Not cranking

[bigbabee]

I upgraded my fuse box to a 4 circuit atm fuse box. now the bike won`t crank. Headlight, turn signal,gauge lights and neutral lights all work but press the start button and nothing. I shorted the two terminals on the starter solenoid and the starter cranked. How can I tell if the solenoid is bad and how do I test it off the bike?

[tkent02]

Put +12v to the green with yellow trigger wire on the solenoid, it should crank. This is all the starter button does. This +12v comes from the ignition switch. Goes through the kill switch on the way. Maybe the clutch danger switch too, but I don't think the '79 would have this. If the solenoid was good before you played with the fuses, it still is.
You probably don't have any power going to the trigger side of it.

[bigbabee]

ok will try tomorrow

[lemonshindig]

You need a multimeter. You can check for continuity by measuring ohms across a simple circuit. The power goes from the fuse box to the ignition switch, from there to the starter button, and from there to the solenoid. A closed (working) circuit should read 0 ohms or close to that. A discontinued/open/non-functional circuit would read infinite ohms, often displayed as a 1 on a digital meter.

To test the circuit, you would measure ohms from the ignition switch wire at the fuse box to the solenoid small post. You would have to press the starter button to complete the circuit. If you read infinite, then you test a small portion of that circuit. 0 is good infinite is bad, so you can trace which portions of the circuit are good and which are bad.

This is the basis of electrical diagnostics.

Now like Tkent said, if you run 12v straight to that small post on the solenoid, if the starter cranks, then the solenoid is good.

[Dj66]

No crank.

My 79 L has the clutch switch.

[bigbabee]

After checking the ignition circuit for continuity and swapping out two solenoids which were both bad, I installed my last spare solenoid and had a running bike again. "Man that Kerker exhaust on her sure sounds sweet!"

[chef1366]

Two solenoids bad? I've never seen one go bad.

[bigbabee]

Yeah they were used ones that I bought in 2000.I took one of them apart and found the small wire that connects to the starter button circuit disconnected.