Hi All,
Recently while riding my 2004 FE550E in Washington my head light quit working, much to my utter dismay. It actually had started acting up just a bit a month before, but, I thought it was the on off switch that was to blame, as I don't use my head light 99% of the time. It's usually got a piece of card board with duct tape over it to keep it from getting broken.
Anyway, it would stop working, and if I got on it kind of hard it would start working again. So I thought it was just a loose/or corroded connection. (turns out that was the case but not where I thought) So, I pulled the tank off checked all the connections and put it back together and it worked, for a few hours anyway. Then it would only work if I pulled in the clutch and revved it hard, and then only for a moment.
After getting back home I broke out the fluke multi meter and read the charging/lighting coils per the manual and both checked open, not good........... I pulled the stator off and with careful examination I found that one of the connections ( there are several) did not look like the others, ie. no blob of solder. I hooked the fluke meter back up again and shunted across the suspected buss with a screw driver and WA-LA good readings.
Being that I don't have a whole lot of experience soldering such small things, I took to work and showed it to one of our instrument techs,Arturo,who does have this experience. He told me NO PROBLEM, and had it solidly soldered up in about 5 minutes. I asked him if felt that the connection had melted off, but, Arturo felt it was a workmanship quality problem and not a component problem. Otherwise known as a cold solder joint. I had originally thought that the connection might have failed due to high heat as this was the first time I had used the light, and tail light at the same time, and had used them for quite a few hours of low speed trail riding.
So, for those of you with Kokusan ignition, it might be a good idea to check these solder joints the next time you have the ignition cover off. I have heard of one or two other similar problems with the Kokusan ignitions, but, overall they seem to be performing very well. Any decent electronics person can re-solder a suspected cold solder joint in a jiffy.
Recently while riding my 2004 FE550E in Washington my head light quit working, much to my utter dismay. It actually had started acting up just a bit a month before, but, I thought it was the on off switch that was to blame, as I don't use my head light 99% of the time. It's usually got a piece of card board with duct tape over it to keep it from getting broken.
Anyway, it would stop working, and if I got on it kind of hard it would start working again. So I thought it was just a loose/or corroded connection. (turns out that was the case but not where I thought) So, I pulled the tank off checked all the connections and put it back together and it worked, for a few hours anyway. Then it would only work if I pulled in the clutch and revved it hard, and then only for a moment.
After getting back home I broke out the fluke multi meter and read the charging/lighting coils per the manual and both checked open, not good........... I pulled the stator off and with careful examination I found that one of the connections ( there are several) did not look like the others, ie. no blob of solder. I hooked the fluke meter back up again and shunted across the suspected buss with a screw driver and WA-LA good readings.
Being that I don't have a whole lot of experience soldering such small things, I took to work and showed it to one of our instrument techs,Arturo,who does have this experience. He told me NO PROBLEM, and had it solidly soldered up in about 5 minutes. I asked him if felt that the connection had melted off, but, Arturo felt it was a workmanship quality problem and not a component problem. Otherwise known as a cold solder joint. I had originally thought that the connection might have failed due to high heat as this was the first time I had used the light, and tail light at the same time, and had used them for quite a few hours of low speed trail riding.
So, for those of you with Kokusan ignition, it might be a good idea to check these solder joints the next time you have the ignition cover off. I have heard of one or two other similar problems with the Kokusan ignitions, but, overall they seem to be performing very well. Any decent electronics person can re-solder a suspected cold solder joint in a jiffy.
nobody was there too see it :thumb: since the stator was
