The Rat Bastard Lives


New Carb still needs adjusted but she fired right up and faster than it ever has.
Pulled the relay back off and with a friends emailed expanded view wire schematic took a closer look. I had relied on the wires as they were and marked/labeled all that way how they came off. What I found was a jumper wire that made no sense. It was short and attached to the small post with the black wire and then to the post with the green wire (But this wire is red on my bike) which goes to the small post on the solenoid. This caused a continued current flow after I activated the solenoid with a jumper and kept power going through the starter button making it hot. So with that small jumper that was not supposed to be there it would not let the switch operate currectly as it kept the circuit open.

My best guess it that the relay had gone bad on someone and they used the jumper (like a penny in an old house fuse) to get them going and just left it.
I also discovered that the Clymer manual is severly lacking in the electrical section and there is nothing at all about the relay plus the wire diagram for the 1975-1976 Model has the key code wrong. Diagram shows (BK) for black but the color key code shows black as only (B). A lot of the manual skips the XLH model for 75-76.

I don't know but some of this wiring harness has been butchered so I'll probably get a new one for winter. All the wires going to the relay are red with the exception of the one black one. Three should be red; one should be black and one should be green.

Now I need to get the rear exhaust back on as she was leaking there tonight and then get the carburetor adjusted. Fingers crossed that the only other ordeal is getting my hand control switches all hooked back up.