High beam switch

[darrsi]

Last few days i've had an annoying issue of my high beam display light flashing on/off at random intervals.
The left switch is never touched and stays in the low beam position.


Today i cleaned inside left and right switches with Isopropyl Alcohol spray then again with a lube contact cleaner spray, around lunchtime.
After work i turned ignition on and the high beam display stayed on this time.


Ever since i've had this bike, about 8yrs, whenever i've used high beam for a little while it literally kills my battery! Never known why but as i don't really use it it's not been an issue since, but yesterday morning the new battery barely had any power in it so had to get a jump start, due to the high beam going on and off.
So just using my new spotlights i went to work and the battery was all good again by the time i'd got there and has been since.


Firstly, anyone got any ideas why high beam would kill my battery? Even after a motorway run, if high beam was on, i'd switch off then the battery would be dead.
But a bump start would revive it, then once the high beam was switched off and i ran the bike for another 10-15mins it would all be okay again, and start fine on the button.


Secondly, i'm gonna take a chance with a used left switch housing, but just noticed after paying that it has no choke lever.
Is this just a simple swap over from my old one, or is it not that straightforward?

[Bretty]

I changed my left cluster after my indicator switch snapped off. I easily transferred  the  choke lever from my old one to the new one. As you undo the housing it literally falls out. It just floats captive between the housing and the bar.
No idea why high beam kills your battery, what bulb have you got in there?

[Bretty]

You've confused me a bit. High Beam 'switch' is on the right. High beam flash 'trigger' is on the left.

[darrsi]

You've confused me a bit. High Beam 'switch' is on the right. High beam flash 'trigger' is on the left.

RIGHT SWITCH:

right = lights off
middle = the small bulb in the front right side of light housing on (sitting on bike)
left = both main lights on - H1 on & H4 low beam on (mod done)


LEFT SWITCH:

down = low beam
up = high beam on H4

Also, in down position the pass button lights up the upper H4,
plus my switch has a hazard lights button on as well.




RIGHT

[darrsi]

LEFT

[darrsi]

I changed my left cluster after my indicator switch snapped off. I easily transferred  the  choke lever from my old one to the new one. As you undo the housing it literally falls out. It just floats captive between the housing and the bar.
No idea why high beam kills your battery, what bulb have you got in there?

I've tried different lamps over the years to try and better the poor lighting, but right now i'm using Phillips Xtreme.
Can't be a bulb thing 'cos they've always been the right spec for the bike, and it's not like the bulbs have been blowing at all.


Last two days on the way home in the dark i've turned on that little light bulb, in the middle position on the right switch, with the main bulbs off, just so that i appear to have some sort of headlight on, but the new spotlights are fortunately about 5 times brighter than the headlights anyway and light up the road for me so at least i can rely on them until it's sorted out.

[bludclot]

I guess that you have a short somewhere in the high beam circuit, it's causing more current to pass through the fault than the bike can supply, hence the battery is being used to make up the shortfall. (No pun intended.)  If changing your switch assembly doesn't fix it (It stands a good chance judging from your first post fault description) then it's a case of tracing the high beam circuit back to source to find the fault(s).

[crickleymal]

Wot Bludclot said.

So on high beam you have both lights on and just one on low beam or both on low? Can you measure the current being drawn from the battery with the engine off? It should be about 5 amps per bulb,so I would expect 10A with both bulbs on. Obviously you're going to have more than this but if it's close to a multiple of 5A then your headlight might not be turning off the low beam when you switch to high. If the new switch doesn't cure it (and I'd try to measure the current before and after the switch change) then you're going to have to trace it through.

[BBROWN1664]

Sounds like a chaffed wire somewhere.

[tommyardin]

Sounds like a chaffed wire somewhere.

You would think if it was a leak to ground/Earth it would pop the lighting fuse.

