Greetings,
I am new to this place and very happy that it exists. Very informative, especially when it comes to the charging system and differences between years.
This is my first thread here (sorry, could not find the New Member section) and it should be a quick success story.
I saved a 1975 XS650 from the crusher. Made the owner an offer he could not refuse (no, he does not own any horses so I had to use cash, sorry) and started working on her 4 weeks ago. She needed a lot of work but well worth it. Yes, it's a 50-y/o bike where all the POs "fixed" things their own way which I had to "unfix" but again, well worth it.
Now that she's running and I rewired the whole motorcycle, I can finally test the charging system. It seems that the voltage regulator is not supplying power to the Field Excitation coil (bad regulator?) and now I am starting to understand why they wired the FE lead to the brake light. Since the regulator was not doing its job, let the bike charge at full capacity at deceleration only (when a little more drag on the motor isn't undesired).
I read a lot here about the regulators and their wiring style for pre-1980 and later builds. Thank you very much, great information, I enjoyed it.
And in the process of searching for a new voltage regulator, I decided that buying the old style (pre-1980) regulator would cost a lot more and there's no need to do it the old way anyway.
So I decided to switch to the newer brush configuration (not grounded) and install a cheaper 1980+ voltage regulator which can then supply power to the FE coil and also drive the low side for power generation from the stator.
I will jump on my other bike and go to our local hardware store to pick up some nylon screws (any excuse to ride, right?) and hopefully have fully floating brushes this afternoon.
At this point, I guess I have only one question: what is the pin-out of the voltage regulator for the 1980+ bikes? It is a flat 2-row 8-pin connector and I have no documentation for that. (attaching a picture)
Wire colors:
3 x white - good assumption is 3 phases from the stator
1 black - I assume ground
1 red - I assume battery
1 green - I assume FE coil low side
1 brown - I assume FE coil high side and ignition power
Those are all assumptions. I will need to supply ignition power to the regulator and I do not know which wire that would be (brown?).
Again, all assumptions. I would like to confirm before I purchase so that I can plan on wiring it up properly.
Thank you in advance for any good advice.
Lou
I am new to this place and very happy that it exists. Very informative, especially when it comes to the charging system and differences between years.
This is my first thread here (sorry, could not find the New Member section) and it should be a quick success story.
I saved a 1975 XS650 from the crusher. Made the owner an offer he could not refuse (no, he does not own any horses so I had to use cash, sorry) and started working on her 4 weeks ago. She needed a lot of work but well worth it. Yes, it's a 50-y/o bike where all the POs "fixed" things their own way which I had to "unfix" but again, well worth it.
Now that she's running and I rewired the whole motorcycle, I can finally test the charging system. It seems that the voltage regulator is not supplying power to the Field Excitation coil (bad regulator?) and now I am starting to understand why they wired the FE lead to the brake light. Since the regulator was not doing its job, let the bike charge at full capacity at deceleration only (when a little more drag on the motor isn't undesired).
I read a lot here about the regulators and their wiring style for pre-1980 and later builds. Thank you very much, great information, I enjoyed it.
And in the process of searching for a new voltage regulator, I decided that buying the old style (pre-1980) regulator would cost a lot more and there's no need to do it the old way anyway.
So I decided to switch to the newer brush configuration (not grounded) and install a cheaper 1980+ voltage regulator which can then supply power to the FE coil and also drive the low side for power generation from the stator.
I will jump on my other bike and go to our local hardware store to pick up some nylon screws (any excuse to ride, right?) and hopefully have fully floating brushes this afternoon.
At this point, I guess I have only one question: what is the pin-out of the voltage regulator for the 1980+ bikes? It is a flat 2-row 8-pin connector and I have no documentation for that. (attaching a picture)
Wire colors:
3 x white - good assumption is 3 phases from the stator
1 black - I assume ground
1 red - I assume battery
1 green - I assume FE coil low side
1 brown - I assume FE coil high side and ignition power
Those are all assumptions. I will need to supply ignition power to the regulator and I do not know which wire that would be (brown?).
Again, all assumptions. I would like to confirm before I purchase so that I can plan on wiring it up properly.
Thank you in advance for any good advice.
Lou
