Removing 78E front brake light switch? Thanks Ken

[buggrin]

Looks so simple. Press in the two little snap-in tabs and pull it out, right? How do you do that? I have pushed, cussed, and pushed some more, but can't get the bottom tab to push in far enough to disengage from the slot. The top tab will disengage with some effort, but the bottom one has me buggered.

Anybody have a trick up their sleeve???

BTW, rebuilt rear MC and caliper and put on Speigler lines. Thanks to Ken and the others who contributed the excellent tech tips. Fairly straight forward after removing the wheel & shocks., but I forgot how the two line holders were configured. Took me an hour to figger it out. Seems like I never remember how stuff came apart.

If I can just get the damswitch out I'll finish the brake job.

[buggrin]

Brake switch -- Almost forgot to say

Hate to admit it, but this was the first time the rear brake has had ANYTHING done to it since the bike was new. Not even adding fluid has been required. The MC and caliper were a mess as you can imagine, but this is amazing to me. Talk about bullet proof design. 25 years and 60K miles!! Quite a testament to this outstanding machine.

[wildbill]

Hope I`am not to late,if you are not real careful you will break one or both tabs.Then will have to go buy new one.Those things have lockjaw real bad,then it slides straight out.Be careful,might need to lightly spray with WD40 or something like that.I broke mine when I tried to remove it.Had to replace front master cylinder anyway so used brake light switch off of it.Good luck

[MartyA]

This summer I also cursed and pulled and twisted and cursed some more. I finally just gave up.
Thanks wildbill.

[strom]

Not enough.... curse some more...
Here is a useful link that should help you somewhat.
My (new) one slid out OK... but I lubricated it a bit when I put it in... had a home made one before, got new from yammie dealer.

LP

PS: My switch seat was pretty rusty/cruddy.

[buggrin]

New box of tools

With a supply of this magnitude success is surely to follow

[buggrin]

Finally got it apart -- now what

After using most of the tools you recommeded the dam thing finally came apart. Found out that prying the outer shell instead of pushing in on the tabs was the trick. Also found after taking the MC off that it would have been a lot easier to get the switch apart by taking it completely out of the aluminum housing instead of taking the two plastic parts apart.

HOWEVER, a whole bunch of little bits came out when the assembly came apart. Is there an exploded view that shows how they all go back together????

[wildbill]

I don`t know if I can help you there but the switch has a button that sticks out with a little spring holding it out.Note: if you see these parts that means that the switch is more than likely broke.To make this work the switch button will be out for the brake light to come on and pushed in for the light to go off.Works simlar to a brake light switch in a old Ford truck if it is out the light is on if it is in the light is off.Hope this helps I`am starting to myself.Good luck

[buggrin]

back together

got the switch reassembled so it works. There's a cylindrical brass bit that rides back an forth between two contacts. It's not all that complicated and if anybody has front brake light problems troubleshooting the switch for corrosion would be relatively easy and a probable cause. Just be careful that when you take the two plastic parts of the switch apart that you are careful to corral a spring, rod, brass cylinder, and two little plastic bits that hold the brass part. I can tell you they're not easy to find once they hit the floor............

[wildbill]

Glad it worked out for you.They are a bit of a pain,just remember how to keep it from coming apart next time.When I took mine off the master cylinder was beyond repair so I used the one off the different one I put on.Could not use the old one on my bike{broke the plastic to bad}so I spliced the wires to make the new switch work.Take care