[Fazerider]

I agree that a switchgear or wiring problem must be causing the mysterious issue with main beam coming on of its own accord, hopefully changing the l/h cluster will sort that.
Even if there was a short in the switchgear that meant the high beam was on without you noticing, the alternator ought to cope OK even with the spots and heated grips. A short to ground should blow a fuse.
Are you sure you've not been sold 100W bulbs? If that's not the cause then I'd guess the alternator or reg/rectifier are faulty and not supplying enough current. If the battery's been killed a couple of times it may not be as healthy as it should be… these modern high CCA ones are a bit less robust in that respect.

[darrsi]

I agree that a switchgear or wiring problem must be causing the mysterious issue with main beam coming on of its own accord, hopefully changing the l/h cluster will sort that.
Even if there was a short in the switchgear that meant the high beam was on without you noticing, the alternator ought to cope OK even with the spots and heated grips. A short to ground should blow a fuse.
Are you sure you've not been sold 100W bulbs? If that's not the cause then I'd guess the alternator or reg/rectifier are faulty and not supplying enough current. If the battery's been killed a couple of times it may not be as healthy as it should be… these modern high CCA ones are a bit less robust in that respect.

No, as said the high beam issue has been there for years, but as i'll only occasionally flash the pass light it's never really been much of a big deal.
Bulbs have always been 55w.


The fact the high beam light stayed on constantly for a short while after using contact cleaner on it would suggest that i've hit the spot, i just hope i've chosen the correct side for the switch.

[darrsi]

Wot Bludclot said.

So on high beam you have both lights on and just one on low beam or both on low? Can you measure the current being drawn from the battery with the engine off? It should be about 5 amps per bulb,so I would expect 10A with both bulbs on. Obviously you're going to have more than this but if it's close to a multiple of 5A then your headlight might not be turning off the low beam when you switch to high. If the new switch doesn't cure it (and I'd try to measure the current before and after the switch change) then you're going to have to trace it through.

When the r/hand side is switched fully to the left my H1 single filament bulb would be on (as standard), but as i've had the mod done the lower filament of the H4 would be on too.


When reversing the bike down my alleyway between two houses i could see the upper/high beam light flashing on, along with the high beam dash display light, anything between a split second or a few seconds, then it'll go off again.

[BBROWN1664]

Check the mod. Specifically, check to see if you have any arcing happening between the original connector spade on the back of the RHS bulb and the additional connector the mod added.

[darrsi]

Check the mod. Specifically, check to see if you have any arcing happening between the original connector spade on the back of the RHS bulb and the additional connector the mod added.

Yeah, i was wondering if i should maybe even replace the mod wiring.
An electronics engineer done the mod for me years ago at work, but i was called away to do a job if i remember correctly so never actually saw what he did, i need to look into it more.
Me and electrics though......not good.
I plug things in all day at work, but wiring and being slightly colour blind has never really been a great combination for me. 

[crickleymal]

When reversing the bike down my alleyway between two houses i could see the upper/high beam light flashing on, along with the high beam dash display light, anything between a split second or a few seconds, then it'll go off again.

Was the lower filament in the bulb going off? Mind you as someone else said, the alternator should be able to cope with that.

[BBROWN1664]

the bulb could be failing and shorting internally as you go over bumps causing the high beam filament to illuminate.

[darrsi]

the bulb could be failing and shorting internally as you go over bumps causing the high beam filament to illuminate.

The H4 bulb is only a few months old, I changed it late summer, so I would hope it wasn't that, i'll bear it in mind though.
I don't think the lower filament was going off, but to be honest it's difficult to tell with the spotlights on at the same time.
I did buy a pair of bulbs so I do have one to hand if the switch doesn't work though.

I'm still clinging on to the fact that as the high beam display light stayed on for a while after spraying the switch housings I'm hoping that it's the left switch that's iffy.
I just spoke to my electronics engineer at work and he thinks the left side as well, as that is what controls the low/high beam, whereas the right switch unit turns it all off without any problems.

[Bretty]

Sorry Darrsi - I'm an idiot.
heavily medicated at the moment with pneumonia. Ofcourse there's a high switch on the left, I was looking at the wiring diagram in the Haynes manual and manage to confuse myself. Good luck sorting it.

[darrsi]

Sorry Darrsi - I'm an idiot.
heavily medicated at the moment with pneumonia. Ofcourse there's a high switch on the left, I was looking at the wiring diagram in the Haynes manual and manage to confuse myself. Good luck sorting it.

