Custom wiring harness?

So the winter build is coming along, just about to tackle the wiring.

Just curious, anyone have any idea how much a shop would charge for a new wiring harness??

 

I don't know how much they'd charge but it is fairly simple to make your own. There aren't any close shops but I had a rats nest. I tackled it myself. until this, I installed two car stereos and read a basic introduction to electricity book. Exp level was novice at best. I was able to pick up some 18gauge wire from the local auto store, some bullet connectors, and some spade connectors. I removed the safety features though. Mostly because I hate them having control over whether or not I can ride. I did keep them tied to the cluster lights to warn of unsafe conditions.
This simple diagram helped a lot. Thanks to Krayzeesmoke for posting.
http://xjbikes.com/Forums/viewtopic/p=320826.html

 

I run my own shop and I charge an hourly rate plus materials. My hourly rate is $40 and hour and it takes some time to do a harness. But I can tell you from experience that these bikes are really easy to do a custom harness on. Just use the post that abvnatter posted above and you will be good to go. Also, spend some money and get a circuit breaker box. The new ones are awesome and you don't have to use fuses. Blow a breaker, push the button and keep on riding.

 

waterproof motorcycle friendly circuit breaker? Link please?

 

Check out this guy. I trust em and his work is bad ass...

http://www.sparckmoto.com/

You can basically design it, he has 100% upfront pricing and he'll work with you to make it right. base price $250 then up with some cool options like RFID...

 

^^^^ that's who I used. He must of up his price ...I think mine was half that from him. but still hes a good guy and he was extremely helpful and responds to emails very fast. He helped me out a lot because I was a little confused since I started from scratch basically.

 

You can do this yourself. it just takes time patience and a bit of learning. I've done a number of harnesses. Print out the wiring diagram and be meticulous with all your connections. Not too much in terms of investment, some basic tools and wire. Find an electronic specific store and get good (Pico) wire. You will also need to get a set of Molex connector screwdrivers for pulling the connectors apart.

In terms of wrapping the harness, use vinyl with no adhesive. Cut a roll to about 3/4 strips and use a touch of contact cement to start and locate the wrap. This is the same as stock. electrical tape eventually just becomes a big booger with heat, and makes it horrible if you have to pull something apart later.

Always test fit your harness before you wrap it!! How do I know this... :roll:



and your kitchen table will look like this for a couple weeks!

 

http://xjbikes.wikidot.com/wiki:xj550-wiring-diagram
Really helpful interactive wiring diagram

I've heard strong arguments for crimping instead of soldering
Your only hiccup might be sourcing connectors that fit with the existing relays etc.

some of these safety mechanisms work by diverting electricity to the frame instead of the coils.

also, the black from the headlight should connect to the other blacks instead of going straight to the relay. theres a couple of places where the wiring diagram is misleading like that.

 

I haven't done a full one yet but I've replaced all lighting and displays and I would recommend crimping but just make sure you have a good solid wire in the end of the connector to crimp on. Sometimes you'll be going from two different guage wires so it can be tricky - you can loop the smaller wire a few times and create a thicker "plug" and it can be helpful to solder that to keep it solid. whatever you do just make sure every termination is rock solid and no bare wires exposed that could short on the frame.

As far as relays go well - firstly I hate the safety relays - I got stranded at the roadside before due to the neutral relay. This is now 100% bypassed and I would fully recommend doing so. All it does is stop the bike from starting if it's not in neutral - so when it goes bad it just kills the bike. The neutral switch on these 30+ year old bikes can also go bad commonly and it's a bitch to get to and diagnose so just bypass the relay and don't be a dumb-ass and try to start the bike on the side stand when it's in gear. If you have a side-stand relay then I suggest the same.

I just have a rule that I only start a bike if I'm sitting on it anyway. This has served me well over the years with friends bikes that had a bogus neutral light and a rental that just slipped in and out of neutral due to voodoo.

 

I will recommend that the safety sensors remain functional. Some night you will be tired and make a mistake. When that happens it's better (and less expensive) to stall the bike than to get hurt. All of the sensors, and related relays are available new if any need to be replaced.

 

It's a personal choice but IMHO these sensors are a false sense of safety.

1) They can go bad and not work and thus if you're relying on them it can be either dangerous or leave you stranded. Having them makes you rely on them.

2) Create habits to keep you safe, then you'll be safe with any bike and you won't be relying on a piece of electronics, you'll be relying on you're own damn self which personally I prefer. Don't start any bike unless you're sitting on it. When you kick the kickstand up do the action twice - your brain will register trying to kick something that's not there more than something that is.

3) If you're THAT tired that you forget to check for green before starting a bike or forget your double kick kickstand then you probably shouldn't be riding a motorcycle.

...this said, if you like them keep them, just keep in mind not all bike will have them and dropping your friends bike is worse than your own.

 

Just a month ago I watched a very experienced (and well rested) motorcyclist ride off on his '47 flathead HD with the kickstand down. He very nearly gave himself a huge repair bill. Thankfully someone yelled at him before he made a left turn.

