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How to convert to LED's and still have everything work

Discussion in 'XJ DIY How-To Instructions' started by SQLGuy, Nov 7, 2008.

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Ahks New Member

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So the LED everything mod will eventually get worked into my current project...

The EFI will live in my dreams... I'm saving that entire page to my "porn" folder...

(porn folder = my folder of dream projects for cars and motorcycles)

Ahks, Aug 12, 2009

#21

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stephen.g.fiddes New Member

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Bringing up an old thread....

OK, so from my understanding, I want to buy the LF1-S-PIN flash relay.
http://www.superbrightleds.com/cgi-bin/ ... 1-PIN.html

Just to make sure I am reading this diagram correctly, the grey wire goes directly to the battery (via the wire for the existing relay), and the black wire goes to the turn signal switch on the handlebar (via existing wire). Am I correct?

I am not worried about the autpo-cancel at this point. I'll deal with that later.

stephen.g.fiddes, Sep 6, 2010

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Metal_Bob Active Member

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For those that can aford it (sub 100 I think) many vendors now sell modules for proper led flashing and original autocancel or time based flashing, sometimes with brake flash options.

This won't help with Atari warning lights but oh well.

Metal_Bob, Sep 6, 2010

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quikcobra Member

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Do you have a picture of the before and after?

quikcobra, Oct 4, 2010

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mandrews New Member

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I'm in the process of rewiring my '80 XJ650, and I'm finding that the relays are mostly connected to plugs in the headlight. Is there a reason why they are originally located so far away? Would there be a problem (interference in the Diode, other relay, etc.) if I rewired the relays to be in the headlight with the rest of the wiring?

mandrews, Feb 26, 2011

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Metal_Bob Active Member

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From the 1st post in this thread:

Anyway, none of this will work with LED turn signals, so an electronic flasher must be substituted for the original one (which mounts under the frame under the tank). The problem is, nobody that I found makes an electronic flasher that will work with the XJ self-cancelling circuit. If you want your signals to still self-cancel, you'll need to make your own:

Actually, you start with a two-pin (or two-pin + ground) electronic flasher. I used a two-pin from Rumble Concept, but I don't like it much since its rate varies considerably with temperature. To adapt the electronic flasher to work with self-cancelling circuit, you need to add another SPDT relay.

Most accessory relays are SPST (that is, they have four pins - 2 coil connections, one common, and one normally open). For this application you need one that also has a normally closed contact (five pins). I used a Radio Shack PC relay, and its working fine, but you may want to get a Bosch-type one that should be a bit more rugged for vehicular use.

Wiring goes like this:
Stock flasher connector Br wire goes to the common pin on the SPDT relay.
The normally closed contact from the relay goes to the supply side of the electronic flasher.
The normally open contact on the relay remains unconnected.
One of the relay coil pins goes to ground.
The other relay coil pin gets connected to the stock flasher Y/G wire.
The load side of the electronic flasher goes to the stock flasher Br/W wire.

I super glued my relay to the electronic flasher, taped up the harness stub, and put a bit of RTV over the terminals before installing the whole thing.
Click to expand...

Has anyone actually done this? It is never mentioned in other posts. Usually just buy an electronic flasher till you find one that works...

I can live w/o the auto cancel but I'd like to try this added step.

I bought two 68 smd LED 1157 bulbs for my Windjammer fairing and I recently ordered K&S's DOT LED turn signals for the rear. So I'm hoping the flasher I ordered and the extra SPDT will work out...

P.S. I'll probably move the flasher and the extra relay to my "fake" headlight bucket hidden behind my fairing.

Metal_Bob, Mar 1, 2011

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bigfitz52 Well-Known Member Premium Member

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mandrews said:

...Is there a reason why they are originally located so far away? Would there be a problem (interference in the Diode, other relay, etc.) if I rewired the relays to be in the headlight with the rest of the wiring?
Click to expand...

I think it's mainly a space consideration. There really isn't room for two or three more relays plus the self-canceler in the headlight bucket.

'83 XJ550R, '81 550R

bigfitz52, Mar 1, 2011

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shnuffy Member

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IS it possible to get those pictures back up?

shnuffy, May 9, 2011

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day7a1 Member

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I'd love to see the pics...I second the motion to get the pics back up!

day7a1, Jul 2, 2011

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Hzleyes63 New Member

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SQLGuy said:

I recently converted my '82 SECA 750 to LED lighting throughout. I did this mainly to save power, since I've converted my bike to fuel injection, and the ECU, fuel pump, injectors, etc, draw a bit more current than I'd like.