No worries matey, get well soon. 

[darrsi]

Sounds like a chaffed wire somewhere.

So, after changing the left switch housing the problem still remained, but after a bit of jiggery pokery you were right, there was what looks like a chafed cable but i'm not exactly sure why because there was nothing actually near it to damage it.
It was one of the cables going into the headlight plug. That's now been soldered and heat shrinked so that's one issue out of the way.


After mentioning to my mate about the battery going flat if i ever use the headlight he did a quick check on the electrical circuit.


The volts were fine with the engine running, showing around the 14.5v mark.


But when he checked the amps it wasn't so good.
With all gadgets and lights off it was reading 6amps @ 5000rpm.
Problem is the manual says it should be 18 amps @ 5000rpm.
Then as you can imagine once i started turning lights on it just kept dropping.  In fact i should've tried it with the heated grips on as well.
With all lights on, including high beam, it went down to a reading as low as 1.5 amps.


So obviously something ain't right, but does anyone know exactly what the problem is?
I just don't do electrics, but first thoughts is an alternator issue perhaps?

[Graham53]

Could it be the battery , dead cell would give good volts but low amps ??

[darrsi]

Could it be the battery , dead cell would give good volts but low amps ??

Only a few months old.

[unfazed]

The volts were fine with the engine running, showing around the 14.5v mark. 14v to 14.8v would be acceptable with 14.4 being absolutely correct

With all gadgets and lights off it was reading 6amps @ 5000rpm. Most likely because was the battery was partial charged and the regulator was doing its job.

Problem is the manual says it should be 18 amps @ 5000rpm This is the max rating and would not normally be seen under normal operation

Then as you can imagine once i started turning lights on it just kept dropping.  In fact i should've tried it with the heated grips on as well.
With all lights on, including high beam, it went down to a reading as low as 1.5 amps.
Sounds more like a dodgy regulator when under load.

The regulator is the first thing I would change based on the above.

You can test the Generator by checking the AC voltage output of the Generator at the connector between the regulator and Generator.
This should rise from around 20 VAC to 90V plus as the engine revs rise. you will need to perform the test 3 times on the white generator wires across 2 of each of the 3 wires in turn to check all 3 coils of the Generator.

The headlight mod was to bring on the unused dim of the H4 bulb and should have a wire from the H4 bulb coming from the electrical box under the tank and joined to a green wire which comes from the Hi/lo switch. Many were done incorrectly and the H4 dim Stayed on when the H4 Main beam was switched on. This caused poor charging and eventually would burn out the Hi/Lo beam switch or the right side lights on switch.

[darrsi]

The volts were fine with the engine running, showing around the 14.5v mark. 14v to 14.8v would be acceptable with 14.4 being absolutely correct

With all gadgets and lights off it was reading 6amps @ 5000rpm. Most likely because was the battery was partial charged and the regulator was doing its job.

Problem is the manual says it should be 18 amps @ 5000rpm This is the max rating and would not normally be seen under normal operation

Then as you can imagine once i started turning lights on it just kept dropping.  In fact i should've tried it with the heated grips on as well.
With all lights on, including high beam, it went down to a reading as low as 1.5 amps.
Sounds more like a dodgy regulator when under load.

The regulator is the first thing I would change based on the above.

You can test the Generator by checking the AC voltage output of the Generator at the connector between the regulator and Generator.
This should rise from around 20 VAC to 90V plus as the engine revs rise. you will need to perform the test 3 times on the white generator wires across 2 of each of the 3 wires in turn to check all 3 coils of the Generator.

The headlight mod was to bring on the unused dim of the H4 bulb and should have a wire from the H4 bulb coming from the electrical box under the tank and joined to a green wire which comes from the Hi/lo switch. Many were done incorrectly and the H4 dim Stayed on when the H4 Main beam was switched on. This caused poor charging and eventually would burn out the Hi/Lo beam switch or the right side lights on switch.

The regulator was changed for a brand new one a few months back, along with the battery.