gauge lights going on and off

i just took the windjammer fairing of the Z1 and now the gauge and dummy lights only come on periodically. i think i might have a short some where, it might be rubbing under the tank or on the frame. Im going to take the tank off and disconnect everything and clean the connections, and also check for bare wires anywhere. when i had the fairing on everything worked good. so if anybody has any info or suggestion let me know.

Might want to get a look inside the headlight bucket as well - it's usually a bowl of spaghetti in there, especially if someone's been fooling with the harness to install a fairing...

I doubt it's a short or you would blow fuses. More likely an intermittent open, meaning corroded connectors, bulb sockets or a broken wire somewhere in the harness. They use wire splices in the harness that divert the wiring from one wire to two or more. These can be source of problems. This means either cutting open the harness or just running a separate wire from working bulbs to non working.

if you just pulled off the faring, I would be looking for bad grounds, and loose pin connectors, take all of the apart, clean them with light sand paper and reinstall them with a bit of dielectric (sp) grease

I second checking the grounds. Usually the number 1 cause of "it's working, it's not working..." other than that of the turn signals.

took the tank off today and disconected every wire i could find and cleaned them all with electric parts cleaner. I put it all back together and now all the gauge and dummy lights work the way they should.