Since I was trying to save power, I didn't want to add load resistors; that would have been counterproductive. Instead I needed to make some flasher and computer changes to accomodate the LED's while still maintaining stock SECA functionality.

Part 1 - the turn signals:

This probably applies to most XJ's. The main problem with swapping to LED turn signals is that they draw about 1/40th the current of the stock bulbs. This is a problem because the stock flasher relies on this current for its operation. The stock flasher (with self-canceller) works like this:

It uses a relay with an NC contact and two coils on the pole piece (one about 100Ohms, the other about .2 Ohms). There are also a 1200uF cap and 150 Ohm resistor, but these are actually just to ensure that the turn signals aren't on when the ignition is first turned on. There is no bimetallic element. The stock flasher has three terminals labelled B, C, and L.

Its operation goes like this:

1. The handlebar switch has a two pairs of contacts in each direction. One pair switches conductivity between the Br/W of the flasher and the selected turn signals and leaves it there, the other momentarily connects Y/R and B to the cancelling unit, enabling it.

2. Once enabled, the cancelling unit, which had been holding +12V on the C contact (Y/G) of the flasher relay, lets this contact float. This deengergizes the 100Ohm coil allowing the relay contacts to close.

3. Once closed, the relay contacts provide 12V through L (Br/W) to the turn signal pair selected by the handlebar switch. The current to them flows through the heavier coil and opens the relay. Once the relay is open, current flow stops, so the relay can now close again, and we have a flash cycle, based largely on the magnetic field build up and collapse time of the heavier coil of the relay.

4. Eventually one of two things happens:
a) the cancelling unit's counters expire and it puts 12V back onto the C contact, energizing the 100Ohm coil and locking the relay open (no more flashing), or
b) the handlebar switch is cancelled, which opens the contacts between the L contact (Br/W) and the turn signals (no more flashing)

Anyway, none of this will work with LED turn signals, so an electronic flasher must be substituted for the original one (which mounts under the frame under the tank). The problem is, nobody that I found makes an electronic flasher that will work with the XJ self-cancelling circuit. If you want your signals to still self-cancel, you'll need to make your own:

Actually, you start with a two-pin (or two-pin + ground) electronic flasher. I used a two-pin from Rumble Concept, but I don't like it much since its rate varies considerably with temperature. To adapt the electronic flasher to work with self-cancelling circuit, you need to add another SPDT relay.

Most accessory relays are SPST (that is, they have four pins - 2 coil connections, one common, and one normally open). For this application you need one that also has a normally closed contact (five pins). I used a Radio Shack PC relay, and its working fine, but you may want to get a Bosch-type one that should be a bit more rugged for vehicular use.

Wiring goes like this:
Stock flasher connector Br wire goes to the common pin on the SPDT relay.
The normally closed contact from the relay goes to the supply side of the electronic flasher.
The normally open contact on the relay remains unconnected.
One of the relay coil pins goes to ground.
The other relay coil pin gets connected to the stock flasher Y/G wire.
The load side of the electronic flasher goes to the stock flasher Br/W wire.

I super glued my relay to the electronic flasher, taped up the harness stub, and put a bit of RTV over the terminals before installing the whole thing.

Part 2 - the tail lights:

These are probably easy on most XJ's but are tricky on a SECA 750. I used local auto parts store red 1157 replacements (Jam Straits), though there are certainly better ones available online (SuperBrightLEDs.com for instance).

The reason these are tricky on a SECA 750 is that the SECA 750, and some others, has the on-board computer that checks a number of things including the tail lights. If you don't want the computer bugging you about your tail light being out, you need to modify it. I, being stubborn, not only didn't want it bugging me, but I still wanted the check to work, and I also wanted the check to work if someone put regular 1157's back in the tail light at some point in the future.

The guys that designed this computer were pretty clever. They included two circuits for testing the tail light. The first one checks the current draw of the running filiments in the tail light. The second one checks the current draw of the brake light filiments. Not only does it check the brake light filiments when the brake is used, it also pulses the brake light when the bike is first started (too quickly to see) to do an initial check of the filiments.

