No power with lights on

[Captmandel]

Hi everyone! Its been a while, but I am back at it.

So heres the case, i have an xs2 with pamco, pma, kick only, with sparx cap.

Bike starts up on first or second kick. with headlight off, the tail light is off. With headlight on high beam, tail light is on, but the headlight is dark. With head light on normal beam the engine dies. If I rev the engine up when I switch to normal beam, the headlight comes on but the tail light turns off. With the head light on the brake switch kills the power.

I also tried turning the idle up, to get more power going and it didnt seem to work. In fact all it did was make gas leak out of a barb on the bottom of the right carb.

I think the head lamp should be replaced. I am thinking maybe I have a bad ground? Or maybe the pma isnt making enough power for everything? Bigger cap? Better stator?

I bought a bunch of wire to make a simplified wiring harness but I would love to just get everything going first before I rip it apart.

The tail light is a TC Bros. Black 33 Ford Replica Side Mount Tail Light/License Plate Bracket. but that seems to be working fine.


Let me know if I left out any vital info. Any advice, help, or tips are appreciated. Thanks in advanced!

 

[TwoManyXS1Bs]

Welcome back, Capt'n.

My first guess would be the wiring between the headlight switch, headlight, and taillight. Might try unplugging all those, then plug-in one at a time to confirm its operation. Easier if using a battery. Also watch out for the 3-lug headlight connector, one pin is low, one high, one ground. Easy to mix-up...

 

[Captmandel]

Thanks for the reply. I will check all that stuff tomorrow. My only thought is that I never changed anything with the headlight and it was working fine before the change. Something I remebered that may be important is before I made the PMA switch the fuse was blowing out whenever I applied the rear brake switch. Now the issue is similar but the fuse doesn't blow I just lose power.

 

[TwoManyXS1Bs]

Something that can give the appearance of losing power is floating grounds. The ground return current can go thru some interesting paths. Seen several conniptions over this...

 

[gggGary]

I'll suggest you still have the same old short somewhere in the head/tail light wiring, now instead of blowing a fuse it consumes all the alternator output dousing your ignition spark.
Wires shorting out where they pass through the holes in the back of the headlight bucket is popular.

 

[Captmandel]

Thanks for the reply Gary.

I remember reading in another thread that the short in the headlight shell is popular, so I checked there once and it appeared clean. The rubber around the holes all seemed intact as well.

I will be sure to check again in my next round of trouble shooting!

 

[Captmandel]

Update 2/17/2015

I re did all my grounds with wider gauge wire and a better connection.

Cut all my other connections and added new connectors.

Installed led tail light bulb from mikesxs.

Cleaned up wiring inside of headlight shell.

The bike still doesnt have enough power. The headlight and taillight come on at the same time now but the engine has to be revved and the tail light is incredibly dim, and the brake light doesnt work if the headlight is illuminated.

I want to get a new headlight anyways, just to replace the old sealed beam, and because the highbeam is burned out. Will this likely solve my issue of not enough power?

Is the problem most likely my stator? Unfortunately I cannot tell you where the stator comes from because I bought it from someone on the forum and dont know where they sourced it from. Maybe the stator I have is from a bike thats normally higher revving? can anyone suggest a better stator for the xs650 application?

thanks again!

Josh.