Rebuild 78E

[tcoop]

Working on getting the 78E back on the road. The engine is from a parts bike (79SF) good compression 150 across all four. Bike will start when I jump the terminals on the solenoid. (I do need to get some mufflers straight pipes are too loud )

I am using XJ1100 right hand controls and the start button is not working (it did work on the XJ) Could the problem with this be that the XJ has a ground wire coming from the control were the XS is grounded through the handle bars?

The other issue is the headlight does not come on. I'm still tracking this one down. Could be anything from fuse, burned out bulb, lighting module under the tank to just bad wiring. The PO took out the original fuse box and put in line blade type fuses. This all worked for two years until I put a hole in the #3 piston, and sitting for the last year I have used parts to keep/get other bikes up and running now I'm kicking my self for it.

[donebysunday]

Once it's running are you getting charge ?
Take a very brite flashlight and double check that the wire colors and the stripe on them match up with what you plugged in.
Check that since you changed the right switch gear and it worked before the change.

[tcoop]

The right hand controls were missing from the bike (used to fix another bike to sell). The headlight that came on the bike was also used on another bike. so the headlight/bucket and the right controls have been just added. Not sure if the headlight bulb works but I do have spares to test.

You are correct that I do need to trace the wire colors in the connector to make sure they are in the correct spot (going to the same color).

The charging system is working. It is just going to take time to trace it down. I just don't want to miss something obvious. I need to take the headlight off to make sure I connected everything.

[crazy steve]

The XJ start switch is different from the XS unit, so make sure you have it wired right. Yes, the XJ used a ground wire off one side of the switch to complete the starting circuit, that needs to be connected to ground. But there's also two more wires, a set of normally closed contacts used to disconnect the headlight when the start button is pushed. The XJ uses this instead of the XS's headlight relay.

The XJ switch is a sturdier design, but suffers from the same internal corrosion issues as the XS bits, so a disassembly and cleaning may be needed...

[tcoop]

So if I make sure the wire colors match in the plug and make sure the ground wire gets grounded it should work?

I took the plug apart last night to clean it and found that the PO had bypassed the kill switch so I need to fix that. I also noticed the extra two wires but didn't know what they were for. With your description I should be able to make this work thanks Steve.

[crazy steve]

Off the top of my head I can't recall if the wire colors match or not; I think they do, but you better check....

With your '78 harness, you should be able to connect the two wires that originally went the 'headlight on/off' switch on the '78 control to the XJ start switch 'extra' wires and eliminate the headlight relay.

[tcoop]

Got the wiring all straightened out. had to swap position of the for wires that were connected to the start button. For the head light...the fuse was out. Missing, completely gone. I'm glad I started checking the little things.