Electrical Gremlins, a Most Exquisite Headache...

[JackoftheGreen]

I'm at my wits end with PowerSlave, my 2001 Vulcan Classic 800, and I've reached the limit of my own knowledge with the events of this afternoon. I'm not sure where to start in explaining my problem, so please bare with me.

PowerSlave has two 4" spotlights mounted to an aftermarket light bar beneath the headlight. When I bought the bike, these lights were wired up to a two-pole toggle switch mounted on the lightbar, which the previous owner told me he had installed because he preferred not to have all three lights running all the time. To clarify -- he installed the switch, but the spotlights were already installed when he got the bike. One thing to note -- the power for the lights was tapped from one of three wires that ran to the right-side turn signal. I can only assume it's the 'running light' wire, but for an oddity, turning the headlight to high-beam would shut off the spotlights. I have no idea why.

Now, towards the end of last season the spotlights started to fail, then gave up altogether. No other lighting system was affected, and on inspection I found that giving a little jiggle to the three wires connected to the toggle switch could sometimes cause the spotlights to flicker. The blade-type connectors attached to the underside of the switch looked pretty rough, so at the time I figured either the switch was failing or the ends just needed re-done. The wiring job had been sorta half-assed, with 'jumper' wires patched in for extra length and the sort of twist-and-tape connections I used for speakers back when I was seventeen. Because of this, I opted to simply disconnect the switch and leave the spotlights non-functional until I had the time and resources to do a clean job rewiring them. That was supposed to be last Thursday.

So here's the progression. Last Thursday, I put clean, new blade connectors on the wire ends and reinstalled the wires to the switch. The switch was the sort that illuminated when it was connected to a power source, and the switch lit up just fine after the re-wire, but the spotlights failed to come on. I inspected the connections on the switch again and discovered that one of the terminals was as loose as a first-graders front teeth, and the other wasn't much better -- so, bad switch. Rather than messing with wiring in a new switch, I decided right then I'd just hard-wire the lights for 'always on', since I had never found myself in a position to use the switch anyway. That's what I went out there to do today.

A confession -- I don't know nearly as much as I should about electrical. I can put together a clean, professional wire connection, but I have no idea where they need to be or why they work the way they do. So although I'm SURE there's a better way to wire up spotlights than to tap power from the right-side running lamp, I KNEW that it HAD worked that way and chose to recreate what was already a winning arrangment. I took the spotlights apart and installed new wire with new slide connectors to the back of the bulbs. Then I ran my two wires into the headlight housing, pigtailed them together with the turn signal wire that the switch had been patched to, and soldered and heat-shrank the connection. Still no good -- marker lights, tail light and brake light still dead. With nothing else making sense, I removed my seats and pulled the fuse box, only to discover the 10-amp taillight fuse was blown.

So I replaced the fuse, and the result was for all my lights to work EXCEPT the left-side running lamp. It would flash for the turn signal, but was dead otherwise. Again, as a victim of my own previous bad luck, it never occured to me it could be just the bulb. The connections inside the headlight housing were all old and showing signs of wear, and last summer I had re-done all the connections for the right-side signal while replacing the turn signal itself, so I went ahead and re-did the three wire connections running the left lamp. Again, solder and heat shrink, very clean. Left lamp still dead, so in desperation I pulled the lens and discovered, lo and behold, that I'd lost a filament in the bulb. Quick trip to Autozone, installed the new bulb, and VIOLA! With the key in the ON position, both spotlights on the light bar, tail light, brake light, and front marker lamps all LIT!! Feeling quite pleased with myself, I reconnected the headlight and tried to start the bike, to be sure that ALL my lights were functional before I put the battery compartment back together and reinstalled my seats. As soon as I hit the start button, there was an audible POP from somewhere within the battery compartment/fuse box, and EVERYTHING is now dead. No lamps, no warning lights on the gauge cluster, no nothing not now how not no way. DEADSKI. All the fuses in the fuse box look good, and while I can only assume the 30-amp main fuse is blown, it also looks fine. I'll try replacing the main fuse tomorrow, but again, it looks fine. And if it's not the main fuse, I have no idea what it could be. Or why the system blew in the first place.

So, at this point, the only difference between how everything was wired up last summer is that the switch is gone. The three wires that were previously ran to the switch are now just hard-wired together.

Oh. And everything's dead, where last summer everything was ticking along just four-oh.

Thoughts?

[Wrider]

Yeesh, those electrical gremlins are beasts aren't they???

First off, double check the fuse with a multimeter. Sometimes they appear good but are actually bad.

Secondly, are you up for some rewiring? I'd honestly run power off of something else. That's a lot of power for a single small running light wire to transfer power efficiently. I'd start over with the headlight power wire as your main wire (unless your headlight turns off when your high beam turns on). Otherwise you can run it straight from the battery with a solenoid that switches power on whenever you turn the key on (make sure to fuse it if you do that). Plus that way you can run a switch if you want.

I have a couple of cigarette lighter type 12V power outlets wired up on my bike, and I'm more than happy to show/tell you how I did that. They're straight from the battery, but fused and they have a switch so I can turn them on and off at will regardless of the key switch.

[sapaul]

I have a similar set up on my Marshalling bike for the strobes. plus the buscan does not like any kind of passengers.

Direct to battery, lighted switch on the handlebar and fused in the loom.

I also think that piggy backing of an indicator feed would put a lot of load on that system. Rather use the battery

[JackoftheGreen]

I think rewiring is the way to go, it feels very unprofessional to me to have the power running to the spotlights like that. To update, I got ahold of a multimeter and checked the main fuse and all the fuses in the board, they all show good. Rather than speculate about what else could have gone wrong, I've pulled the battery and am now charging it, given that it's been the easy solution the whole way through this clusterfudge. Maybe, right...?

In the interim, here's a question: inside my headlight housing I have two mystery wires!

Okay - obviously you see the plug for the headlight. The wires above the plug with the pink shrink connections run the right-side marker and turn signal. The red/orange pigtail shrink above that is where the power wire for the spotlights is patched in -- I'll be taking that connection out. Finally, the three wires up and to the right with the white shrink connections are the wires for the left side marker/turn signal. But those two wires hanging down to the right of the headlight plug, with the clear rubber boots on them? They aren't shown on any of the wiring diagrams in my Clymer, either for the US/Canadian models, European or Australian diagrams. My assumption is that they were once attached to some accessory the bike no longer has, though I can't imagine what, or possibly may have ran the spotlights themselves before Shadetree Auto got their hands on my bike. They don't look like factory connections because they're not heat-crimped, and I'm wondering if they just might be good candidates to run my spotlights. I have a multimeter -- in what way could I test those leads to see if they're carrying power?

[JackoftheGreen]

Here's a closer view...

[Johnj]

I'd check them for battery and ground.

[sapaul]

Do you have a park light bulb in the headlight housing, that would be my bet, some countries want them installed.