Jara311

I bought a set of flush mount blinkers for the front. The blinkers only came with two wires and no place for a ground. The factory blinkers have a ground. I tied the factory ground to the negative lines on each side since the flush mounts have not place to accept a ground. Thought that would work but now my small head light and gauge cluster don't work. Any help out there?

VTRsurfer

The 2 wire flushmounts don't accommodate the running lights of the stock units, so you'd just hook up the blinker hot lead and ground to the 2 wires on the flushmounts. You'd have to tape off the 3rd wire for the running lights to prevent it from grounding out and blowing a fuse...which I'm guessing you did (blow a fuse by shorting to ground, that is).

Jara311

Thanks man. I'll try that and let you know how It works out

Jara311

Didn't work for me. Maybe I did it wrong. On the left factory is ground, orange/white and solid orange. I tied the ground to the solid orange and then to the two blinker wires.
On the right I have factory blue/white and solid blue. Hooked up the same way. Turned the blinkers on and it popped the fuse. I think/thought the factory hot wire is solid w/o a stripe. What am I doing wrong here??

Jara311

Calling for help! Anyone? I'm stuck on a beautiful day till I get this fixed

thetophatflash

On the right side the blue/white and the left side the orange/white are not used.

Jara311

Did that. No luck. Are there inline fuses behind the gauge cluster that may have popped?

Jara311

Blinkers work but not the cluster. Are there inline fuses behind the cluster that may have popped? Btw, it's a 2002

8541Hawk

No, only the fuse box and the main fuse.

Jara311

Took the fairing off. Tried number six posting again. Got running lights and gauge cluster. Hit the blinker and popped the fuse.

8541Hawk

Are you saying you had running lights in the front?

Jara311

Now I do, yes. This whole time the ground has been wired with the hot and the other wires. That's wrong, right? Do I need to find a ground location to the frame?

8541Hawk

If you only have 2 wires in the front signal you either get running lights or blinkers, not both.

Choose which one you want.

There is no need to ground anywhere but the ground wire that is in the factory harness.

On your signals, one wire is hot, the other is ground. It's as simple as that.

Tweety

Now, I could just tell you what wire to hook up where... But none of you that are having problems are going to learn from that, so I wont...

The obvious way to figure it out which two of the three wires on the bike that you hook up and which one you isolate off, is to take a multimeter and put the blinker on without hooking anything up...

Then use the multimeter... One pair of wires will give you a steady signal, thats running light... One combination will give you a pulsing signal, that's the one you want... The cable not used, you isolate off well...

It's not rocket science... It's not even half complicated... Most schoolkids will do this level of electronics in 4-6 grade as part of the physics/science education, so if you managed to survive to an adult age, it should be feasible to work it out...

Jara311

thanks to all who gave solid advice that I was simply reading wrong. Special thanks to tweety who for a minute had me thinking my father was responding.

7moore7

lol

Tweety

I guess you have a smart father then... Listen too him...

autoteach

Sad thing is, Tweety, most school kids actually dont use DMM's in USA. It is only in the very specialized classes that they will use them, and not every student takes those courses.

7moore7

This is entirely true... and in my area if this understanding of electronics was taught, it was in around 9th-10th grade.

Edit: But I am damn good at taking standardized tests!

Tweety

Ok, I stand corrected then...

In Sweden at least you get to learn the basics... Ie play around with batteries, lightbulbs and switches... And measure volt and ampere, ie which is in series, which is in parallel... The difference between AC-DC, and some more on the same theme...

This is taught to all students as part of the basic classes in science in 6'th -7'th grade or so, ie not optional... Still doesn't mean the Swedish students are much smarter than any others though...

VTRsurfer

Tweety, Here in the US, the public schools are much more concerned with teaching tolerance of alternative lifestyles than they are with teaching anything that could be somewhat useful and practical.

Jara311

Cool thing is is that I learned a little something. BTW, I now know how to make your brake light flash when you are at a stop All you have to do is tie your ground, hot line of blinker, and the two blinker aftermarket wires together, as one. When you hit the blinker, whala, your brake flashes! see how useful this exercise was?