'81 Special. Make adjustments as required...
It dawned on me the only thing keeping the headlight on is a relay with an old not really sealed coil. You can keep it on all the time by soldering the wire on the left on the relay, bypassing the relay. The light comes on when you turn the key on, and the bike still starts fine, at least in warm weather.
You can just stop there, or adding a switch will probably help with cold weather starting. This switch is all over ebay and comes in different colors.
Cut the blue/yellow wire that comes from the left handlebar switch, and splice in an on/off switch. Tape the joints individually and then make it part of the left switch bundle with tape.
The switch wire is thinner than the stock wiring. It's 22 AWG, good for at least 8 amps, and my headlight draws 4 - 5 amps. So good to go. Keep your headlight turned on even in daylight.
Something that will probably happen....if you still have your Reserve Lighting Unit, it will probably think the switch is a blown headlight and turn on the high beam through a sneaky back channel, which you don't want. I removed my RLU a long time ago, because I didn't know if it would turn the light off if it failed from old age. I'm hoping to quickly get on my high beam with my thumb if my low beam ever fails... To bypass the RLU, remove it and connect together the blue/yellow and the blue/black wires that went to it. Since you don't need the headlight failure light on the dash anymore, you can turn it into an alternator failure light -- just connect the green wire from that same connector to the red/white wire on the starter solenoid. Good to go.
It dawned on me the only thing keeping the headlight on is a relay with an old not really sealed coil. You can keep it on all the time by soldering the wire on the left on the relay, bypassing the relay. The light comes on when you turn the key on, and the bike still starts fine, at least in warm weather.
You can just stop there, or adding a switch will probably help with cold weather starting. This switch is all over ebay and comes in different colors.
Cut the blue/yellow wire that comes from the left handlebar switch, and splice in an on/off switch. Tape the joints individually and then make it part of the left switch bundle with tape.
The switch wire is thinner than the stock wiring. It's 22 AWG, good for at least 8 amps, and my headlight draws 4 - 5 amps. So good to go. Keep your headlight turned on even in daylight.
Something that will probably happen....if you still have your Reserve Lighting Unit, it will probably think the switch is a blown headlight and turn on the high beam through a sneaky back channel, which you don't want. I removed my RLU a long time ago, because I didn't know if it would turn the light off if it failed from old age. I'm hoping to quickly get on my high beam with my thumb if my low beam ever fails... To bypass the RLU, remove it and connect together the blue/yellow and the blue/black wires that went to it. Since you don't need the headlight failure light on the dash anymore, you can turn it into an alternator failure light -- just connect the green wire from that same connector to the red/white wire on the starter solenoid. Good to go.