Direction lights stopped working.

[lakeview]

Folks, I write as I am running out of ideas to try to get the direction lights working again. 1976 XS650 the one I call Red Hammer (from the place where I bought it). It has a new harness I put on, PO had deleted the starter, but added a Pamco and a PMA with a standard battery, fused going to the battery and also the usual 20A fuse in the harness. The direction lights were working when it was inspected 2 months ago and less than a quarter tank of gas into its new career, the direction lights quit totally. They will not even light up and stay on.
Checks done so far. OEM flasher works on another 650 and only buzzes when I turn on the key now. Research here says that is a dead short, so I have been going through the system to find same and come up unsucessful.
Each of the stalks have been checked for continuity and are fine, no breaks in the wire up to the harness, the bar switch has been dismantled, cleaned and inspected. With the bar switch dangling, the key was turned on and the flasher buzzed but the horn did not work, proving to me that there were no shorts in the switch itself. Once the bar switch was remounted, the horn did work, but the signals flasher still buzzed. I have switched out to another OEM flasher unit, same results. I put on an electronic flasher and promptly blew the main fuse.
My plan now is to pull apart all the connections in the headlight and redo, as well I am going to switch out the bar switch with another, plus dismantle the stock "dash" and check it thoroughly.
I will add that although wired up correctly, IMO, the neutral light has never worked, but that is in the tach with the high beam indicator and stop light indicator, both of which work. On the dash, just the two lights that flash when the direction lights are going, only one of which I could get to work and the brake lining warning light which was never hooked up, (did not see anything on the harness to connect to the rear shoe.)
Other than the standard advice to check all connections, can someone give me a bit more focus than that? I am thinking the ignition switch wiring and the dash may be productive areas, but only because that is all that I have left to dismantle.
Thanks for reading this far.

 

[retiredgentleman]

I suggest you disconnect one turn signal, and then try the flasher again. Repeat that for each of the 4 signals. One of the signal lights may have a bulb that is short circuit. Have you tried replacing each signal bulb with a new bulb.
Those signal light bulb sockets can get water and/or corrosion build up. Inspect and clean as needed.

 

[lakeview]

Thanks, have done that with the back ones, no joy, will do it on the front ones next and report. My tester shows continuity when I test the hot lead and the ground on all of them, but taking the stalks out of the circuit and testing should put that source of error to rest.

 

[xjwmx]

OEM flasher works on another 650 and only buzzes when I turn on the key now.

If the flasher has a magnetic reed inside it sounds like low voltage, like a starter solenoid on a car buzzes when there isn't enough juice to make it stick. That could just be a grotty connector someplace.

 

[MaxPete]

Hey - Lakeview! I just recalled that when I was having all the grief with Lucille's flasher circuit, I had to change to a modern two prong flasher AND - I had to disassemble the flasher socket and swap the two terminals.

You'll need a tiny little screwdriver to get the metal terminal out of the plastic socket body - and you can just try the terminals one-by one (actually, you'll need two at a time) on the flasher. I know that one of the three terminals on my original flasher is simply folded back and taped off on Lucille.

I had so many other problems with that bike that I had simply forgotten about this little fix.

Give it a whirl and see what you find.

Pete

 

[fredintoon]

Hi lakeview,
I had a similar thing happen on my XS11 except that it quit charging.
Replaced every last charging-related component to no avail.
Had to be the harness.
Bought a replacement.
Just took the tank off to pull the old harness and found the wire that Mr. Stupid had trapped under a coil bracket.
It had taken half a year for the insulation to extrude off the trapped wire so it could ground itself out.
I'd suggest you start looking at something that was done to the bike a while ago that's just recently come home to roost.

 

[Paul Sutton]

There was a recent thread relating to indicator problems and Peanut kindly posted a flow diagram which will help in establishing where the issues lie in a nice logical manner:

http://www.xs650.com/threads/xs650-indictors.50016/#post-515412

See Entry 8

 

[lakeview]

I suggest you disconnect one turn signal, and then try the flasher again. Repeat that for each of the 4 signals. One of the signal lights may have a bulb that is short circuit. Have you tried replacing each signal bulb with a new bulb.
Those signal light bulb sockets can get water and/or corrosion build up. Inspect and clean as needed.

Positive lead from each stalk removed individually and key turned on, no change for each test.

If the flasher has a magnetic reed inside it sounds like low voltage, like a starter solenoid on a car buzzes when there isn't enough juice to make it stick. That could just be a grotty connector someplace.

Morning session started with battery at 12.29, now fully charged, no change.
Just removed light checker no change. Jumpered the brown and brown white wires going to flasher unit, blew main fuse.

 

[fredintoon]

- - - Jumpered the brown and brown white wires going to flasher unit, blew main switch.

Hi lakeview,
oops! Here's Fred's failsafe for jumpering things:-
Don't use a plain ol' length of wire. Jumper them with two wires connected to a headlight bulb.
A dead short in whatever you are checking will light up the headlight bulb but the bulb limits the current flow so it won't blow nothin'.

 

[retiredgentleman]

You have a short to ground on the brown/white wire. Could be in the handlebar switch itself or maybe a bare spot on the wire. Use
your ohm meter on the b/w wire while you investigate.

 

[lakeview]

I have the switch apart, the brown wire's solder allows the wire to rotate on its mount, the other two wires seem solidly attached, but the b/w wire's insulation appears to be receding, looks like I have more close work for tomorrow. Thanks

 

[Mailman]

I know you have checked your individual turn signals so this doesn't apply to your case, I'm throwing this out there for someone who might read this thread at a later date. I recently installed a luggage rack that used the rear turn signal mounting bolts as an attachment point. When I pulled off my RR turn signal I was surprised to see the hot wire had been pinched between the turn signal stalk and the frame and the wire had a bare spot rubbed into it. It hadn't shorted yet but it wouldn't have been long before it did.

 

[lakeview]

MaxPete stopped by today while out exercising Lucille and offered a couple pointers. Thus encouraged, I replaced the bar switch with a spare I have inspected, cleaned and lubed thoroughly but still the buzz. Next I am going into the indicators on the "dash", I do recall that even when the lights were working, one indicator would not light up, maybe something is bad in there.
By installing the fresh switch, the brown and white wire was replaced. I am going to look deeper into the headlight/junction box as well.

(looked at my 77 project for a rest, it has direction lights bold as could be, but the starter button will not activate anything. Switched the safety relay out first to get the obscure out of the way, no joy, I guess tomorrow I will open up the button area and check that out. Bike turns over with a screw driver on the solenoid so that is positive.)
Glad the FJ-09 is here to ride!