These checks of current draw are done in the computer itself. The wiring feeding the tail lamps runs through the computer. Inside there are a .47Ohm series resistor that allows measurement of the current drawn by the running filiments, and a .12Ohm resistor to check the brake lamp filiments. The resistors are the white ceramic blocks on the corner of the computer's circuit board:

An initial guess might be to replace these resistors with much larger values so that they would still drop the correct voltage despite the much lower current draw of the LEDs. The problem, for me, is that that solution would result in burned resistors if anyone ever put regular 1157's back in.

Instead, I replaced these two resistors with rectifiers. Semiconductors have a fairly consistent forward voltage drop that is largely independant of current. The whole process involved some trial and error and I got to disassemble and reassemble the cluster several times, but here's what eventually worked:

I replaced the .47Ohm resistor with a 1N5404 3A rectifier (Radio Shack P/N 276-1144). I had to Dremel down the leads a bit to make a good fit for the stock resistor holes. For the .12Ohm resistor, which needed higher current capacity, I used an NTE581 TO-220 cased rectifier. This is an 8A device. Both of these rectifiers drop enough voltage to indicate to the computer that the LED's are drawing current, but they also can carry enough current to work fine if regular bulbs are ever put back into the tail lamp.

In both cases, the cathode of the rectifier (banded end on the 3A rectifier) goes towards the edge of the circuit board.

Part 3 - instrument lights and the license plate light:

The best power savings by converting to LEDs are obtained for lights that are always on. Two of these are the backlights for the instrument cluster. They're only 7W, but, by converting those to LED you save a full amp of current all the time the ignition's on. That's 5% of the alternator's capacity... nothing to sneeze at.

Since I had to open up the instrument cluster anyway, to make the computer mods, I figured I'd do the lamp substitution at the same time. I also made a new bezel for the warning center, repainted my needles, and cleaned and polished everything while I had the cluster open.

Initially I tried finding some LED 194 replacement bulbs locally. Pep Boys turned out to be the only place that carried white ones. While their packaging claimed to be "brighter than OEM", I found them to be nowhere near as bright as the original 194's. So, instead, I ordered some bulbs from superbrightleds.com. Their prices, selection, and service were all excellent. Besides ordering the white backlight bulbs, I also got replacements for the amber (turn signal), blue (high beam), green (neutral), and red (warning) lights on the instrument cluster, and a white 67 replacement for the license plate light.

http://www.superbrightleds.com/specs/bulb_specs.htm

For the backlights I chose their warm white WLED-WW5 bulbs, and they worked great, very natural and perfect brighness, though they can be a bit tricky to install because of the LEDs sticking out the side. For the indicator lights I used their WLED-x4 bulbs, which actually turned out to be too bright. The green, especially, was blinding. I ended up putting blue masking tape over the green and blue LED's, and regular masking tape over the others. This reduced the glare a bit and also diffused the light so it looks more like the original lighting.

Summary:

So, I now have lights that are at least as bright as stock, will likely last as long as the bike itself, and draw considerably less power than stock. I would estimate that, at idle, and in gear, I am saving a good 48W (4A) of power. Put the bike in neutral, put your foot on the brake, engage the turn signals, etc, and the power savings goes up considerably; the brake lights alone save about another 3.5A over stock when engaged.

Cheers,
Paul
Click to expand...

Hzleyes63, Oct 10, 2011

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RickCoMatic Well-Known Member

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Offers a host of Modules to aid in LED Conversions, plus "Dummy-load" devices that you can use to maintain the Self Cancelling feature on the bike.

RickCoMatic, Oct 10, 2011

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Hzleyes63 New Member

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I already have dummy loads on the tail light circuit b ut I still get tail lamp out warning light. I bought the dummy loads from V-LEDS and I was instructed to put them across just the parking light circuit only. SQLGuy figured out that the XJ750 has two monitoring circuits, one on the parking light circuit and one on the braking circuit. The replacement LEDS I have in tail light sockets work fine.

Hzleyes63, Oct 11, 2011

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44Dave Member

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I wish the pictures would come back, too.

44Dave, Feb 9, 2012

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FtUp Well-Known Member

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because I am a visual person (as are a lot of people here), I had to draw this out. the quoted text is copied from the op.

