Fried Battery Terminal

[Lucygoosey]

Damn near took the whole bike apart except for the engine and reinstalled my new starter for my 1983 Suzuki GS 450ED. So I figured I would retry installing the battery since last time I got the connection wrong. I connected the ground to the negative and then went to connect the Black along with Red cable and it started to fry the terminal. I didn't even have the red hooked up to starter and use am I hooking this up incorrectly or is there a short?

[Steve]

Damn near took the whole bike apart except for the engine and reinstalled my new starter for my 1983 Suzuki GS 450ED. So I figured I would retry installing the battery since last time I got the connection wrong. I connected the ground to the negative and then went to connect the Black along with Red cable and it started to fry the terminal. I didn't even have the red hooked up to starter and use am I hooking this up incorrectly or is there a short?

We are going to need a bit more explaination here.

.

[Lucygoosey]

Oh sorry. I connected the red positive cable the one that has leads out to the starter and the fuse to an all black connection that came out the bottom right hand side of the motor.

[Steve]

I have seen different color wires (usually red or black) connected to the positive terminal of the battery. Regardless of color, the large wire that is connected to the POSITIVE terminal of the battery gets connected to one of the terminals of the starter solenoid. The other terminal of the solenoid is where the starter wire will be connected.

Look carefully before connecting a black wire from the engine to anything. The starter wire AND the ground wire are both black.
The starter wire will come out from under the starter cover, the ground wire is usually bolted to the engine case near the top rear motor mount. Make sure which one you have before connecting it to the starter solenoid.

.