Total Motorcycle Community Forums

Did you check the voltage? This sounds like the achilles heel that older Honda's have with their faulty rectifiers, and both of them that failed on me had similar sounding failures. The voltage is even hit and miss and sometimes you get a good reading and have to check again. It's definitely and easy check and the fist place I would look after the battery terminals.

Lights don't come on with ignition so I'm going digging the next warmish day I've got free...

So, with a little digging from Blues, I found out this bike has a problem with a connector from main power to ignition switch. They seem to over heat and burn out. So I pull my gas tank off, and found nothing wrong, pulled a cover off the left side of the bike and checked out the main fuse, 30 amp and not blown, swapped out with the provided spare and no difference. Pulled out the multimeter and checked the voltage at the previously checked connector, same as the battery, A-OK. Checked the other end of the connector for continuity through the switch, Ok when turned on, none when turned to accessory. Reconnected still no juice to anything... Riding season is inching up on us and I need help...

Old wires can get brittle and go open or intermittent.
Wires can also melt to protect the fuse (sometimes). The fuse protects the whole but not necessarily the smaller branch wires.
Check wire continuity from end to end.

Connectors are evil but sometimes they are innocent.

This can be tedious but you'll find it.

GS_in_CO,

The bike is a 2007 Royal Star Venture, I haven't found a single wire that's even remotely brittle. I definitely need to find out how to properly test that Ignition Switch...

After a struggle, have the ignition switch out and it is fine, no burnt or corroded contacts, continuity where it's supposed to be, but no power after the switch is turned on. What am I missing???

You can read voltage on a wire while it's open but it can have such high resistance that it won't pass enough current to operate the stuff it's supposed to. Look for corrosion under the crimped wire ends.

I had this trouble in the Euro-sedan. Battery ground terminals are big lugs crimped onto braided cable. While everything looked clean and shiny and the crimp was tight, occasionally the cable wouldn't pass enough current for the starter. Soldering the crimps to the cable fixed it.

Also had a circuit breaker in a Jeep fail such that it opened to protect the wiper motor when the wipers were iced to the windshield. As designed. It reclosed and tested ok with ohmmeter but it wouldn't pass enough current to let the motor run. New breaker needed.

Okay, who said battery? Damnit, I checked that thing and it had a full load of power, and terminals checked out fine. Tore into the beast, ripped out the ignition switch , and I mean ripped out. It had non-removable bolts holding it on. A couple of hours with the Dremel trying hard not to damage the ignition switch casing. Ended up doing minor damage but nothing that will effect it's use. Did bits and pieces of work for better than 5 months when the weather co-operated, to find out that one of the battery cables was indeed loose. just the tiniest bit, but apparently enough to pisseth me right off. Now to put it back together and find out if it will fire when the gas tank is back on...

DOH!!!