No Lights!! Egads!

[Seaking]

Oh man, no kidding, I'm wondering if this bike is jinxed now..

 

I was out tooling around the back roads this evening, trying to catch a cool breeze and on the back stretch of a winding road in the middle of no where..

 

POOF

 

No LIGHTS!! NO Nuttin!! Holy crap batman.. I tossed on the 4 way hazards right away and you'd be surprised how much light they'll toss in pitch dark of night.. Barely enough to get the bike stopped without hitting anything etc.. Dashlight out, headlight out, highway lights out.. Dunno about the rear lights, wasn't too curious at that time as you can well imagine. Signals and 4ways worked ok..

 

I didn't hit a bump, didn't touch anything and there, right in the middle of a turn, poof. Talk about a heart attack in the making.

 

All it turned out to be was a blown 15A fuse in the left side panel.. It was SO pitch dark I has to use the light of my cell phone to illuminate the work site lol.. literally so dark you couldn't see anything..

 

Ok, shyte happens once in a while but they all seem to be happening to me all at once.. the bike has over 46,000 miles on it, 2006 Midnight, just had the 4 coils and fuel pump replaced the other week..

 

How common is this fuze blowing? Is this something that happens on occasion or very rarely does it happen?

 

I swear.. this bike gets more and more interesting every day..

[dr_bar]

Normally, a fuse blows when there is a problem, usually a short....

 

Is it possible with all the monkeying around, that someone could have pinched a wire???

[RandyR]

There may be a problem somewhere (else) that is manifesting itself as failed electrical components. I know you've looked at a lot of things already.

 

Has anyone confirmed that the rapidly blinking signal lights you were getting is really a valid error code of some kind?

[Seaking]

Normally, a fuse blows when there is a problem, usually a short....

 

Is it possible with all the monkeying around, that someone could have pinched a wire???

 

I dunno.. anything IS possible at this point.. I'm having my 20x20 (or 24x24 if lucky) garage built this month and this winter will be pulling a lot of panels off the bike and having a good look at the wiring.. I suspect something amiss around the neck area where we found cut and pinched wires last fall.. Could be the area of concern..

[Seaking]

There may be a problem somewhere (else) that is manifesting itself as failed electrical components. I know you've looked at a lot of things already.

 

Has anyone confirmed that the rapidly blinking signal lights you were getting is really a valid error code of some kind?

 

No one has yet confirmed fast flashing lights as a valid error code but as mentioned earlier, a gent experienced the same thing but right now everything checks out good, as mine did.. and now we're waiting for his next failure and indication..

[LilBeaver]

Some quick brainstorming:

 

Well, something to do would be to look for the pinched wire (as you have already said), bare wire (possibly shorting to ground -- which is kindof covered with the pinched wire business), loose/corroded ground, and if you have a multimeter handy start the bike and check the voltage at the battery terminals (you could also do the check on the lighting circuit) for the proper operating terminal voltage (the regulator/rectifier issue comes to mind since I just went through those shenanigans but I blew bulbs instead of fuses for some weird reason).

 

Do you know how your passing lamps are wired (what is the wattage on those puppies)? What else is on that circuit? (ie. tail lamp, light bars, etc)

 

It is not very common, but sometimes fuses do just burn out.

 

This is what comes to my mind immediately and where I would consider starting with the troubleshooting.

 

Good luck

 

NOTE: I think I missed your earlier posts regarding other issues you've been having so hopefully I haven't repeated anything yet

[Sylvester]

If the passing lights are wired with the head lamp this could be your problem. They need to be on a relay. Just more to think of.

 

[Seaking]

Well, I got the problem figured out and know what the problem is.. I went out on a ride today and the lights went out again but it was daylight so no probs. I did a bit of trouble shooting and put in a new fuze, jammed the bars to the right, and then to the left and poof.. AHA!! I saw it right away.. a puff of smoke escape the bike..

 

Do you remember the laws of physics and electricity? The more smoke you permit to escape from a component, the more expensive or difficult it is to put it back in there to make it work again.. no kidding.. try it at home.. serious.

 

Anyway, joking aside, the problem turned out to be the passing lamp cabling is shorting out the works and causing the fuse to blow, as it should. However, while jamming the bars back and forth, this time when it shorted out the right highway light blew out also.. dead bulb now. So easy enough, turn off the highway light switch and test it over again.. and this time the head light didn't go out.. problem fixed for now..

 

I remember long time ago people saying never to wire your passing lamps to your head light for obvious reasons.. once again, one of the previous owners did a botch job this one too and now I have something extra to fix this winter.. no probs. Now that I know what and where to go looking, I can also put the lamps on their own circuit with their own fuse.. as they should have been in the first place..

 

Rode all day without blowing another fuse. Just means I won't have any highway lights until I re-wire this thing.

 

I'm starting to wonder if this fault was affecting anything else on the bike. A while back I asked about what was causing the bike to 'buffet' while in 5th gear doing 70 mph.. not a lugging feeling but the whole bike feels like the wind buffeting it.. I didn't feel any of that today at all.. Could be the heat, the road, the fuel I was using but Hmmm WHO KNOWS.

 

All I know is that I had one hell of a great ride today and plan to go back out for more tonight.. blistering HOT here..

[LilBeaver]

Glad you figured out what it is. The rewiring is not very difficult at all, and you can use the existing wires to activate a relay so the only remaining wire you would need to run is the one to power the passing lamps when the relay is activated... Well obviously replacing whichever wires are goofed up.

 

Glad it was something relatively simple/straightforward and relatively cheap

BTW I got the replacement spotlamps at o'riley autoparts for 15 a piece. Wagner 4449 30W spotlamp (exact same bulb Yamaha sells for the 120 for the pair)

[Seaking]

Glad you figured out what it is. The rewiring is not very difficult at all, and you can use the existing wires to activate a relay so the only remaining wire you would need to run is the one to power the passing lamps when the relay is activated... Well obviously replacing whichever wires are goofed up.

 

Glad it was something relatively simple/straightforward and relatively cheap

BTW I got the replacement spotlamps at o'riley autoparts for 15 a piece. Wagner 4449 30W spotlamp (exact same bulb Yamaha sells for the 120 for the pair)

 

Thanks for the info.. as it turns out I still have the SAME lamps from my VStar which are no longer needed on that bike.. When the time comes, I'll be adding them on..

 

Thanks for all the help info.

[Leland]

I wouldn't use the existing headlamp wires to power the relay coil. You would still be without lights if you blew that same fuse.

[Seaking]

I wouldn't use the existing headlamp wires to power the relay coil. You would still be without lights if you blew that same fuse.

 

No worries, everything will be on it's own circuit so that if one blows, the other will still work.. I'd have to lose the power source to lose everything

[LilBeaver]

I wouldn't use the existing headlamp wires to power the relay coil. You would still be without lights if you blew that same fuse.

 

Good call! Wasn't even thinking about that one sheesh...