1100 Sport electrical starting gremlins

[BigHalse]

Hi everyone, iam brand new here, so go easy on me!

I joined this site to get more info on this old 95'sport, its been reliable so far but....today...

 

I lost the tach whilst riding, then i noticed no neutral light didnt aluminate when i pulled up, thought i probably shouldnt shut it off cos i was suspicious about a re start... but i shut it off anyway...and thats were my ride suddenly took a turn for the worse

( the battery was flat for the first time the day before, so it was charged before use, had good voltage, bike wound over as normal several starts this morning, thought i would be ok)

 

After it refused to wind over, I checked voltage at 12.9 V across battery, but yes its an old battery, attached a good battery, no change, indicators are working perfectly, looks like brake light is stuck on.... too bright for the park light, tacho and speedo lighting is on, a tiny click sound from the relays when the starter button is depressed, but thats it, nothing else... zilch. No headlight, battery or oil lights, horn, operating the brakes makes no change to the brake light being stuck on.

 

On the side of the road, checked the battery leads, checked the fuses, ( 15 A ) ok, checked the 3 relays, they are all the same, so I swapped these around in every combination, no change, visual check on everything possible, all appears good, roll start and ride it home 80 kms, running normally.

 

Remove tank, fairings, etc, disconnect every wiring connection found, check for corrosion, ( all clean ) spray with WD and re connect, multi meter fuse box and ignition switch, voltage available everywhere, check starter connections, looks perfect.

 

After looking around in these pages I discover a greatly enhanced wiring diagram, traced wiring backwards from troublesome dash warning lights, everything points to the headlight relay... or Regulator...

Has anyone ever come across this scenaro or similar before?

I have ordered some of the upgraded dioded relays I saw mentioned somewhere, waiting for those to arrive.

Any feedback is welcome, thanks in advance.

 

Stu

[fotoguzzi]

first, be positive you have 12.5 or better battery power.. a bad battery might read OK until you load it. Um, doesn't your bake have TWO batteries? maybe the other one is dead? I don't think a headlight relay came stock so check into that. Regulators have been known to crash but the bike should start if the batt is good. when my Bassa had a bad reg and the batt drew down the tach was the first sign, it fluctuated then died. also iit seems like there should be more than 3 relays? Seimens relays have a bad rep, get new ones from dpguzzi.com or an auto parts store.

[motoguzznix]

It sounds like the starter relay does not work.

This is the one with five contact pins. If this does not work properly, the lights are inoperative too.

[BigHalse]

first, be positive you have 12.5 or better battery power.. a bad battery might read OK until you load it. Um, doesn't your bake have TWO batteries? maybe the other one is dead? I don't think a headlight relay came stock so check into that. Regulators have been known to crash but the bike should start if the batt is good. when my Bassa had a bad reg and the batt drew down the tach was the first sign, it fluctuated then died. also iit seems like there should be more than 3 relays? Seimens relays have a bad rep, get new ones from dpguzzi.com or an auto parts store.

 

Er, hope i am responding in the right place here...

thanks for the feedback there fotoguzzi,

yea I believe the original wiring diagram shows a dual battery set up, which was replaced 7 or more years ago with a single maint free unit. ( before i prchased the bike second hand with 29 K kms on it, i have done a further 8 K kms since then only.

Got a good life out of that battery though huh! Reckon I will buy another one of those!

I hooked up the car battery to it when i started the fault finding , made no difference to the situation however.

The wiring diagram shows a headlamp relay, which feeds the warning lights with power, i think.

The original diagram required a micro scope to read it! Got another one from the net.

If there are more relays, I cant find em. Yea the seimens ones i will stay away from after this learning, cheers.

Stu

[BigHalse]

It sounds like the starter relay does not work.

This is the one with five contact pins. If this does not work properly, the lights are inoperative too.

 

Yea 5 pins, on all 3 relays, mmm well thats kind of whats going on with this bike, so i will possibly have it sorted when these new relays arrive, thanks for the feedabck there motoguzznix

I will post with an outcome and what the fix was, when / if i get that far.

[raz]

Just to avoid confusion, this is a carb Sport, hence the less number of relays. The so called headlight relay is Guzzis nomenclature for the relay that powers lots of stuff from key-on, including the headlight. It should be called "main relay" or something. It's not a proper headlight relay.

 

Other than that I don't know. Is there voltage to the solenoid when pressing starter button?

