| Author | Message | ||
     Espcustoms |
I just bought an '04 XB12s with 2700 miles on it a week ago today. On my way to work this morning, the whole dash panel went dead. No speedo, tach, neutral light... nothing. Is there a single connector that could have come loose or a single fuse that could have blown to cause this? Now I'm wondering if the previous owner didn't disconnect the dash to hide the true mileage. ANy thoughts/recommendations? | ||
| Moboy516 |
check your fuse box. I shorted mine last summer and sounds like similar symptoms to me. | ||
| Pwnzor |
My dash used to blink on and off while the bike is running. I torqued my battery cables to spec, and used loctite on the threads and every electrical gremlin I ever had disappeared. These bikes shake a lot and even loc-tite can work its way loose after a while. Could also be a fuse. From long experience I always start at the battery and work my way outward. | ||
| Darthane |
What Pwnzor said, though a loose connector or blown fuse could be a culprit as well. Fuses are easy to check, so are the battery connections. I'm not positive where the cluster connects or if it's 'parking lot' accessible on a S. | ||
| Espcustoms |
Thanks guys, I'll check that stuff out when I get home. I figure it must be something like that, but you never know. | ||
| Darthane |
No need to wait. Check it before you even turn the bike on to go home.  Your toolkit includes everything you need to fix loose battery connections and the fuse block should have spares already in it. | ||
| Diablobrian |
It'll be one of the 7.5 amp fuses if that's what blew. | ||
| Espcustoms |
It was the 10 amp ACC fuse. Gotta love it when it's the easy answer! | ||
| Darthane |
LOL...weeeeeell...don't be so quick to think that was the 'easy' answer. Fuses don't blow for no reason, you know. You may have one of those dreaded intermittent shorts. Check the wiring near your horn, XBs seem to have a hard-on for rubbing through wires there and blowing that fuse. | ||
| Espcustoms |
Darthane, you must be psychic! I knew when I wrote that post that it probably was not the end of the story. Of course this morning the fuse blew again. Thanks for the tip to look near the horn. I'll have to get into that tomorrow and hopefully can figure it out. | ||
| Darthane |
Hopefully the problem manifests itself regularly enough to make it easy to track down. Troubleshooting is a large portion of my job, and intermittents are my worst nightmare. ...if you think tracking down an intermittent short on a motorcycle as easily accessible as Buells are is a PITA, try doing it on a car with 1300+ circuits. LOL (Message edited by darthane on July 21, 2006) | ||
| Gentleman_jon |
You might want to check out this thread on finding intermittent shorts. http://www.badweatherbikers.com/buell/messages/32777/211173.html?1152707968 | ||
| Espcustoms |
I can't even imagine doing that! So far, my problem has reared its ugly head in the same way at the same time. I start the bike and everything is fine and as soon as I start moving the bike, it's blows. In fact, today it happened right when I rolled it out of hte garage and hit the little dip between my garage and the street. It seems pretty clear that it's the vibration or bump that's causing it to short so I just have to find the spot where it's happening. At least I should only have to trace the one circuit so it shouldn't be THAT bad, but I'm not going to hold my breath. Thanks again for pointing me in the right direction! | ||
| Diablobrian |
also check your speedo sensor for metal build-up. | ||
| Rocketsprink |
When I had this problem at Deals Gap last year it was after it rained. Now follow me here. In your headlight assembly, there is a plug for the parking light that is required in Europe. They don't install the small ass bulb here, but the outlet is still there. It's between the headlights. A LITTLE water got in there and it blew the fuse. Changed the fuse and did it again. Thanks to Honu, that doesn't seem to be around anymore and his wife having the same problem, I dried up the water, filled the plug with silicon and have not had a problem since. Worth a try too.  | ||
| Espcustoms |
Well, I did some searching around trying to find the short, but as of yet had no luck. I have a service manual coming which should arrive tomorrow so hopefully that will help me trace the circuit. I seem to have at least disturbed the source of the problem since at first I could replace the fuse and it would be fine until I rolled the bike around at all. Now, it seems to blow immediately upon turning on the key. Seems like progress.... sorta. I checked the speedo sensor and there was no metal to be seen. I pulled the front fairing off and messed around with all the wiring inside and couldn't find anything in there. I think it might be with a bundle of wires near the rear shock since those are the ones I was messing with that seemed to make the problem less "intermittent" but I need to investigate further. The hard part is that I don't know any better way to find the short than to keep replacing the fuse and messing around with things until it blows. So far about 15 fuses have given their lives for this cause and I think the casualties will continue to pile up! | ||
| Darthane |
LOL...thankfully fuses are cheap. Any wiring that can move would be the primary suspect - check near the steering head first. Once you get past that point the wiring should be largely immobile and the likelyhood of a short due to a rub-through goes down a good chunk (though these bikes do tend to shake, rattle, and roll all over the place). Don't give up - it shouldn't be too hard to track down now that it's no longer intermittent. | ||
| Diablobrian |
did you try the 12v light bulb in place of the fuse trick for finding the short? There was a recent thread detailing how to do it complete with pics. | ||
| Espcustoms |
I started to try that trick with the bulb, but couldn't get the solder to stick to the bulb base. I didn't even try to deal with soldering wires to a cut open fuse. I think I'm going to have to give another go at that though. Why not just stick the two ends of the wires into the slots for the fuse though? I tried putting a new fuse in and then shook around all the wiring behind the dash and near the steering head and couldn't get the fuse to blow. So, it seems like it must be somewhere else. I think it's just a matter of time though. Fortunately, I can still ride the bike although not having a speedo makes it hard for me to exercise any sort of self-control! | ||
| Darthane |
Putting the wires directly into the fuse slot will work electrically, but you run the risk of spreading the terminals and causing a problem down the road. The solution that Gentleman_Jon's brother came up with is a permanent and elegant one, thought obviously takes a bit of work. Did you specifically look at the horn bracket where Ss have been known to rub through? Just shaking wiring around, while the obvious 'low-tech' test for a short like this, isn't conclusive. Grabbing the wiring may very well have pulled it away from what it was shorting to. Not trying to discourage you by any means. Keep looking. =D | ||
| Espcustoms |
I did look at the horn bracket, but I'll look again. I'm not very good at this sort of electrical detective work, so I expect to have to check everything 10 times before I find the problem. And I'll definitely take the time to sort out the fuse/bulb tester. I hadn't thought of the risk of spreading the terminals and that makes perfect sense. Thanks for the encouragement, I need it on this one!! | ||
| Espcustoms |
Ok, I took the time to make the test light from a blown fuse and a 12v bulb and that made all the difference. As suggested, the short was in the bundle of wires that wraps around the steering head. A little time and some electrical tape and I'm good to go. Thanks for the help!!! Now I can get back to focusing on mods! | ||
| Darthane |
Glad to hear you found it. How badly was it worn through? Were all of the copper strands intact? If it can wear through wire insulation, it can wear through electrical tape. I'd suggest getting some conduit or some other similar wire cover around that area to prevent it from happening again (wiring is what I do, so I tend to over-engineer things when repairing them...LOL). | ||
| Espcustoms |
It was just barely worn through the insulation and it's right at the spot where the bundle of wires goes through the little plastic piece that bolts to the steering neck. I'd like to get something more substantial around the wires, but I'm not sure what I can fit inside that plastic thing. I think I'll get some split-loom and see if I can get that in there. | ||
| Pwnzor |
IMHO, wiring on these bikes is way under-engineered. | ||
| Darthane |
That's the spirit. =D | ||
| Diablobrian |
Good Job! I'm glad you found it, and that it was relatively easy to get to. |