"Wiring goes like this:
Stock flasher connector Br wire goes to the common pin on the SPDT relay. (pin 30)
The normally closed contact from the relay goes to the supply side of the electronic flasher. (pin 87a)
The normally open contact on the relay remains unconnected. (87b not pictured)
One of the relay coil pins goes to ground. (pin 86)
The other relay coil pin gets connected to the stock flasher Y/G wire. (pin 85)
The load side of the electronic flasher goes to the stock flasher Br/W wire."

LED signal wiring diagram close by bmonkey36, on Flickr

FU

Last edited: Apr 5, 2015

'82xj550rj '83xj750k

FtUp, Jan 22, 2014

#34

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FtUp Well-Known Member

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now that I am finally getting around to doing this mod on my 83 maxim, I am learning a few things. one is that if you have a single signal indicator, you will have to install 2 diodes in the indicator wiring. my 550 seca has a right and left indicator and won't require the diodes. the other thing is that I can do this mod without cutting the main harness. the diodes will be installed in the cluster harness and can easily be replaced (or left in place) if I were to reverse the mod and go back to stock signal lights. I doubt that will ever happen. but you never know, I could end up selling it down the road to some purist that wants to put it back to stock, so there ya go. I will provide more details when I get the parts I just ordered from len next week.

FU

'82xj550rj '83xj750k

FtUp, Apr 5, 2015

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FtUp Well-Known Member

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well I haven't received the parts I ordered yet, but I have made some progress. I picked up a couple diodes at radio shack (yes I am one of the lucky ones to still have a radio shack in my neighborhood). so the indicator light in the maxims grounds through the other side of the flasher system. goofy I know, but it works. therefore I have to connect one side of the indicator bulb to both signal wires through diodes and the other side of the bulb to a ground. turns out that the high beam indicator bulb grounds on the black wire in the indicator cluster harness. so the dark green wire ended up on the diodes and the chocolate wire got soldered to the black wire. the diodes are 200v 1 amp diodes. more than sufficient to run in either configuration.

liquid electrical tape is used where heat shrink tube cannot be slipped over the wire. I plugged it in for a quick test and it works perfectly.

FU

'82xj550rj '83xj750k

FtUp, Apr 7, 2015

#36
FtUp Well-Known Member

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I never cease to be amazed at how quickly I get stuff I order from len. 2 days from Georgia to Seattle! and that's the cheapest shipping option. thanks again len! so I got the turn signal mod all wired up, without having to cut any of the main wire harness. I ordered some connectors from len to make it all possible. he has the male and female spade terminals I needed. I ended up breaking one of the female terminals trying to get it out of the terminal block, luckily I ordered extra connectors.

side note: the connectors len has are not identical to the ones the 83 750 maxim uses in the headlight and turn signal flasher connector. they will work, but you have to pry their retainer prong way out to make it happen. a small amount of uninsulated connector also sticks out the back of the connector shell.

luckily that was the only connector I broke. I barely had enough wire to repair it too.

I bought some male spade terminals to plug into the stock flasher connectors after I removed them from the connector shell.

then I insulated the connection with heat shrink tube. if I ever wanted to reverse this mod, I could just cut the heat shrink off and plug the connector back into the shell.

the spdt relay rests on the inner fender on the left and the brake light flasher can be seen on the right side. I think I might mount them to the inner fender with vhb tape, but they both are nestled in and aren't going anywhere, so maybe not. the ground for the relay is on a ground point that is also the lower left mounting bolt for the air box. you can see the one red wire on the left.

at this point, you are probably thinking, "omg! he used red wire for everything!", yup, I sure did. it's all I had sitting around and I know what goes where.

edit: I don't know why the last pic is rotated that way. it should be 90 degrees to that, and I don't know how to fix it.

anyway, that's it. easy peasy! I tried spinning the front wheel to activate the auto cancel, but I could not spin it fast enough to even register on the speedometer.

FU

'82xj550rj '83xj750k

FtUp, Apr 8, 2015

#37
IronHD New Member

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Where do you get the spdt relay?

IronHD, May 26, 2015

#38
k-moe Pie, Bacon, Bourbon. Moderator Premium Member

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Radio Shack (if you town still has one). http://www.parts-express.com (or any other online parts retailer (Amazon too)) if you don't.

82 XJ750 Seca
Read This First
Choosing Oil for a Wet Clutch Motorcycle
Why You NEED TO REPLACE Original brake lines w/pics
The easy things, always check them first.

k-moe, May 26, 2015

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IronHD New Member

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Cool. Thanks!

IronHD, May 26, 2015

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