Boxerworks.com

Something must be wrong with my ('71 R75/5) bike too. The flashers will blind you and flash only slightly slower (if any slower at all) at idle than with the engine off. The charging system, although I have added some extra grounds and as well did a full connection cleaning and re-grease where appropriate, is over adequate; unless you want to use a carbon-arc spotlight as an accessory or jump start a car battery.

Am I alone on this one? Everyone keeps talking about blowing money on all things electrical and all I could ever dream of might be the headlight system.

Doug, you are back to "new" with the system and it works. Imagine that? I too keep reading about upgrading to some other systems and in some cases it may be the thing to do.

The original system was quite good, so if your current requirements are within the specs, then just fix what you have as Doug did.

Thanks Duane, I'm glad your take is the same as mine. To say nothing of others that might "really need" more; I think much is done by replacing this and that simply to overcome resistance that could be removed with some labor and a bit better grounding that costs virtually the same, mostly time...

I might add, (even if it is not read) the following about extra grounding on these bikes.

It has been at least three or four years since I went through all the wiring and made the additional ground wires and such for the bike. From memory, since I didn't want to pull the bike apart to be 100% certain how I attached it all, I think these are the additions I decided on.

1) Wire from under rectifier board and secondary wire under cover
2) This wire (which BTW was in the 10 gauge stranded range EMT wire IIRC) was hard soldered in parallel into the wire I added that extended from the batter negative cable to a fastener under the tank on one of the coils; naturally I cleaned the pain and such off under this connector.

These things worked well for me. Perhaps they were unneeded, perhaps they were quite helpful. One thing is certain, while there are many ways to improve the grounding on a 40 year old bike, there is one simple thing I feel I overlooked when doing the deed. I am lazy; henceforth, it seems "SO EASY" when wanting to service something to just pull that simple speedo/ground cable bolt out and insulate it from making contact with the bike. Well, with an extra ground wire attached, you have to fiddle with the battery connections every time you work on the bike (to do so safely.) So, might I recommend to anyone if they go a similar route, to perhaps look into an industrial disconnect on your aux. grounding system? It surely would make for easier servicing, at least how I chose to connect things and would avoid the temptations I sometimes get to not disconnect the ground at all because of the 10 minute off and 10 minutes on, fiddling with the battery connections that at least on my bike are simply not easily dealt with.

Food for thought. I'll be doing this modification this spring (that means right now...) as it will be simple, fast and will no longer be an excuse for attempting that hurried front cover removal with the batter still connected - A BIG NO-NO!