WG Coil Rewiring

I'm finally getting around to doing the WG Coil Repowering mod, and I'm afraid I'm stuck. For relay trigger #86 WG talks about the yellow/red wire that comes out of the main wiring harness above the valve cover that terminates in a dual outlet female connector.

My 1981 KZ1000M1 CSR has no such item. Further down the harness there is a yellow/red wire that comes out together with a red and a black wire and goes to a press-together red connector and from there it goes up to the kill-switch on right-hand control.

Here's my question: Do I cut the yellow/red wire between the connector and the harness and then install a female press-on connector (leaving the red and black wires alone) and then run the new wire from relay trigger (#86) up to this new connection? Or do I also cut those red and black wires, cap them and let them dead-end?

Obviously I'm not an electrical guru, and any help would be greatly appreciated!!!

Okay, I think I have it figured out. The yellow/red wire is left alone, as it continues on to the Ignitor. I think I need to connect the red wire after the connector to the relay trigger #86.

Wired-George's directions are incorrect as it relates to my bike model, and the factory manual drawing is confusing as it appears the drawing combines both red and yellow/red wire path until a connector just before the Ignitor.

I'm hoping that someone who has done this can respond with correction or confirmation. I'd really appreciate it as I can't move forward until I know what I'm doing.

Double post

Post edited by: Norseman, at: 2007/07/21 20:41

The wires you cut are the main power wires for the coils from the switch.

I have only done this on a KZ650-B1 so some of the fine details may be different, but since you say it is a show-stopper at this point, here goes... As you have guessed the idea is to give the Coils a more direct and therefore lower resistance path from the battery. The coil re-powering modification does this by routing the battery feed more directly to the coil while routing the relay on/off control lead through the original path, which includes the Ignition switch and the Kill switch and a lot of wiring and especially connectors in the neck and in the handle bars.

That said, see diagram as to how I did mine. Note that I ended up swapping out the original glass tube style fuse holder in favour of a more modern blade style fuse holder with 5 useable positions because the original was becoming less and less reliable. Then I decided to use a new and separate Coils circuit through an additional 5 Amp fuse for troubleshooting purposes. That way I can still test the Coil relay control circuit even if the 5 Amp fuse is blown open. Seemed like the way to do it at the time.



I hope this helps.

Post edited by: bill_wilcox100, at: 2007/07/22 08:37

Post edited by: bill_wilcox100, at: 2007/07/22 08:44

This is how I mounted my Coil Relay under the left side cover. Note that the loose tie-wrap is intended to prevent vibration from reaching the Coil relay.

Thanks Bill and LTD76. I'm still a little lost on my bike, and here's why. The two red red wires from my coils (each in little take-off pig-tails from main harness) feed into harness and run all the way back to where the harness splits into three paths - two on the left side (connector panel side) and one on the right side of the bike.

Now I have four red wires in the harness. One is skinnier and I think comes from the light switch control on left handlebar and goes to back of bike. The other three are: 1 from the Kill Switch through a connector into the harness, 1 from left coil, and 1 from right coil. None of these red wires join inside the harness, at least not before the airbox. At the end of all the main harness pigtails, I can only detect one red wire that goes into the bottom connector at the connector panel (left side of bike) and on the other side of the connector it look like it suddenly has changed into yellow/red and goes to the Ignitor.

One the other side of the bike, the skinny red comes out of a harness take-off and goes toward the rear of bike, looks like lighting system.

My question is:
a) Do I cut the red power wires from the coils, join them and add the new relay trigger wire?

b)Or do I cut both red coil wires, cap the ends, and splice in the new relay trigger wire into the Yellow/Red wire coming from the Engine Kill Switch?

c) Is there a tripple-connector somewhere in the harness that takes the two red coil wires together with the red kill-switch wire and joins them into one red wire that goes to the panel connector?

I have partially unwrapped the main harness, and my plan is to continue to unwrap it until I get back to the source of the two red coil wires, and that's where I remove the two red coil wires and exchange them for the one new trigger wire to the new relay. That way I am at least partially following WiredGeorge's directions...

Post edited by: Norseman, at: 2007/07/22 11:35

As I said, I only have experience on the '77 KZ650 with original points ignition so I really can't confirm your wiring layout. If you don't already have one, you will want to get a repair manual for your year and model... you will need one for sure.

a & b) As I tried to document for myself in the diagram, what I did was to use the existing Coil power lead to operate the relay and I striped back all of my harness and ran a separate 12 AWG Red only wire all the way from my additional 5 Amp fuse, through the Coil relay and on to the two Yellow-Red pigtails already on the coils. At the coil end of my Red wire I decided to added a "Y" splitter with a connector on each one... this allowed me to keep the original connectors on the pigtails to the coils for easy maintenance.

c) Sorry, don't know on yours! See your repair manual.

Sorry, I can't tell you for sure what to cut on your model. As my dad taught me, measure 7 times, cut once. Not the other way around.

Best of success.

Post edited by: bill_wilcox100, at: 2007/07/22 12:12

Post edited by: bill_wilcox100, at: 2007/07/22 12:16

Thank you, Bill, and I really appreciate the diagram. While I am not real good at electrical "stuff", it helped alot. From what you described, it appears that's the way to go on my bike (although I have solid reds goint to coils while you had yellow/reds). I also think I'll follow your method and add an additional 10Amp fuse.

Many thanks again!