Well well well......
After a beautiful late evening rider where I maxed her out to about 95mph, I decided to stop for a coke and ponder life. It was such an enjoyable evening, I didn't even mind that the second and last sub side panel of my 83 Heritage went awol somewhere out in the boondocks. Things get pretty shakey at 150km/h on an XS. At least my replacement muffler supports weren't cracked like the last ride. Unfortunately, I noticed that I had somehow managed to lose the headlight. Probably another vibration victim I guessed. Shame, I had just replaced it a week ago. I checked it the next day and, weirdly, both filaments were intact. Did I crack up the headlight fuse too? No, it looked fine and had continuity. Aha! The infamous headlight safety relay. I pulled it out and cleaned off the decades dead spiders from the contacts. As I did, I shorted out two leads, heard a click, and the headlight came on. I did this with both relays, turning them on and off at will. Dang, curiouser and curiouser. So I did a little research and found that there was a yellow wire coming from the alternator that triggered these relays once the motor was running. I began to get a sinking feeling.....Yup, no voltage on that wire. Checking the battery at fast idle got me 11.55V and dropping very slowly.........F......F.....S!
I checked the rotor and got no continuity. That was actually encouraging, since I figured it suggested a broken wire at the joints, and indeed, after I got home and pulled the rotor, there was the wire hanging loosely from one terminal. Ha! Easy peasy! Except trying to strip the insulation from the wire got me a shorter wire. The another shorter wire. Well, effit, the rotor ohmed out high anyway, so I uncoiled one wrap and soldered it on good and stiff. I was preparing to mix up a batch of epoxy to anchor the wire good and hard when I decided to remeasure the continuity.
Infinite effing ohms.
I resoldered, but no dice. There was continuity from the terminals to the rings, but no continuity from ring to ring, so the wire is split somewhere amongst the coils.
Did I mention
F...F...S!!!!!!
Then I noticed the plastic bobbin that the wires were in could easily be spun by hand inside the rotor cage. Whatever used to anchor the bobbin was obviously not up to the job. Maybe it was the hard riding, but you'd think it would be manufactured to withstand any conditions it was likely to see. The bobbin must have rotated inside the rotor halves and pulled the wires apart. Maybe I'll press this one apart and see if the break is near the end and get it running, but frankly, I have lost all confidence that I can ever find any rotor that's going to fix this for good. It's easy to say the XS has excellent aftermarket support, but frankly, just about every aftermarket part I have bought has been of poor to barely acceptable quality. Case in point, the new Mike's/XS650Direct chrome front fender I just installed. Seems sturdy enough, unfortunately it leaves no room for the brake line stays, so now they just hang, supported only at the ends.
I think I'm done with this bike. I'll probably just throw on a cheap Chinese wobbler and sell it on. The wrenching to riding ratio is solidly in the red. It's a lovely city bike, and the lines are beautiful to look at, but there is always something needing to be fixed. Fun for awhile, but I think I'm over it now.