I've got a bit of an electrical problem with my Dash fuse blowing repeatedly so I thought I'd come to the experts to see what you lot think it could be. The fuse is the 10A one that is marked "Meter Illumi" and when it goes you lose speedo, trip, rev counter, neutral light, fuel warning light and the HISS light then flashes as though the ignition is off. It also makes the bike run like an absolute pig below around 4K rpm which I put down to the exhaust flap being stuck open? It happened the first time the other week on my way up north and then again last Friday. I had spares this time so I changed the fuse and it then blew again on a little rideout on Sat evening, so today I got some more from the local motor parts place and set off back down south with the fuse blowing within 10 miles, and a 4th time once I stopped for petrol, again within 10 miles. There's been no correlation with the riding style each time it went, sometimes it went cruising at motorway speeds, sometimes pootling about on residential/urban roads. Electrics are far from my strongpoint Sounds like something is shorting or spiking the current, maybe? Given it's now 5 years old and has done 34K (flawless) miles, I'm at a loss as to why it would start failing now? The only thing I can put it down to is it only happening since I moved to a Lithium battery. I'll swap back to my Yuasa to see if that remedies it but unless I've got a dodgy unit the Lithium batt should be fine, shouldn't it? this is the one I got.
wonder if you have trapped a wire when changing your battery.. If you have, it may have cut / rubbed through the insulation and be shorting to earth depending on you going over bumps in the road etc?
Forgot to mention - when I stopped mid-way on my journey south today and refuelled & changed the fuse I then set off again on the A1 but within 20 miles I had a couple of incidents where the engine cut out and the yellow engine management light came on. Luckily I managed to get across to the hard shoulder each time, where a turn off/turn on managed to restart it, after a couple of tickovers. Presuming it'll be connected to the fuse-blowing somehow. Thankfully it was fine after the 2nd time but not knowing if it would cut out again certainly put a dampener on the rest of the ride back!
wonder if you have trapped a wire when changing your battery.. If you have, it may have cut / rubbed through the insulation and be shorting to earth depending on you going over bumps in the road etc?
Also just remembered that when I had the Blade in with the local Honda dealer for a post-winter service, the mechanic asked who fitted the GiPro gear indicator and warned that it could spike the diagnostic plug and harm the ECU. I dismissed it at the time, but now pondering if that might have something to do with it? Having said that, I fitted it last year and have done lots of miles and 3-4 trackdays so would be unlikely, I would think?
Yes that's a possibility although when I took the battery off when I got back it seemed to be seated correctly with no wires in the way. I did notice the battery was very hot but as I don't usually take the battery off after a long run in warm weather I'm not sure if that's to be expected or not? I'll check the wires to make sure they're all insulated and in tact. Good shout.
Thanks - will do a full inspection of the wiring under the seat first. Anything more than that and I'll have to block a day out and strip it down.
Have a good look over the wiring at the rear tail tidy area as folks commonly trap wires there, that fuse tie's into all the side lights, indicators as well as the brake light so check those wires over for any damage or trapped wires causing them to short out an blow the fuse! G-luck dude.
Thanks all. Something's just occurred to me that may have a bearing - with the old Yuasa batteries I got out of the habit of re-applying the rubber strap to hold the battery in the tray, mainly because of changing it so many times and it being a bit of a faff to secure on I kept forgetting to reinstate it. Now I realise I haven't got it on at the moment so with the much-lighter lithium batt what I think may be happening is it could be 'jumping around' as I go over bumps n' ting and even though the connectors are tight on it may be stressing the cables somewhere causing the short? My suspension is a bit over-stiff for the road as I set it up for the track so that's exacerbating the jolting over the connection of linked-potholes we call a UK road system. I'll try it with it properly secured in the batt tray and see if that helps.
