burning through low beam

[old70dodge]

This is my first post. I've dug through this forum as well as forums for other bikes to figure out the problem, but haven't seen anything that seems quite right. My Ulysses has just under 6k and has given me no problems other that some low RPM hesitation when cold. I've got mechanical ability but dread working with electronics.

My first low beam went out somewhere around 5k. My night driving has been minimal so I got away with using my high bean. It wasn't til recently that I decided to swap it out because I was going to go on a lengthy road trip. I changed it out and it burnt out within the first 100 miles. I'm not exactly sure when, but it wasn't right away. I ordered some 35W 4,500k HID builds after I read that the stock bulbs are kind of crappy anyway. When going to install those bulbs, I cut the low beam wires to do a solid splice instead of just having a quick connect. When I did, I noticed that the positive wire was burnt internally, at least a little bit. A few, but not all of the strands were blackened. There didn't appear to be any damage to the insulation, though I didn't chase the wire all the way back. Out of curiosity I completed the install and ran the light for a short period of time. The HID would come on, then cut out and come back on again. The bike through a check engine light twice but went out right away so I'm not sure what the light was for. Does this sound like a voltage regulator or resistor of some sort? Just a bad wire? All the other lights, blinkers, and instrumentation work fine and the bike seems to run fine otherwise. any suggestions would be much appreciated.

 

[uly luigi]

Ground wires at the steering head, one of em is bad

 

[sparky300]

^Yep. I noticed my headlight winking at oncoming traffic one day. The next day all three grounds broke right at the terminal screw on lower triple. No headlights, no siggys, no taillight, nada.

 

[old70dodge]

I'll check that out. It's amazing how grounds cause so many problems in all sorts of things. Think that wire will need to be replaced?

 

[old70dodge]

Probably a dumb question, but where do you plug a code reader in at?

 

[uly luigi]

On the Uly, it is on the left side, under seat, right around the little plastic trim piece, little 4 wire Deutsch plug with a rubber cap

 

[old70dodge]

So I cleaned up that ground and coated it with some dielectric grease. Went for a drive with a buddy in front of me(daytime) and everythinig seemed to work fine for the most part. No check engine light and they weren't dimming or cutting out. The bright seems dimmer than the dim and I'm wondering if I didn't wire them differently. That left me wondering what the difference is. Are the housings just a little different? Doesn't seem like that would make sense. They're the same bulb and the wiring diagram makes htem look like they're wired the same, but that only leaves the housing, unless there's an inline resistor or something?

In either case, the suggestions were much appreciated. Seems to be working for now. Such a simple fix makes me wonder if I've really tackled the problem. I guess the proof is in the pudding.We'll see how she does. If all is well I'll be riding the gravel in the black hills of South Dakota very soon.

 

[uly luigi]

Yep the housings make the difference, but you can put the bulbs/sockets in the wrong hole, and then low beam will say highbeam, left housing is High Beam

 

[jimijeans]

which headlight bulb are you using on the low beam? if you go too high for a brighter field of vision at night too high will start burning up the wiring, starting with the grounds.
Make a GOOD new wire for your ground if the other one is melted so a higher Amprege draw doesn't fry the wiring again right away. When using a higher Bulb than factory installs this will happen over time when running for long periods of time. just keep tabs on it once your repair is done.Good Luck.*Jimi

 

[old70dodge]

Looks like I didn't get it fixed. So a couple things that are going on. The new HID bulbs, which are 35w 4500k, start dim and slowly brighten up. Both bulbs do this. It probably takes 10-15 seconds before they are full lit. Also, they consistantly cut out after a few minutes. Only once and then they seem to work fine. I readjusted the ground to make sure it's good. Seems fine. I started trouble shooting the charging system to see if it might be a voltage regulator or something along those lines. I started by checking the battery voltage after the bike sat all night. 12.8 volts. Good. Turned key on. Drew down to 12.4 or so and slowly drew down after that due to the light being on. While the starter was activated the draw was down to 8-9 volts, but only for the second that the starter was running. While running it showed about 14.6 volts for a while. After a short time the voltage spiked up over 18 about half a second then immediately dropped to a 12.5 and falling. I shut off the bike and restarted. Still in the mid 12's and showing no sign of charging. Waited about 10 minutes and restarted the bike. 14.6 volts, no spike and stayed in this condition for a good five minutes. shut bike off. Waited about an hour and started again. Good voltage before start. While running sat at 14.6 for a while, got another 18 volt spike and dropped back to the 12.5 range. Stopped and restarted bike several times and it never came abouve 12.5 again while running. after it sat for a couple minutes it was showing 12.8 volts with thte bike off.

So...is it common for the voltage regulator to fail intermittantly like this? Any ideas?

 

[84yotaguy]

not sure on the voltage problem but HIDs start dim and brighten up, thats normal. it does that on my truck. also on my truck they cut out (flickering) when i first installed them. installed a relay and everything was fine.

 

[djohnk]

If your voltage spiked like that (up over 18V) it could be your VR or stator starting to go. My uly was killing bulbs and it ended up my stator was burnt out (I think my stator killed my VR because I had to change that also).

Also, HID's take awhile to warm up to full brightness, and they don't like it when you shut them off while warming up.