Vintage Dirt Bike Q & A

Hi,

I have read some of the electrical problems various memebers are having with their bike projects. In working on my two bikes plus a parts bike I found very low quality wiring and connections, which would be highly prone to corrosion if wet or not maintained.

I have a lot of experience in electronics, to include rigging ocean boats with radar, autopilot, gps and most all other things a boat might need electronically.

I had a boat restoration business and got to work on some of the most rusty and corroded electronics in the world since salt water boats face the toughest mother nature can dish to electrical systems.

The biggest problem I found on these bikes are the open plastic sheath connections with brass connectors and wire. These plastic sheaths are worthless as, they tend to "hold in" water better than they keep it out. Thus they are perfect for starting and maintaining corrosion. Go to Home Depot or Lowes and look for water resistant connectors or pay a fortune from West Marine. These connectors and wire are "tinned" or an alloy composition which resist corrosion much better than stardard brass wire. You can get male and female connectors of this same metal which feed into your factory harness connectors.

Go through your bike and clean all connections with a corrosion removal cleaner like battery terminal cleaner from Napa or whatever and then add a "dialectic" grease which you find at most autoparts stores.

Cleaning your connections is as important as keeping your carb jets or fuel lines clean. Electricity flows much like liquid and if anything blocks or impairs it's path it creates "resistance" which lowers your "current" or the volume of your 6 volt flow. You will still read 6 volts on your meter, but you are not getting enough to your bulb or component to let it run correctly. Current is many times overlooked and voltage is generally thought to be all that matters. I could write a small book on that one. Wire gauge, length of cable run all must be correct to prevent a fire or electrical failure. Never replace wires with a different size or "gauge" of wire unless you know what you are doing.

I will later get into how you can replace much of your lighting system with energy efficient LED "light emitting diodes".

Got to go work on one of my bikes.

Take Care!

I agree, having dealt with enough green corrosion electrical mold in boats!!!

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