 

I guess you found this one: http://www.thisoldtractor.com/guzzi007/sch..._Sport_1100.gif

 

Oh yeah, note that the relay sockets are very crappy too, at least on my Sporti.

[Cliff]

It sounds like a poor earth; particularly the front fairing frame.

[pete roper]

It sounds like a poor earth; particularly the front fairing frame.

 

 

Yup. The early sports had the most atrocious earth path imagineable through lots of corrosion prone or painted parts bolted together.

 

Run an earth wire from the instrument/fairing mount to one of the timing chest bolts and then get a bloody great earth strap from an auto parts store and run it from one of the bell housing bolts direct to the battery negative terminal making sure it doesn't foul the rear shock. Betcha the problems will go away.

 

pete

[Karl Von]

Yup. The early sports had the most atrocious earth path imagineable through lots of corrosion prone or painted parts bolted together.

 

Run an earth wire from the instrument/fairing mount to one of the timing chest bolts and then get a bloody great earth strap from an auto parts store and run it from one of the bell housing bolts direct to the battery negative terminal making sure it doesn't foul the rear shock. Betcha the problems will go away.

 

pete

 

The exact same thing happened to me at bike week on my 1100 Sport carb. I was running down the interstate and the tach dropped off. My brother then told me the head light was out. I also had no stop light. or idiot lights, I did have turn signals and a tail light I stoped to check the fuse, which were all ok. Went to start the bike up and nothing. Pushed started it and it fired right up.

 

Turned out it was the circuit on the #3 fuse. it never blew the fuse but the wire going into the fuse block had a bad connection and melted the plastic shroud on the connector. The tach, starter, head lights & stop lights all run through that fuse.

[BigHalse]

The exact same thing happened to me at bike week on my 1100 Sport carb. I was running down the interstate and the tach dropped off. My brother then told me the head light was out. I also had no stop light. or idiot lights, I did have turn signals and a tail light I stoped to check the fuse, which were all ok. Went to start the bike up and nothing. Pushed started it and it fired right up.

 

Turned out it was the circuit on the #3 fuse. it never blew the fuse but the wire going into the fuse block had a bad connection and melted the plastic shroud on the connector. The tach, starter, head lights & stop lights all run through that fuse.

 

Thanks alot to you guys, Raz, Cliff Pete and Karl, its nice to know iam not the only one, yeah come to think of it, i did see lots of paint around the fairing mounts, but it didnt register at the time.

I ran multi meter around all that area but when you do that you always prove the earth properly, so its not a realistic representation of whats really happening.

The schematic all points to the number 3 terminal and the relay that runs the lights, but i have what i should there... i will take another look at the wiring in this area and look for signs of resistance / heat etc.

Yea this is a carby model, its running those Flat slides, works ok too.

 

cheers

stu

[Murray]

Remove and reseat the relays, if you have some contact cleaner hit them with that too. Usually fixes it 9 times out of ten if not do the same to the fueses.

[BigHalse]

Remove and reseat the relays, if you have some contact cleaner hit them with that too. Usually fixes it 9 times out of ten if not do the same to the fueses.

 

Well i replaced all the relays with upgraded ones from the Guzzi dealer here, no change in things here, connected earth leads all over the place, no change, fuses all have voltage, all ignition wires do too, yes tested all the starter wiring, nothing wrong that i can find,,, its time to load her on the truck and take it to the dealer,,, tail between my legs!

Oh well its needs fresh tyres and such anyhow.

 

Thanks for your help gents.

[Murray]

Other Have you tried shorting the small wire on the back of the starter to the large terminal? There will be sparks but it should go if it doesn't you have a soleniod/starter problem if it does most likely the OEM switch block which is the same as a 1992 CB1000F is full of road grime a clean works wonders.

[BigHalse]

Other Have you tried shorting the small wire on the back of the starter to the large terminal? There will be sparks but it should go if it doesn't you have a soleniod/starter problem if it does most likely the OEM switch block which is the same as a 1992 CB1000F is full of road grime a clean works wonders.

 

Hi Murray, just got home again and checked the thread,

no i didnt try the shorting trick at the starter, i was a bit worried about causing some grief in the ignition circiuts elsewhere and possibly damaging the electronics, tho it probably would be safe enough, but i have got voltages everywhere, both sides of the ignition switch and at the starter, so i am a bit flumuxed by this one, I reckon i will just give it to our trusty dealer here, and let him sort it out for me, rest assured tho, i will be after a full explaination when he does so we can learn something from this one.

 

cheers mate.

[Murray]

Voltage doesn't neascarily mean current.