Almost no electrical power.

[Nexus]

So, while reconnecting my battery of my 2009 ST-1300 ABS, I had a spark jump. I guess it was a short. Now, when I turn on the ignition, all I get is the right front headlight (hi/low works), brake light continuously on, and the front turn signals continously on (not flashing). The rear signals come on (left, right, hazard) but do not flash. Everything else is dead (dash, horn). The starter button cuts out the headlight, but doesn't engage the starter.

I've checked all the fuses and they all appear good.

Anybody have any ideas/recommendations?

 

[heffly]

Battery voltage?

 

[Larry Fine]

Methinks it's the infamous multiple ground wire connector.

 

[Nexus]

Battery voltage?

I forgot to check, but the battery had been connected to a battery maintainer prior, so it should have been producing full voltage. The lights appear to be fully bright which also leads me to believe that the battery is producing enough voltage.

 

[Nexus]

Methinks it's the infamous multiple ground wire connector.

I'm not quite following you. Could you elaborate further?

 

[dduelin]

There are two wiring connectors that when corroded and/or heat damaged can produce similar strange electrical system anomalies. Both have green wires indicating negative or ground wires. One is yellow and located above the right hand headlight. This one connects a number of devices in the front of the bike to a ground circuit. The other one is white and has 24 pins (wires) passing through it. It is located on the outside of the frame just above the left hand cylinder head valve cover. If the ground circuits encounter high resistance the electrical current finds its way to ground through alternative paths thus causing strange behavior from lights and devices. The ST1300 has some history with grounding issues and many threads can be found by a Google search that includes ‘ST-Owners forum green ground wire’.

I’d give you some relevant links but I’m traveling with a mobile device at present. These three were pretty easy to find and should get you going:

2003 ST1300 lighting circuit wiring diagrams | ST1300 Related

Winston66, from Western Australia, My 2003 1300 has developed some problem with its lighting circuits. Headlights and dash lights will not work. Ie lights , (Both , the headlights and the full dash display)will only operate when manually switched and held on by pressing the manual...

www.st-owners.com

2009 ST1300 cranks but no ignition | ST1300 Related

I had two Honda dealers, in contact with Honda, each spend 2 weeks with my bike in Omaha where the failure occured. One thing I am not clear on is whether the plugs fire from the alternator output OR the battery. It was suggested that some bike, boat, and of course airplane motors don't use the...

www.st-owners.com

Lost electrical power | ST1300 Related

While I sit and wait to be towed home, I thought I'd ask what are the likely causes. Riding to work I lost electrical power, no warning. She started right up, the battery is 2 years old, no accessories hooked up.

www.st-owners.com

 

[Larry Fine]

When items that are normally off are on, that usually means a poor ground, not a blown fuse.

Example: the parking lights making turn signals glow, because the shared ground is bad.

 

[Nexus]

There are two wiring connectors that when corroded and/or heat damaged can produce similar strange electrical system anomalies. Both have green wires indicating negative or ground wires. One is yellow and located above the right hand headlight. This one connects a number of devices in the front of the bike to a ground circuit. The other one is white and has 24 pins (wires) passing through it. It is located on the outside of the frame just above the left hand cylinder head valve cover. If the ground circuits encounter high resistance the electrical current finds its way to ground through alternative paths thus causing strange behavior from lights and devices. The ST1300 has some history with grounding issues and many threads can be found by a Google search that includes ‘ST-Owners forum green ground wire’.

I’d give you some relevant links but I’m traveling with a mobile device at present. These three were pretty easy to find and should get you going:

2003 ST1300 lighting circuit wiring diagrams | ST1300 Related

Winston66, from Western Australia, My 2003 1300 has developed some problem with its lighting circuits. Headlights and dash lights will not work. Ie lights , (Both , the headlights and the full dash display)will only operate when manually switched and held on by pressing the manual...

www.st-owners.com

2009 ST1300 cranks but no ignition | ST1300 Related

I had two Honda dealers, in contact with Honda, each spend 2 weeks with my bike in Omaha where the failure occured. One thing I am not clear on is whether the plugs fire from the alternator output OR the battery. It was suggested that some bike, boat, and of course airplane motors don't use the...

www.st-owners.com

Lost electrical power | ST1300 Related

While I sit and wait to be towed home, I thought I'd ask what are the likely causes. Riding to work I lost electrical power, no warning. She started right up, the battery is 2 years old, no accessories hooked up.

www.st-owners.com

Thanks! I'm traveling right now and won't be home until the weekend, but I'll read the stuff you mentioned and have a look at it on Saturday.

 

[Nexus]

Its not uncommon to get a spark jump when connecting the battery - if the ignition is turned on when you connect it (particularly our european bikes where main lights are always on. That is a heck of a lot of power to suddenly connect. Otherwise, one of the circuits is likely to have a shorted to earth. Quite probably, one of the circuits has fused.

