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To take the front engine cover off I disconnected the negative battery cable at the transmission.
Some time later I realized that my auxiliary ground wire from the diode board was still connected to the battery.
YIKES! Luckily I am carefull when removing that cover so nothing happened.
Now I disconnect all grounds from the battery.

That's why I run all both my grounds to the same place.

In my shop we almost never disconnected the ground. That is because we knew how to do it without shorting out the hot lead. For most people, it is far safer to remove the ground wire. Do it carefully, or you will have other problems.

That's a useful warning. For my bikes, I've made new ground wires and on most of them, Rob Frankham style grounding looms. On my Cafe Racer, there isn't even a ground wire going to the trans bolt. It goes to one of the top bolts that holds the trans to the engine.

Chuey

Good tip Doug, and also a good point to disconnect at the battery due to the likelihood of eventually damaging the thread at the other end of the ground wire in the transmission casing.

ME 109 wrote:Good tip Doug, and also a good point to disconnect at the battery due to the likelihood of eventually damaging the thread at the other end of the ground wire in the transmission casing.

You're right.
My spare gearbox has threads that are "iffy".