Anything that works can break and leave you stranded (and honestly if you can't fix a 30 year old motorcycle on the side of the road, or do the preventative maintenance necessary to prevent breakdowns, then you might need to get a newer bike).

Safety devices are there because people make mistakes. When mistkes become an impossible event then I could see a sound argument being made for removing safety devices.

 

I respect your viewpoint but I don't agree.

Trying to diagnose and fix an relay electrical problem on the side of the road is a challenge even if you have a multimeter and the right tools with you.

For me it's a case of where do you draw the line. Following your thought process someone could argue that all bike should have sissy bars or, all bike should have training wheels, cos you know one day you'll come to a red light and forget to put your foot down right?.... I draw my line a little before yours k-moe because I see those things as the same as putting your foot down or remembering to brake or change gear, to me it's second nature cos I've habituated myself over 15 years to it just like you do with anything on a motorcycle, it becomes almost subconscious but I know consciously that I can jump on any bike and not get caught out.

 

Is it just American people who make those mistakes? because the bikes here don't have any of that stuff :wink:

 

Interesting. So your XJ550 doesn't have a relay to stop you starting it in gear?

The thing with the USA is you can't make generalizations because this country is made up of people from everywhere else and there's so many people that there's generally a large group that thinks, does and IS any certain way.

There are a lot of people that buy into the whole nanny-state, wrap yourself in bubble wrap paranoid mindset but then there's a lot of folks that take stupid risks. I like to think I fall in the middle somewhere and I trust in my own judgement and abilities, which is a skill that needs to be practiced else it goes away. Too many people IMHO give this skill away by playing by these stupid rules religiously. It makes me want to shoot people sometime - folks that stand at a crosswalk waiting for the WALK when there's no cars in sight... people that come to a complete dead stop at a stop-sign on a side street at 3am with no other traffic for miles around - man I could go on for hours.

If you use your brain you actually can be safer cos you're consciously judging life rather than blindly going by a set of rules or assuming that the safe guards you have your trust in will protect you from your own stupidity. That's pretty sad if you think about it - if you don't have faith in yourself what do you have? I rely on me cos others rely on me.

Y'all can also as always rely on me to take a thread way off track....

 

All I know is that I occasionally need a wake-up call, and I'd rather that not result in a trip to the hospital. In 30 years of riding, safety switches have prevented my having an accident on two occasions. I figure that those two occasions saved me 2 broken akles and around $50,000 in bills and lost wages.


A story that is somewhat related: A service tech I used to work with decided that it would be OK to bypass a safety switch on a crusher, because you normally need to remove a second door to access the actual crusher, and that door had another switch on it (plus it saved him the 15 minutes it would have taken to repair the broken switch).

Well one night a manager at the store where the crusher was located pressured a 16 year old kid to fix the machine. Now this was a smart kid, but he liked his job, so he did what he thought was the right thing, even though it wasn't. Not knowing the usual procedure for clearing a crusher jam, he proceeded to open the top door, reach in with his hand, and try to clear the jam (all the while thinking that the lockout switch would keep the crusher from running). With that switch disabled the crusher did what it was programmed to do; continue to try and clear the jam by cycling itself. Well the kid managed to partially clear the jam, allowing the crusher to move...and crush his hand.
While the hand was salvageable, he would never actually be able to use it for anything again.

Two simple (and seemingly isolated) mistakes, and one bypassed safety switch, resulted in a young kid being permanantly disfigured and partially disabled. This is another reason why I don't remove safety equipment .

 

Ouch! I used to bypass things and tell myself I'd remember.... Well, I was reminded a couple times -- no problems though..... But when a shop owner had kickstand down and didn't know it- subsequently tossed off his bike and killed on a slow left turn at a traffic light, I fixed them all and normally do not bypass those things anymore.

Sometimes accidents happen from just a moment of not thinking though--

I
Know a dump truck driver that is missing an index finger .... He had been dumping a load(c'mon... You know what I mean), an when he started lowering the dump body, it jambed up. He crawled underneath and found the pin at the bottom of the big hydraulic cylinder had walked almost all of the way out of the bore. He could wiggle the pin quite easily but couldn't push it back in. He realized he could push the pine the rest of the way out and the re-align the pin to re- insert it. Problem was he just reacted rather than think-- instead of taking the time to block everything up, and go get a drift, he saw that he could just poke it through with his finger. Now he doesnt have the finger anymore.

Be careful out there.....

Dave f

 

Doesn't have that or the sidestand stand cut out, in 35 years I've left a stand down once probably due to the fact I tend to use a centrestand wherever I can and I don't think I've ever tried to start a bike in gear

Were the safeties a USA only feature or do most other markets have them as well?

 

As far as I know the safety switches are world market devices, though they could have been a delete item in some markets if they weren't required. I know the home market, North American market, and European XJ's had the safety circuits. I seem to recall someone from the Middle East asking about the sidestand safety switch several years ago.

 

They haven't been fitted to any of the four XJ550 that I have owned or my friends XJ600

I remember a friends Kawasaki having one on the clutch and that was an American model KZ1000LTD with 80mph speedo