'79 XS650 Special Low-Effort Resto

[BSAKat]

In the headlight bucket.... one of the T-signal wires is dark green.... grounds are black. Average to poor lighting makes it hard to tell the difference.

I double-checked all my connections and they were correct. That said...

THE PLOT THICKENS

The flasher unit blew the brown wire fuse in the fuse box when the switch was flipped. The fuse also blew when I jumped the brown wire to the brown/white wire per Peanut's flowchart. So, that's fun. Trace, trace, trace...

 

[5twins]

I don't think the flasher is supposed to have a switched brown power wire attached to it, just the Br/W coming from the turn signal switch. That may explain why all your lights were flashing, the "flash" signal was going out on the brown wire to all systems. Or maybe it does have the brown wire attached but you just had it hooked up to the wrong terminal.

 

[BSAKat]

Mine has brown/white, brown, and green/white (or white/green, the one from the self-canceler. First I had the two-prong flasher plugged into the brown and b/w wires. That's when it was all flash, all the time (but no turn signals, because of course). Then I switched it to B/W - G/W and got nothing. I'm starting to doubt my own sanity at this point.

 

[5twins]

When you switch to a 2-prong flasher, you don't connect or use the 3rd wire, that G/W from the self-canceler, anymore. I think maybe you had the brown and Br/W switched around. The brown was on the "flash out" tab and the Br/W on the "power in" tab.

 

[BSAKat]

I just went to double-check. There seem to be only two ways the flasher fits into the plug - brown and b/w or b/w and g/w. Maybe the flasher is backward from what I need? It's from Mike's so I should be able to trust it, but on the other hand, I know Mike's sometimes has quality issues with the parts it sells. What about a generic two-prong flasher from, say, AutoZone or O'Reilly? I'm checking out a couple old threads on the site here about them. Looks like a 552 flasher might work? Or I can just go pick up a bunch of new fuses and experiment/switch wires around until I find the right combo.

EDIT: O'Reilly has this guy. It's a 552 as recommended in this thread.

 

[5twins]

You may need to move the wires in the plug so they match up to the proper terminals on the flasher. Maybe test it with some jumper wires?

 

[YamahaSpecial]

This thread was a good read. Nice little mental check for me.

 

[BSAKat]

Just got back from trying the jumper thing (I wanted to try it before I bought a new flasher) and you'll never believe what happened! It blew the fuse. Got one click, then bzzzt. So, I'm gonna grab some fuses and that other flasher from AutoZone and have me a wild night of wiring and experimenting.

 

[5twins]

Can we call you "Sparky"? lol

 

[BSAKat]

Hahahahahahahaha. Honestly, at this point, I'm ready to believe that I, myself, have some kind of entropic field that affects electrics.

 

[650Skull]

To stop any confusion post some pics...........

 

[BSAKat]

To stop any confusion post some pics.

Ask and ye shall receive.

I took the headlight back off and double/triple-checked my connections. Everything seems to be in order. The front turn signals don't have colored wires or tags, but the right one is plugged into green and the left one is plugged into brown/chocolate. The grounds for both are plugged into one of the double female plugs. You can see that the ground wires are sandwiched between the nut/lock washer and the metal plate on the back of the rubber isolator. Oh, I didn't get any pics of the rear signals, but I double/triple-checked those as well and they're fine.

Here's the inside of the handlebar switch. I took it apart a couple weeks ago to paint the box and carefully reassembled it using pictures I took of the disassembly. While it was apart I went at it with contact cleaner, 400-grit sandpaper, and a lint-free rag.

Here's my flasher relay socket and the flasher relay I picked up tonight from AutoZone.

The relay was recommended in another turn signal thread. This relay does the same thing the Mike's one does - immediately blows the 10A brown wire fuse in the fuse block when the turn signal switch is flicked either way. It does this when plugged in correctly and when the wires are switched (same as the Mike's). Also, the fuse blows when the wires are jumped together, which I discovered when I followed Peanut's turn signal troubleshooting flowchart. In fact, this whole ordeal started after I jumped those wires together. Probably coincidence, but still...