The bike was off when this occurred. The spark happened as soon as I first connected the battery but then no longer happened when I tried to reconnect it again.

It would be really useful (for you and for us) if you can tell us which fuse has blown (if any). There are 3 places to look:-

The forward fuse block behind the left hand side panel.
The rearward fuse block almost next to it behind the left hand side panel
(one of these has a fuse which is sideways to the rest - don't forget to check that one).
The single fuse on the starter relay - which is mounted to the rear of the battery behind the right hand side panel.

So I looked into the first two fuse holders, including the sideways one. All fuses appeared normal. I didn't realize there was one by the battery so I'll check that on the weekend.

If you have had things turned on while trying to check out what is going wrong, your battery could have got too low within about 10 minutes. After that all sorts of funny things begin happen as different relays don't energise as they should.

I don't think I even had it on that long. I was a bit hesitant, not knowing what was going on. The above problem happened instantly, and never changed.

Thanks for your insight! I'm gonna check that out on the weekend.

 

[Nexus]

When items that are normally off are on, that usually means a poor ground, not a blown fuse.

Example: the parking lights making turn signals glow, because the shared ground is bad.

Thanks! It just felt like a fuse since I got the spark at first, then it didn't happen. I guessed it could be a faulty ground that cause something to blow.

 

[Larry Fine]

Electrical loads work when there is a voltage difference between its terminals. The hot terminal depends on receiving full voltage through wires, fuses, and/or switches that provide a pathway with little resistance in it, and likewise, the ground terminal depends on having a low-resistance pathway to the battery - through wires and/or the engine and frame of the bike, just like a car.

When a wire that should be grounded (at 0v) burns open, the no-longer-grounded side becomes +12v through other loads that should be on (and still have +12v on the hot terminal and thus stop working). Instead, that +12v flows into the no-longer-grounded terminal of other loads, and turns them on when they should be off, because the hot terminal does not yet have +12v on it.

The voltage between the battery's + terminal and the load's + terminal should theoretically be zero, but wire and connections do have a little resistance, and the current through that resistance creates voltage drop. The same applies to the load's - terminal and the battery - terminal. There should be almost no voltage between battery + and load +, or battery - and load -.

A troubleshooting method involves checking for voltage between points where there shouldn't be any, like from the line (source) terminal to the load terminal of a switch, fuse, or breaker. Almost all of s circuit's voltage should be across the load's terminals (as long as the load's switch is on). You'll measure full voltage across an open switch, a blown fuse, or a tripped or bad breaker.

 

[Nexus]

So I checked the third fuse that @jfheath suggested (the one on the battery):


I didn't realize it was a fuse, since it was so large and thin, although the words "fuse" and "fusible" should have been a giveaway! In my defense, I had to pull it out to even read what is said.

When I pulled back the cover, this is what I found:


So I'm guessing that this is probably causing the strange grounding issues that @Larry Fine mentioned.

I found this thread to, at least, get a replacement:

Honda part # for main fuse? | ST1300 Related

I am putting together a road trip spares kit. Spare fuses are part of it. The owners manual shows a main fusible link that looks like a strip of aluminum. I recall (no manual here at this computer) that it is 65 amp. I can't find that fuse in the Honda micro fiche to get the part number to order...

www.st-owners.com

Which would fix the symptom but not the problem.

My question now is: While I'm troubleshooting this issue, could I temporarily use an ordinary fuse so I don't keep blowing this genuine Honda part? Say somthing like this?

 

[Nexus]

A troubleshooting method involves checking for voltage between points where there shouldn't be any, like from the line (source) terminal to the load terminal of a switch, fuse, or breaker. Almost all of s circuit's voltage should be across the load's terminals (as long as the load's switch is on). You'll measure full voltage across an open switch, a blown fuse, or a tripped or bad breaker.

Sounds like my weekend's been planned!

 

[Andrew Shadow]

My question now is: While I'm troubleshooting this issue, could I temporarily use an ordinary fuse so I don't keep blowing this genuine Honda part? Say somthing like this?

You could but if whatever failure that caused the fuse to blow is still present the fuse will immediately blow again. Unless the short is somewhere apparent and easy to find you might want to safely have the circuit powered while you are trying to locate the cause of the short.

If you do need to power the circuit to find the short do a search on that same page that you linked to using the key words short finder. This is basically a circuit breaker that also has a meter to help locate the short. You can find them cheaper than what is listed there.

I don't think that the meter will be very effective when used on a motorcycle so you might want to just buy a 12V circuit breaker for a few bucks- search circuit breaker. You can attach it across the fuse terminals with some jumper wires so that you can disconnect it easily at any time. You can use it to temporarily and safely power the circuit while you attempt to locate the source of the short. Auto-reset circuit breakers are available as well and are a little more convenient as you don't have keep manually resetting them while you are trying to find the short. When they stop tripping and resetting you have eliminated the short. Using a 20 or 30A breaker is well below the circuit design limit of 65A so there should be no danger of damaging any wiring.

