Couple of electrical issues....horn and brake light

[kopio]

Hey Guys,

Well, I've had my 82 GS1100E for three days now, and I've managed to put around 250 miles on it. Today I rode up to a local ski resort (Bogus Basin) and it was filled with amazing twisties!

For the record....I did do a couple of searches to see if I could find something to help....the horn thing I came up with nada, the brake light issue came up with

On the way home, my brake light indicator came on in the dash intermittently. It doesn't usually come on when I use the brakes....is it supposed to, or does it just come on if there is a short or a bad bulb? My buddy I was riding with said he saw my brake light come on when I definitely wasn't braking. So....any guesses? Is it just a loose connection? Bad bulb? I'm a total rookie when it comes to working on a bike, so any advice would be great.

Then next thing that happened was kinda funny. I got home, pulled up to the garage door to punch in the code to open the door and suddenly my horn went off.....and kept going off! I turned the bike off....rolled it into the garage, turned it on and the horn was still blasting! Anyone have that happen before? Like I said....I'm pretty new at all this. I've worked on my old 66 chevy truck, a little bit on my Tahoe, but never wrenched on a bike before.

Thanks for your help.

Matt (aka kopio)

[bbytes]

Definitely sounds like short circuits to me. Might want to check your wiring harness, and the buttons and switches on your left handlebar.

[Steve]

On the way home, my brake light indicator came on in the dash intermittently. It doesn't usually come on when I use the brakes....is it supposed to, or does it just come on if there is a short or a bad bulb? My buddy I was riding with said he saw my brake light come on when I definitely wasn't braking. So....any guesses?

Check the front brake lever and the rear brake pedal to see if either one needs to be adjusted. The switch activation points for both of them are adjustable, you might just need to adjust where the switch is activated.

Then next thing that happened was kinda funny. I got home, pulled up to the garage door to punch in the code to open the door and suddenly my horn went off.....and kept going off! I turned the bike off....rolled it into the garage, turned it on and the horn was still blasting!

Personally, I really enjoy it when my horn goes OFF.

It usually does that right after it comes ON because I have pressed the button.

However, I think that in this case, you are complaining because it came ON when it was not expected.

You definitely have more than one problem there. Power to the horns is always there, but only when the key is ON. To activate the horns, the button is pressed to complete the ground side of the circuit. If you have a short to ground between the horns and the horn button, they will sound, but should stop when the key is off. There must also be a short that is connecting the power side to the battery, in spite of the ignition key being OFF.

OK going back and re-reading your post, it almost sounds like the horn stopped when you turned the key OFF, then came back on when you turned it back ON. Definitely look for a bare wire between the horn and the button. Inside the headlight bucket is a good place to start looking.

.

[Redman]

Cant help you with the brake light warning indicator (none of the 3 Gs I have had had that).
Although having worked with other warning indicators like that in industrial controls, they come on when detect no power on the circuit OR when it detects is no bulb filiment (or less bulbs) present, but maybe on your bike it just detect the bulb filiment(s).

But I can say that the brake light and the horn are on the same fuse, the "signal" fuse.

And I will somewhat repeat what Steve said. When trouble shooting the horn you will have to know that the power (org/grn, from fuse, same as goes to brake swtiches) is connected to the horn. The wire from the horns goes to the horn button and the horn button then connnects that to the grouind (black/white).
Seems like two problems there.
1) horn blowing when not push button. could be internal fault to ground inside one horn (which maybe might cause problems on the signal circuit and maybe make the brake warning come on, maybe). Try disconnecting one horn and see if that makes the other one quite, then plug that on back in and dsiconnect the other.
Or problem with the horn button. May have to take aprt the left handle bar control to investigate.
Or problem in wiring harness such that the wire to the button is shorting to frame ground or a ground wire.

2) Horn blowing when ignition swith is off. (..or did I missunderstand...?)
Was anything else on?
Should not be any power on any any of the headlight fuse the signal fues nor the ignition fuse circuits.

Tell us more what you find.

.

[kopio]

Hey Guys,

A little update.....

Last night I just unhooked the horn because I had to get up early and didn't have time to mess with it. Today I unhooked both of the leads into the horn, blew them out a little bit, plugged them back in and now it works just fine. My guess is maybe vibration caused the ground to short? Dunno. We'll see if it comes back again...it could be a fun drive when it starts blowing again.

As far as the brake light. Tonight I started doing the first cleaning of the bike (gotta take pictures and post soon, you know?). I know that doesn't help the electrical! But what I did today was check both of the bulbs in the tail light. They were both good and in there solid, so we'll see what it does tomorrow.

It seems like the brake light in the dash only comes on when the bike is hot. I don't know if that means anything or not, but it seems to be the case.

I do have a very good friend who is a mechanic (he's actually the mechanic at the shop I got the bike at), but I'd really like to try and fumble my way through it first and see if I can fix it myself. Thanks again for the help.