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Wiring Harness Tuck Inside Frame?

  • Thread starter Thread starter gsweakley
  • Start date Start date
G

gsweakley

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Hi,

This is my first post here on The GS Resources and I own a 1983 GS750ES which I received from a friend from church who was the original owner. It was in pretty good mechanical condition when I received it but it was down 2 times I think.

Overall the bike ran after sitting for 5 years after some routine maintenance and I have been riding it for 2 years and nothing major happened other than my stator and rectifier blew while I was about an hour and a half from my house.

I recently decided that a partial rebuild is in order for the bike, which I see as simply cleaning EVERYTHING, replacing old tubes and hoses, and fixing the general broken stuff on the bike.

I believe that the electrical system is not at 100% and so I want to clean all of the connectors and wires and test all of the different components that may be faulty and clear up the whole issue of charging in one fell swoop.

Now to the question that I have. After doing a lot of thinking I want to clean up everything under the seat. Part of that would include potentially running the wires from the wiring harness through the frame by drilling a hole at various points in the frame to allow for the wires to get to their different destinations. I am wondering if this will weaken the integrity of the frame and make the motorcycle dangerous to ride? Is there another way to hide wires or make them impervious to the weather?

Let me know and thank you so much for reading this!

Geoff Weakley
 
There is a chance you could weaken the frame. It would be a lot of work for little gain. Your wiring harness requires maintenance at the connectors and plugs, all of which are available the way the factory designed them or more modern waterproof connectors (always use the proper crimping tool). The one failing of all these bikes is the design of the R/R which commonly causes stator failure. The newer series R/R's seem to be the answer to that problem. They switch on and off depending on charging requirements instead of shunting through the stator. There are more reliable shunt type R/R's that are popular also and cheaper, so there are a lot of upgrade options for more reliability. This is where your maintenance should begin, an odious job just before riding season, but very necessary with long lasting benefits. All connectors and plugs should be gone through, cleaned and coated with dielectric grease, and replaced where necessary. Switches are also on the list for cleaning and protection with dielectric grease (be careful not to loose springs and small parts). Welcome to the forum. There will be others chiming in to welcome you and drop tons of information on you. Everything you need to know is here for the asking.
 
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There is absolutely NO guarantee that there are holes where two frame pieces meet, so you would have to cut the frame apart to make a hole at the joint, then weld it back together.

Even if holes were available, how would you protect the wires that would be rubbing on the sharp edges? Again you would have to cut the frame apart to put grommets over the sharp edges, then weld the frame back together.

You want to do this to make them "impervious to the weather"? How about the wires that would go through the bottom loop of the frame? With all those holes, there is a chance of water getting in there, soaking the wires, then eventually rusting the frame from the inside. :eek:

If you were building a chopper frame from scratch and it only had five wires, it might make some sense, but for something that has real-world wiring needs, like a GS, the number of holes you would have to drill in the frame would definitely compromise its integrity.

"Cleaning up under the seat" is a noble quest, but how necessary is it on a stock bike? With the seat closed and the side covers on, you can't see any mess in there. I have changed the wiring a bit on all of the bikes that I have, even all that wiring is hidden by the seat and side covers.
icon_shrug.gif


Personally, I would be more inclined to use proper-colored wires and connectors, then route them where they can be bundled with existing wiring, and possibly even installed in plastic conduit to "clean them up". :D

.
 
Don't waste your time for the reasons already pointed out but do spend your time cleaning and or replacing connectors and checking the performance of your electrical components.

As you noted, a properly working charging system is key to bike health and reliability so study the Stator Papers and using the information and guidance contained therein check it all over. I would also recommend that once the system is verified to work correctly add a voltmeter to the bike so you can follow charging health as you ride along. That way you can avoid another dead bike miles away from home.

Good luck with and welcome to the nuthouse. Those are great bikes when sorted out so well worth the effort.

cheers,
spyug
 
All of the above as mentioned,,,,

get good electrical tape, not the cheap stuff, and route the harness the way it needs to go and you will good to go for another 30 years....

some inspiration

P1080146.jpg


P1080154.jpg


hard to see but you get the idea....

.
 
Down with the horrible black sticky tape stuff. This is my dream wiring:

oilcoolerinstalled005.jpg


Turn your wiring into a thing of beauty instead of trying to hide it away.

Greetings
 
Phew, I am glad that I didn't simply start drilling holes in my frame hoping for the best, that would have been a disaster. Thanks for all of the input and I found the wiring harness cleaning section on BassCliff's website so I will begin with that. Thanks guys!
 
Nice....I would do it if I drove the bike around naked....but once all the plastics are on, can't really see much of the wiring....

but I do like that SS braided stuff looks really good, I wonder though does it rub the paint off of the frame where it touches.....hmmmm

.
 
I'm looking at my 750 and unless you don't have plastics, there isn't much wiring exposed. I realize wire tucks are the recent auto/cafe trend. But as mentioned, not worth the hassle when you are broke down on the rode and need to get to a connector.
I'm using snake skin wire loom on my rebuild. You can get it from any number of retailers online, I prefer mcmaster-carr.com. It gives a nice professional appearance and can be had in fire resistant types. (edit) What Toasty posted a pic of

if you go with regular tape. There is a specific wire harness wrap that factories use. It doesn't leave a sticky mess like electrical tape, as its sole purpose is to wrap a bundle of wires.
 
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I'll be using this stuff (PET braided sleeving) on my custom wiring harness. They even make a flame proof version. It has the same kind of look as the stainless stuff but it won't rub off paint and is easier to work with.

pet-braided-expandable-sleeving.jpg


pet-expandable-braided-sleeving-colors.jpg



Shrink some heat shrink over the end and a connector and it looks super clean.
 
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Toasty said:
I'll be using this stuff (PET braided sleeving) on my custom wiring harness. They even make a flame proof version. It has the same kind of look as the stainless stuff but it won't rub off paint and is easier to work with.

pet-braided-expandable-sleeving.jpg


pet-expandable-braided-sleeving-colors.jpg



Shrink some heat shrink over the end and a connector and it looks super clean.
Click to expand...

I really like that! Where did you get that - or I should say, where can I get that??
 
It's all over Ebay but its usually long pieces in a single size. There may be a distributor (harness, wiring connector places) near you that stocks it so you can grab a few feet of each instead of having like 30ft left over.
 
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