Gremlin's Tall Stories

Yeup… you read that right. I had an electrical issue with my bike, and basically fixed it myself. This might not sound like a very dramatic thing to believe… so perhaps I should entertain readers with a bit of history.

Back in 2007 I owned a 2004 ZX10R, and decided I wanted to mount a radar detector. Having seen others say it was easy, wire it to the battery and then flatten the bike, I knew I was going to be smarter than that. Running the power cable back towards the battery, I realise I need to start looking for a power feed. I spy a very handy fuel pump circuit. It makes perfect sense, as it will only be on when the bike is on – so no flat battery. It’s at this point you’ll see the difference between myself, and those that should work on bikes. I ask myself how much a fuel pump would use? Would there be spare? Well… a radar detector doesn’t use much, and no-one would make a circuit with no spare.

I told you… I should never be the first choice for working on a bike. Not owning a multi-meter, hell, I don’t even know how to use one, I figure this should be sweet. I tap into the wire and wire everything up. Then, on with the gear for the important test ride. Down the road, climb a hill… bike cuts out. Hmmm, never done that before. Get bike started, carry on. Accelerate through roundabout… bike cuts out. Again? Under harder acceleration? Hmmm, maybe I did screw something up. Unplug radar detector, start bike, open throttle hard and find myself wheelying past a school.

Back home, give up, get some extra wire (power cord not quite long enough) and wire radar detector directly to battery. That ended my first proper foray of doing electrical stuff.

You can see I really shouldn’t be let near the stuff.

Nevertheless, I’ve toyed with my bikes now and then, been proud when I have gone as far as removing the fuel tank. A few weeks before Christmas I hit a problem with the KTM while at Pukekohe Raceway, marshalling. All my accessories, GPS, Radar, Comms, etc, all stopped working. Investigation at home found a blown fuse, and when putting another in and turning the bike on, I blew the replacement. Even with a complete lack of knowledge, I knew it was a short somewhere. Bearing in mind my mechanic has clearly said to me “If you ever ring me with an electrical problem, I’m going on holiday. I reckon you have as much wiring in the bike, again, for the accessories”, I felt it was easiest to leave this one to my trustworthy companion and myself, to find the fault.

Trustworthy companion means GiJoe, the long suffering fellow who had scottoil all over his shirt the last time we looked at bikes. Still, we agree. I promise not to work on his bike if he works on mine.

I told him about the issue, and we arranged that when free, we’d pull it apart to find the fault. With Christmas coming, I headed off for a week on the boss’ Blackbird, GiJoe got busy himself, so we hadn’t sorted it by the new year.

Wednesday morning, I want to head down to Mount Maunganui to look at a BMW R1200GS Adventure, let the shop see my bike with the possibility of trading. With a test set of Pilot Road 2’s still fitted (and almost brand new) it makes perfect sense to switch to use a one third-used set of Syncs and keep the Pilot Road 2’s for the Hornet.

I head over to Botany Honda after giving them a ring. They are a little short staffed, so chatted to some customers, then the bike was ready. Head out of the store around 1pm and before I get to the first intersection the bike goes dead. Nothing on the dash, nothing from the engine. Hmmm… lucky the shop is a short push away… in full gear, in hot humid weather. Back to the shop, I open the bike and find a fuse from a different circuit has blown. New fuse in, I think it’s best to go home and some spare fuses. This time I get past the intersection and the bike is dead again. Now I have to push it uphill to the shop… full gear, and the weather hasn’t changed either.

One of the mechs is now laughing his arse off at the sight of me pushing the bike back again… bloody Honda mechs. Still, good guys. The source is probably behind the headlight and could be related to the other shorting circuit. Headlight off, I find a sheath cracked, so a bit of tape, let’s see. Down the road, and dead before the intersection.

Push the bike back to the shop for the 3rd time, except this time I was prepared, and was just wearing a helmet. At this stage, the first mech, who fitted the tyres re-appears, and says, “Oh, I meant to tell you, when changing the tyres I saw a bare wire, but been hectic since”. It’s down by the front disc, and looks like it rubs on the disc. Tape and a zip tie later, that should fix it for good. Down the road, up and down, hard acceleration, hard braking, no cut outs.

Sweet 3 fuses, 3 pushes to the shop, and a couple of mechanics entertained.

Left shop around 2.45pm, no chance of going to Mount Maunganui, but least I got the problem sorted (was sorta scared of spending into the night trying to fix it). When I got home, I grabbed the GPS, and it appears I’ve even sorted the problem in the accessory circuit. A proud txt to GiJoe, who as usual, doesn’t believe me.

More riding around today, no problems. Amazing… I don’t think I’ll let it go to my head though…