"It just died" redux

[sjh]

Someone posted a thread with a title along the lines of "it just died" a while ago, it was not me but I like the title.

So a while ago while bimbling along a country back-road near to home my bike decided it preferred being a lawn ornament without a complete ignition fuse. It was blamed on an over-enthusiastic washing, which never quite sat right with me & some others here voiced concern over the prognosis at the time.

It was a shitty time for me, I was under time pressure that week, in a general bad place mentally but with an exit in site that involved money but required a working motorbike so after being given the all-clear by a dealer, I  let it go without finding the real fault, as the miles-since-fault grew into the multiple-thousands I started to forget about it.

Well, shock horror it happened again today. This time though it happened at a healthy 70mph (honest officer) in the outside lane of a busy section of the M69. Of all the things I've imagined going wrong while on a bike that was just about my worst nightmare. Initially I indicated right but as I did so the median strip dissipated into nothingness, just a concrete barrier with a metal railing on the top. So, onto plan B & thanks to one particularly attentive 4x4 driver, some liberal beeping, hazard lights and much arm waving I got over to the hard shoulder and screamed "feck" in my helmet for about 5 minutes straight.

I called the RAC and resigned myself to a long wait for an expensive recovery & expensive everything really.

30 minutes later an RAC man in a van called Lindsey (the man, not the van) showed up. I was under no particular time pressure tonight, and after his optimism rubbed off on me we spent 90 minutes or so wriggling wires with a test lamp plugged over the ignition fuse. Finally with nearly all of the fairings off on the hard shoulder a cable behind the left frame cover just below the pillion grip was found it stripped, with the frame rubbed shiny too.



bingo.

[greywolf]

That's a lot of loose wires. How did that happen, installing electrical accessories without using conduit or wrapping?

[sjh]

That was after tell removing tape and the zip tie that was holding it against the frame. re-wrapped the wires, and reattached to the now wrapped frame,

I've not done anything myself back there, and it's the only glee I've owned so know no different, of that isn't stock though it's coming apart and being reverted!

[greywolf]

I just took a look at mine. The harness could use a little extra protection there and the tie is best kept a bit loose.

[Timmo]

I like the RAC They seem to know their stuff and actually repair by the roadside instead of calling up the recovery truck.

[Juvecu]

This is what the dealer should have done to start with. Fuses hardly ever blow because there is something wrong with the fuse, they blow because there was an over current (like a short) in the circuit the fuse is protecting. A dealer should find it easier to troubleshoot this than the RAC man, after all, the dealer has a wiring diagram showing them which parts of the loom to check first.

Well done to the RAC man