Indicator Woes

[marksabin60]

HI guys... hope you can help me. I have a 88 US import VMAX and am currently putting it back to more "normal" by refitting more original indicators. I have put them on but when i indicate they come on, Flicker once then stay on constant. I've done some checks and note that i am only getting 8.4V at the connector wires. I've checked back to the relay and can see that i am getting 12 volts in (Brown wire) but only 8.4 out of in on the Brown/White wire that goes to the indicator switch. This is a puzzle. The previous indicators worked just fine though I can't confirm that there was only 8.4 volts then and maybe somehow in the process i have damaged the relay.

Any ideas??

I'n going to put the old ones back on and check again.

Both old and new do have 12v lamps in them.

Any advice welcome

Mark

 

[Fire-medic]

Renew your ground connections (clean 'em if they need it). You may need to disassemble things and to check your crimped connections. It's not-uncommon for the wires to fatigue and to break strands where the crimp connectors for individual wires are. Also cleaning the right rear side of the engine & frame location where the ground wires are (disassemble and clean shiny-bright all wire connectors and the ground point) and using dabs of dielectric grease before re-connecting things should help.

Have you done the crimp fix on your wire harness by the rear ignition coils?
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[marksabin60]

Hey fella... thanks for the quick reply. Yup did all that. All good. Put old ones back on and they work as normal. CHecked voltage at the realy again and its 12v ish so must have been the way i did it before... so.. relay looks ok. now thinking the Lamps in the indicators are not right so will replace them before i do anythink else. They have 12V10vv on them - not sure what the 10vv is but doesnt sound right. Bike looks a lot better with the retro (sort of original) indicators on it i have to say.

got to wait for the lock down to finish so i can get to our local motorfactors to get new lamps.

cheers

Mark

 

[Fire-medic]

Ten watts for a single filament running light sounds about right, and something twice that for a turn signal double-filament bulb. Even ten watts for a normally-off, turn signal fixture to illuminate, flashing for a turn, doesn't sound dim. I don't have the factory specs in-front of me to compare.

 

[marksabin60]

Hey ....thanks. The Wattage seems to be the only difference. The old were 23W compared to the new @ 10W. That's not going to have a bearing on how often they flash is it? I'm going to get some 21 W bulbs for them if i can find the right fitting and see what happens then!

 

[marksabin60]

Done a bit of googling.. looks like that could be the problem. Will get new bulbs and recheck.

 

[Fire-medic]

The load placed on the system should be similar, that's why when people use LED bulbs in systems designed for incandescent bulbs, they need to use resistors, so the electrical components read the proper resistance at-which they're designed to work. Too-low a resistance, and the bulb flashes staccato-style.

 

[putin]

Done a bit of googling.. looks like that could be the problem. Will get new bulbs and recheck.

Most likely that a different bulbs. I had similar problem with my turn signals.they must be exactly at Yamaha specs.

 

[[email protected]]

Were the old LED?

If so, heck the "idiot" light on the dash to see if someone altered the circuit (installed diodes) to make it work right.

Did you check for any hidden resistors? They are often installed to cure blink rate issues with LEDs. Under scoop, under dash, under rear seat are common spots to wire them in

 

[02GF74]

Yeah, change the bulb wattage. I took off a set of aftermarket indicators to fit the original type that have 10W bulbs - they flash but about 3x a second, that is too fast for UK law. I either will replace bulbs with 23W or fit a flasher relay with flash rate independent of load (and that may work with LED bulbs although what I read about that it may need modification for the turn signal lamp to work)

 

[one2dmax]

Simple fix is to wire a pair of original bulbs in parallel and just hide them out of site.

 

[02GF74]

yeah, except that the flasher module is load independent - I had a feeling it may be the case as with lower wattage bulbs the flash rate should decrease or even stop. Just now I wired in a 10 W and then 23 W bulb for the left side and there was no difference.

Flash rate is 2.6 times a second, max allowed is 2.... so close.

So my next question is, has anybody taken apart the flasher module? There are two tabs, you can see one on the top left - that release the end but I did not want to pull too hard as I could see the PCB was not moving. It could be a simple as fitting a capacitor to slow the flash rate, depending on implementation.

 

[alan97max]

Simple fix is to wire a pair of original bulbs in parallel and just hide them out of site.

I tried this method today and it worked until i tried to cancel the turn signal the actual turn signal bulb stopped flashing and went to solid running light but the bulb i wired in to hide continued to flash at a fast rate, it wouldnt stop until i actually un-wired it.
maybe i put this extra bulb on the wrong wire?? i wired it to the turn signal wire going into the 5 pin relay under the left side scoop. It is the correct wire that gets power only when the turn signal is on. any suggestions????

 

[one2dmax]

You would wire in a pair of bulbs to the pair you had. If you do a single that won't break the circuit of flow enough to prevent the current from back flowing.