Using a color wiring diagram found elsewhere on the site, I traced back through all the wires related to the handlebar switch and relay. Everything looked fine and I didn't find any obvious shorts like exposed/touching wires, evidence of melting/burning, etc. So, yeah. At this point, my diagnosis is "Haunted" and also, "Maybe I don't need turn signals" (is joke). I called it quits for tonight because I've worn pants long enough for today and now it's whiskey time.

 

[5twins]

When I clean out and reassemble switches, I use several different lubes. The electrical contacts get dielectric grease, the metal to metal moving parts get a regular grease, and the plastic to metal or plastic to plastic moving parts get white lithium grease .....

 

[BSAKat]

Yeah, I realized yesterday when I shot that picture that I'd apparently buttoned it up without lube (I can be a touch scatterbrained in the shop sometimes, especially when I'm excited/hurrying/my kids are around) I remedied that tout suite.

 

[BSAKat]

FIXED

I had a little break in the action at work so I popped out to the garage for some light troubleshooting. Last night I tracked the issue down to the switch box, so I unplugged everything in the headlight bucket, took the switch box out, and started to disassemble it to check the internal connections. That's when I realized that two of the wires I thought were black were, in fact, dark brown and dark green. So dark, in fact, that they looked mostly black even under the bright lights over my bench. I was like, "What the shit?", and scraped them both with my thumb, revealing their true colors. My eyes are worse than I thought, apparently. So I plugged everything in the right way and, viola, I got turn signals all around and no blown fuses.

I still maintain this thing is haunted, but maybe not for electrical reasons.

 

[BSAKat]

 

[Jim]

FIXED

I had a little break in the action at work so I popped out to the garage for some light troubleshooting. Last night I tracked the issue down to the switch box, so I unplugged everything in the headlight bucket, took the switch box out, and started to disassemble it to check the internal connections. That's when I realized that two of the wires I thought were black were, in fact, dark brown and dark green. So dark, in fact, that they looked mostly black even under the bright lights over my bench. I was like, "What the shit?", and scraped them both with my thumb, revealing their true colors. My eyes are worse than I thought, apparently. So I plugged everything in the right way and, viola, I got turn signals all around and no blown fuses.

I still maintain this thing is haunted, but maybe not for electrical reasons.

Well if it makes you feel better, you ain't the first bit by the hard to make out colors of the turn signals.

 

[BSAKat]

It does. Also, in my defense, those wires are clearly black with a hint of color and not actually brown and green.

 

[5twins]

If you can find it, get a can of the Tannery Leather & Vinyl cleaner and conditioner. It works great for cleaning up the wiring but also good for so much more (leather, tire sidewalls, seat). Once you try this stuff, you'll be going back for more, lol .....

https://www.acehardware.com/departm...tants/leather-conditioners-and-cleaners/12694

 

[BSAKat]

Today I threw it back on the lift because it was running terrible yesterday on my test rides. It idled fine, but it ran like dogshit once underload up to around 3000 rpm. Lots of bucking and popping and then stalling out completely once I came to a stop. Clearly it needed more tuning.

First off I disassembled everything and started at the beginning of the basic maintenance list. I discovered that the cam chain was way out of spec so I set that right and redid the valves. I could have sworn I did the cam chain way back last October, but apparently not.

Took off the carbs and took 'em apart to check everything. Ran carb cleaner, compressed air, and little wires/brushes through every nook and cranny. I also moved the clips on the needles down one notch to richen my mixture since I have the new exhaust and the more porous foam on the stock air filter frames. I mostly did that as an experiment. If it doesn't work it's easy enough to switch back. One of my floats needed adjusting, so I rechecked both floats and got them squared away before I reassembled everything.

So, carb syncing question. I bought new intake boots for this thing and, of course, they came without vacuum barbs for syncing. I know there are vacuum ports on the side of each carb body, but what size are those ports? 6mm? The adaptors I have for doing Honda SOHC 4 carbs are too small. Mike's has 5mm adaptors for sale, but in the description, It says that the Yamahas take 6mm units.

I caved and picked up the basic XSCharge kit from Mikes, the one with just the coil and ignition unit. That oughta be here Wednesday and I can't wait to get that slapped on.

So, yeah. That's the update.