’t mount directly to,” Jordan said.

Basket rack and tube rack mounting systems are available in addition to the LINQ and Lock & Ride mounts.

The purpose behind the Power Rail is to give riders an easy way to install and uninstall 12-volt accessories and run them using the unit’s battery power. Each Power Rail kit comes with a fixed accessory mount in the center, which uses T-slot brackets and thumb screws to slide-mount accessories to the rail. A center plug allows that accessory to then plug into the 12-volt system.

Also available on the Power Rail are the Push Fit accessory mounts on both ends of the rail. Those allow for nearly any 12-volt accessory to be installed on interchangeable Power Pads, which can be rotated 360 degrees.

To power the products, the Power Rail uses a standard SAE plug that can connect to the accessory port on the ATV or side-by-side, however Jordan recommends users go directly to a battery terminal connection for the best performance.

As much as the accessories can be easily removed, so can the Power Rail itself when the mount’s bolts are replaced with pins, which are included in the Power Rail kit.

“Everything about the rail is what we call ‘releasably attached.’ As easy as you can put it on, we wanted it to be as easy to take off,” Jordan reported.

Accessories

The $169.99 Power Rail kit includes the Power Rail itself, the wiring needed to attach the Power Rail to the ATV or side-by-side’s 12-volt power source and two Power Pads. Additional Power Pads and a Power Link 12-volt accessory Y-harness can be purchased separately.

Currently, Power Rail sells two Power Rail-ready accessories, the Power Box and Bazooka 6” Amplified Bluetooth Speakers.

The Power Box mounts to the center T-mount slot. It has a USB charging port inside the box, so a phone or tablet can be stored in the box while also connected to the machine’s 12-volt power. The waterproof box, which comes in large (15-by-11-by-5 inches) and small (11-by-9-by-4 inches) sizes, also includes a configurable foam insert to secure its contents.

Bazooka 6” Amplified Bluetooth Speakers are pre-installed on pads that attach to the Push Fit mounts. They come with or without integrated lights. And, with the Bluetooth capability, they can be used in concert with a device stored and plugged into the Power Box.

“I can advance a song, rewind a song, volume up, volume down, pause, play. The switch can turn the light on and off, and it even has a waterproof microphone built in, so if my phone rings, I can hit the play button and talk hands free without ever having to go into the box to get to my phone,” Jordan said.

His company also sells stands for the Bluetooth speakers, so when they’re removed from the Power Rail, they can be used inside a home or garage.

Power Rail has also made a pump bracket available for Wayne PC1 water pumps. And Jordan plans on creating more Power Rail-ready accessories, including a 110-power inverter, a thermo-electric ice chest and a small air compressor. He’s also looking to partner with other aftermarket companies on more accessories.

“As we get an install base of Power Rails on the market, we know that we’re going to get suggestions, and we’re going to come out with more accessories, as well as we want to partner. One of my big goals is to partner with other manufacturers for them to have their own Power Rail-ready accessories, and they develop their own stuff that fits our rail because then it becomes a de facto standard on how to easily put something on your bike,” Jordan said.

The Power Rail and its accessories draw as much power as any other accessory would, so while riders will have to be mindful of their battery, they won’t have to take any special precautions with the Power Rail.

“[It’s] no different than if you’re at a football game tailgating and you’re running your stereo in your truck all day. It’s the same concept,” Jordan said. “The pump draws the most current. If they’re going to be pumping for a while, they’re going to need to crank the bike, let the bike run. It’s not going to outpace the stator or the alternator built into the bike. But as a standalone, if they’re using it all day, they’ll draw their battery, but any accessory is going to do that.”

Increasing dealer accessory sales

One of Jordan’s primary goals with the Power Rail is to help dealers sell more accessories for ATVs and side-by-sides.

“It’s kind of a razor/razor blade selling philosophy. Give a man a razor and sell him blades, or give the kid an Xbox and sell him games,” Jordan said.

In addition to the accessories that Power Rail sells, nearly any 12-volt accessory will mount to the Power Pads or the T-slot mount, so dealers who sell a Power Rail can continue to sell accessories to the ATV or side-by-side owner in the future. Jordan expects LED lights to be a popular Power Rail add-on.

“If I want lights today, I have them. Otherwise I undo it, snap it off, put my Bluetooth speakers on. Everything is ‘releasably attached,’” Jordan said.

Jordan also thinks some ATV and side-by-side owners who use a lot of accessories will install more than one Power Rail. He had two on his ATV displayed at the Tucker Rocky Brand Expo, so he could display the Power Box, speakers, LED lights and pump bracket all at once.

“I’ll have the pump, run the pump, and I can even turn my speakers on in the front if I wanted to, if I have two Power Rails on my bike,” Jordan said. “We fully expect some people are going to put two on their bike. They’ll put some utility function on the back and then some recreational function on the front.”

Dealers can only purchase the Power Rail through Tucker Rocky, as the distributor was quick to jump onto the idea after the Power Rail was first shown as a concept at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in January.

“The product idea was conceived in October; prototyped for CES, where we did a public first launch of it at CES. We had such a good response at the Consumer Electronics Show that we started taking the idea to the next step,” Jordan said. “I came in and met with Tucker Rocky, and they embraced us, and that’s when we just said, ‘Let’s do all the tooling, make it happen.’”

With the production-model Power Rail making its debut at the Tucker Rocky show, it was hard to find a minute in which the booth wasn’t full of dealers. Jordan said the initial dealer response was overwhelmingly positive.

“The dealers at this show have completely validated that we did the product right, that we designed it correctly and brought it to them the way they need it to be successful,” Jordan said. “So that’s been exciting for us.”