Making turn signals from scratch

They have a color code on them, a series of stripes. You can either look up the color code chart, or use a meter to measure the resistance. They would go into the wire leading to the lamps. So depending, 1 resistor per side of bike, or 1 resistor per lamp. That would depend on what you need to have them function, and what you have. Also you can add two together in series, one attached to the other, for additional load on the relay. You'll have to experiment. Once its all working solder and heat shrink those into your wiring. Radio Shack would also have a Potentiometer/ variable resistor that you could adjust to get the correct flashing and brightness. Then measure that resistance, and solder in the regular resistors.

Oh and since your building all your own circuits, do you have your circuits fused still? 10 amp fuse should be ok for you turn signal circuit.

How about we ignore the LED's for now? They're complicating your circut.

Put in some regular bulbs for testing, that way we know everything is hooked up right, and that the flasher relays are actually doing their job.

Once you have a working system, then it's time to convert to the LED's and figure out the resistors and whatnot.

Oh and I just bought a 5pk of resistors from radioshack and have NO idea how to use them. Any suggestions? Im going to look around google now

Awesome news.. maybe?

So I got the resisors, tried one didnt work. tried puting
all five in between. Didnt work. So i thought maybe you were right and i had somehow blown the flasher relay. Unfortunatly the only light i had available to test this theory was a standard house lightbub. hooked it up and BINGO!! The flasher starts clicking on and off. The light bulb didnt come on im guessing because it didnt have enough power going to it but the fact that the flasher is clicking on and off when a light that draws more means all I need to do is get stronger resistors.. right??

On the bag of resistors you bought, or on the receipt, does it say what the value is in OHM's? It sounds like you still need more resistance to have it work. But what did you buy?

Do you still have the blinker bulbs on the handlebars? If so you could run them into the circuit to get your needed resistance.

@ Motorhead:

The resistors I bought happened to be identical to the top one in the picture you posted of the color chart. 22Ohm 1/2watt 5% tolerance

@ jjwoodman:

No like I said the bike got stripped down to almost nothing in the beggining, all the factory circuitry for the turn signals/hazards is gone. Im not even actually putting turn signals on the front at this point since it isnt required by state law, just the back. And im not hooking up hazards or anything, its got a running light and a brake light so all I have to have is a left and right blinker for the rear.

OK now, remember the link I posted with the wiring for the relay? Well their site has the info for your resistance you need, superlumination.com/equalizers.htm
It would be 6 OHM, probably. Maybe only 10 OHM, somewhere in that range, 220 is not enough, as you have already found. Click the link and scroll down to the load equalizers, and they have descriptions on how much load they will make. Remember you took out bulbs that were like 15 watts a piece. So either buy a load equalizer here or some resistors from Radio Shack.
It will work just got to get it set up.

Ok I will go to radioshack tomorrow and exchange mine for a pack of 6ohm and buy a pack of 10ohm and just return whichever one I dont need. When im using them I am supposed to only put the resistor on the positive line correct?

Like

[+]

---

[relay]----[switch]----[resistor]
\
\
[bulb]
/
/
[ground]


or is the resistor supposed to connect to the positive AND the ground?

it didnt post it right should have hit preview

the diagonal lines wer supposed to come off of resistor and go to bulb and then off of bulb and go to ground

In the positive feed line to the bulb, would be best. You should be able to do it with 1 I think, put it in the wire where the power goes into your switch, that way if it set to right or left turn it will pull the extra current. Savy?

So the amount will effect both the brightness of your bulbs and the speed as to which it will blink.

Savy!

Im only 19 and this is my first motorcycle so Im sorry if ive been a bit difficult to educate but I AM learning and I must say im havin a blast doing it

Thanks for everything Ill post tomorrow and let you know how it goes