Valve Stem Seals, or maybe throw in the towel

[93Bandit]

Excellent! See, that wasn't so bad was it?

[Nessism]

Excellent job, Rich. Thanks for keeping your GS on the road!

[rphillips]

Congrats, appears to be a job well done. Those little switches are so cheap, hardly worth trying to repair old one. Just think, if they'd left the dang choke down on the carbs, where they always worked perfectly forever, instead of installing a stupid choke cable, you'd be done... Oh yeah, did I mention I've always hated them choke cables, totally useless.

[Eli69]

Way to go rich.

[pdqford]

.
And a Merry Christmas.

[Rich82GS750TZ]

Merry Christmas all.

Been a few weeks. It didn’t take long to find my short. Took the front brake lever light switch apart to clean and inspect.

Was going to cut back the wires and re-solder, but just decided to buy a new switch. eBay took a week or so then got busy with Christmas stuff and car shopping with my son.

Finally today got everything buttoned up, tightened up an exhaust bolt underneath, believe I fixed the leak. Went for a 20mile ride. Engine sounds great. I’m super happy with the results of all this work. Thank you all who chimed in with tips and advice. Aside from maybe needing to fiddle with the choke cable adjustment at the carbs, I think I can call this a successful job. Thank you all!

[Rich82GS750TZ]

Thank you both. That gives me some good guidance.

[pdqford]

What Glen said ^^^

If I found the correct wiring diagram on bwinger’s site (and it is in color!), there is a white wire from each brake light switch that are spliced together in the harness. From that splice a single white wire runs through a 3(?) wire connector and on to the brake side of the tail/brake light.

Break out your DVOM, put it in ohm mode, and remove the brake lamp from its socket. With the brake switches off, place one of the meter probes on the white wire contact in the brake socket and the other meter probe to a good ground.

If the meter reads OL or infinity, the white wire is not shorted to ground.
In that case the bulb and/or socket might be shorted to ground.

If your meter shows some resistance, the white wire is grounded.
Move back up the white wire and repeat until you find where the white wire is shorted to ground.

You could also disconnect the white wire from the switches.
Then activate each switch. If the fuse blows, the switch is suspect.

[dorkburger]

If the fuse blows only after activating a switch I'm thinking the glitch is after either switch. A quick and easy check might be to pull out the taillight bulb and check for continuity to ground. Not sure of your exact setup, but I'm thinking two contacts (running and brake) and the socket is grounded. If the brake contact shows continuity to ground start tracing the wire backwards. Checking the switches is a good idea, but it would be surprising if both failed at the same time.

[Baatfam]

Sounds like wire between the brake light switches and the taillight bulb is grounded. Should be easy to check.

[Rich82GS750TZ]

So, started in on the Fuse Blowing situation last evening.
The Signal Circuit 10A fuse blows whenever I activate the front brake or the rear brake.

There is a new good tail/brake lite bulb in a very clean bulb socket.

I've un-taped and cleaned all bullet connectors to the rear of the bike that live in a bundle behind the battery box. Found nothing suspect there. Cleaned everything anyway. No obvious kinks or breaks/rub-throughs that I could visually see.

I've gone through a pack of fuses. Have to get more.

Throughout the tear-down/rebuild of the top end, I disturbed none of the wiring in this circuit, not on-purpose, anyway.
I suppose I'll try cleaning the front and rear brake lite switches, pull the headlamp out and clean connections there, look for breaks.

Will attempt to meter/continuity check the switches..

This circuit controls some instrument panel lights, turn signals, horn, and brake light. All other items work until I activate either brake light switch.

Is there something obvious (to someone smarter than me) that I should be looking at as the cause of the fuse blowing?

[dorkburger]

Nice work Rich. Congratulations.

[Rich82GS750TZ]

I'll get the one from amazon. Thanks Eli.

[Eli69]

I've got a few of those old flashers. I could send you one. But the electronic ones for LEDS work fine too.

[Rich82GS750TZ]

Thanks, Bandit. The mechanical stuff is sorta like following Lego directions. Just have to get to it. The electrical stuff I’m not great at diagnosing. I took the seat and airbox off today, didn’t see anything obvious in the wiring around the battery. Burned a couple more 10A fuses on the Signal circuit. I didn’t feel like unwrapping wiring today. May start in on it tomorrow evening, or wait until Friday, have another day off work.



I did pill the signal relay. I don’t know if a bad relay could cause the fuse to blow. It’s cruddy inside, ran out of electronic cleaner spray. My thought is to just replace it. It is original.

Question for the hive mind. Can I replace with pretty much any 2-pin signal relay. Everything I see on Amazon is for LED. Is that ok to use without LED signals? Example:

https://www.amazon.com/Electronic-Flasher-Motorcycle-Adjustable-Indicator/dp/B0BR1D6SRJ/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2JESI2F02DEDC&keywords=Electronic+Led+Flasher+Relay+2+Pin+Motorcycle+Turn+Signal+Rate+Control+Blink+Relais+Speed+Adjustable+LED+Indicator+Light+Relay+for+Motorcycle+Signal+Light+%2812V%29&qid=1701660532&sprefix=electronic+led+flasher+relay+2+pin+motorcycle+turn+signal+rate+control+blink+relais+speed+adjustable+led+indicator+light+relay+for+motorcycle+signal+light+12v+%2Caps%2C342&sr=8-1