Electrical/wiring issue!

[kristo.thaler@gmail.com]

Hello everyone,
My right turn signal has not functioned in the least since I bought my xj11. Well, I got to replacing the fuse casing which was too small to fit the 20 amp fuses which all the other lighting/signals use. When I turned it on, the bike started smoking. What could be the cause and the remedy for such a problem?

[kristo.thaler@gmail.com]

For clarification, the wiring which lead to the replaced fuse housing is what heated and melted the casing. The whole fuse housing unit also melted.

[CatatonicBug]

Sounds like you have/had a short in your wiring. Very glad you were able to catch it before the whole bike went up in flames!! When you say the fuse box was too small for the 20A fuses, what do you mean? The fuses are all the same size, with different filaments in them. Did you upgrade to the blade style fuses, or stick with the old, unreliable glass tubes?

Be sure the wires don't have nicks in the insulation. If a wire can contact the frame or another wire, that would definitely case the kind of short you are talking about. Also be sure that the crimps on the wire ends are solid, so there is as little resistance created there as possible.

[motoman]

+1!......you either got bad connections/wrong connections, or both.

[kristo.thaler@gmail.com]

Well, I fixed the connections and they are no longer lighting on fire! But they didn't fix the problems I was hoping to fix... My headlight now no longer works, nor my taillight. Other lights started working that hadn't before, though! Thanks for the help guys

[skids]

You could run the headlight with a handlebar off-on switch, that is hooked to the low amp side of a relay solenoid switch, which the high amp side is wired to the a hot wire including a fuse. This gives you the option of turning off the headlight when not needed. You lose the stock headlight relay where it switches filaments if one burns out, but that doesn't bother me...