What happened?

SO, I'm out riding around for over 2 hours on the most beautiful St Pattys Day ever when the bike simply died. After a quick walk to the nearest auto parts store for some fuses I found the main fuse blown. I put a new one in and it immediatley blew. Back home to get the trailer and get her home for further investigation. I had recently been messing around with the turn signals (trying out a Maier fairing that I have since found out I don't like at all) so I figured that must be part of the problem. BTW - While out riding the left turn signal quit working so I started there. I pulled apart the wiring and redid it. Now here's the new problem... Both turn signals flash very quickly and the starter will not work. What happened? When I push the starter button there is silence! The bike was running great before this. I know nothing about wiring but I better learn or get ready to take it in to a shop. The rear running light and gauges lights still don't work (since last fall) and I haven't found that issue yet either. Please help!!

I can't say what circuit it is on, but all the wires for the gauges and what-not you are having issues with are in the headlight housing. The issue sounds like a wire that has grounded itself. If it were me, I would check:

1. All connections in the headlight

2. Check all wires for bare/frayed/exposed wire that may be grounding itself on the frame

3. From the headlight, I would check the ignition wiring, then the handlebar controls.

4. If nothing, check all wires coming from the battery

It sounds tedious, and it just may end up being tedious, but it is most likely the cause of the issue. Start in/around the headlight/gauges/turn signals bc that is where the problem seems to be. Sounds like it is a loose or bare wire that may have been there forever, but was recently moved when installing the fairing.

Let us know what you find.

~Clutch

Check the wires in the ignition switch. I recently had a similar problem, and come to find out that the previous owner switched handle bars a little too much. The bolts were tightened down a little too much and cut the ignition wires open. A little electrical tape around the wires, and fuses stopped blowing.

Testmonkey wrote:

Check the wires in the ignition switch. I recently had a similar problem, and come to find out that the previous owner switched handle bars a little too much. The bolts were tightened down a little too much and cut the ignition wires open. A little electrical tape around the wires, and fuses stopped blowing.

yeah an open wire on a handle bar is what i'm thinking...check the bulb in the signal that stopped working ...the others may be flashing to tell ya the bulb blew...good luck....

Had similar problem turned out to be the kill switch wires grounding to handlebars.

So, I am obviously an electrical dummy! I bought some inexpensive LED turn signals since the one was out and I was needing to get a set anyway. I figured LED was the way to go. Now I can't get them to light up. I think I remeber reading in here somewhere that the system needs resistance to use LEDs. How does that work? I need to get this figured out then try to move on to why I get nothing when I push my started button.

LED's are polarity sensitive, the Red Wire goes to the Positive voltage supply. To check them out make up some wires with clips and carefully hook them to your Battery,connecting Red Wire to the Positive Battery Terminal and the Black Wire to the Negative Battery Terminal. DO NOT TOUCH THE RED AND BLACK WIRE CLIPS TOGETHER WHILE CONNECTED TO THE BATTERY,AS THIS IS A DIRECT ELECTRCAL SHORT!!!!!! YOU WILL "SMOKE" THE WIRING!!!

If the LED's are good they will light up, if not the LED's could be bad. I'm not sure if a multimeter will contnuty check LED's

To make them work as a turn signal blinker/flasher a load equalizer might be needed to make the turn signal flasher/blinker work. On a regular incandescent bulb circuit, the resistance of the bulbs filiments(sp) makes the bimetal strip inside the little silver can heat up making and breaking the circuit making the lights flash.

Most good auto parts stores sell replacement electronic flashers/blinkers that can be used for LED turn signals. They come in two and three wire configurations. Bring your old one along to match up the new one.

Adding to what Mfolks said.

There is more to LEDs than just switching bulbs.

You have to go expensive, about $20 USD a pop, to begin matching the brightness of stock ones.

They could be two circuit (running/directional), or single circuit, just directional.

You need electronic blinking relay. The mechanical stock one won't work properly. Electronic relay is inexpensive, but you may have to improvise mounting. The resistors are just as wasteful as stock incandescent.

Make sure your bike does not have a single dash directional indicator, or all your directional will blink at once. In this case you'd need add diodes in your harness to use LEDs.

I now have all four lights flashing when they are supposed to, however, only if I hook up the old incandescent with them. Does this mean I need a resistor or a different relay as hugo suggests? The lights still blink very fast and I haven;t figured that out yet.

kztee wrote:

I now have all four lights flashing when they are supposed to, however, only if I hook up the old incandescent with them. Does this mean I need a resistor or a different relay as hugo suggests? The lights still blink very fast and I haven;t figured that out yet.

Fast flash means the LED lamps are not drawing enough current to work the standard flasher. A solid state flasher should fix it.

OK. Do I get one of those at an auto parts store?