One thing that I am not sure about however, is if a regular circuit breaker is capable of handling repeatedly tripping and resetting for a significant amount of time until you find the short in the way the circuit breaker that is in the short circuit finder kit is capable of doing. I have never used a regular circuit breaker for this purpose as I have a short finder.

Good luck!

 

[Larry Fine]

So I'm guessing that this is probably causing the strange grounding issues that @Larry Fine mentioned.

Shouldn't be, as grounds aren't fused.

My question now is: While I'm troubleshooting this issue, could I temporarily use an ordinary fuse so I don't keep blowing this genuine Honda part? Say somthing like this?

A much better troubleshooting trick is to temporarily replace a fuse with a high-power load, like both beams of a headlight bulb wired in parallel. This allows current to flow so you can find an intermittent short without blowing a fuse while you look, while the relative brightness indicates how much of a direct short there is.

 

[Nexus]

The one I meant was the 30A fuse to the left of the large blown fuse.

Ok, one more fuse to check.

Why did you have the battery disconnected. What were you doing ? That might give a clue as to where the short might be.

I disconnected the battery in order to put it on a battery tender. I'm storing the bike in a storage "container" so I have to take the battery off and bring it home.

I've ordered the 65A fuse and am waiting for it to arrive before I go back to the bike.

 

[Nexus]

The one I meant was the 30A fuse to the left of the large blown fuse. Sorry, i dont have a photo immediately available, but it looks something like this one - pinched from a google search.

I checked that one, and it was good too.

nb I think that there is a spare 65A fuse clipped vertically on the fuse holder or on the cover. Can't remember exactly where i have seen it.

I just noticed this now, but when I was pulling things apart, I don't recall seeing a spare.


So, I ordered a new fuse, two actually, but they are still on their way. I decided to hook up an ordinary inline fuse so I could troubleshoot. The auto parts store I went to didn't have 65A fuses so I got a box of 45A's. I figured better to go low than high. When I powered up the bike, everything works! Headlights (both) work correctly. The turn/hazard lights work. Horn works. Dash Turns on. And the bike starts up. Wasted 8 bucks buying a box, but there you go.

I must have shorted something when I was connecting the battery, even though I thought I was being careful not to. As @Larry Fine said, the electricity was probably finding it's path using the wrong wires.


So, so far so good. I haven't used the bike for any significant length of time (and probably won't for at least a few more weeks). Thanks all for your help and insights. Here's hoping that my lack of dexterity was the root of the problem.

 

[Nexus]

Well that is good news.

That would worry me, until I had worked out how it happened ! Can I ask - which terminal were you connecting when you got the spark - the positive (left) or the negative (right).

The reason that I ask is that although it doesn't matter in which order you connect them, one way is much safer than the other.

I always connect the positive terminal first. If you connect the negative terminal first, the entire bike becomes one big negative terminal, so that when you connect the positive, should your driver, spanner, wrench or socket touch anything metal, it will short directly.

However, that would be a direct short across the battery and would not blow the 65A fuse. Since you have established that no other fuse has blown, then the short to earth must have occurred somewhere from the right hand end of the 65A fuse terminals to where the red and white leed feeds the two fuse blocks, OR along the red/white connection to the alternator.

If the 65A fuse was not fitted and covered when you connected the earth, you may have caught the terminal with whatever tool you were using to secure the earth post.

Just thinking out loud. Many would say - "it works, go and ride", But I get demons whispering things in my ear ....... I need to know so that I can get rid of them.

All good points. I think I connected the red first, for the same reason you mentioned. But thinking back I'm not 100% sure. This time I was careful to connect the +ve first.

The battery is disconnected again so I will have at least one more chance to @##%! up before the riding season really starts around here.

 

[Andrew Shadow]

Just thinking out loud. Many would say - "it works, go and ride", But I get demons whispering things in my ear ....... I need to know so that I can get rid of them.

I agree.
In my experience fuses rarely blow for no reason. An excess load was encountered when they do.
It is best to know why so any future failures can be prevented.

 

[Nexus]

So, against most's better judgement, I put the bike back together and took it out for a quick trial spin a couple of days ago. I took it out for a longer ride (30-40 miles) yesterday. No issues on either outing. I kept the smaller (45A) fuse installed figuring I could swap it out quickly if needed but never had to, even though I was running with full heated gear (gloves, jacket, and pants).

So I'm gonna take it out once more and if all stays good, I'll replace the fuse with the fusible link and chaulk it up to my being a doofus and touching the wrong thing(s) at the wrong time. Thanks to all for the help!