Now that I have LED blinkers: strange electrical phenomenon

[AirCooled]

If you'll listen to some info from the "Peanut Gallery", an incandescent bulb with a single terminal doesn't "care" which direction the electrons flow from. It is in fact simply a piece of Tungsten that acts as a resistor, and as result, gets hot enough to "Glow". As we all(should) know, in a 12V Negative ground system, electrons actually flow from "ground" to positive. So the original incandescent bulb doesn't care where the power comes from, as long as the cicuit is closed. An LED on the other hand, does care. By it's very definition "L"ight "E"mitting "D"iode(LED), by it's very nature only allows electrons to flow in ONE direction. The whole purpose of a DIODE is that, allow power to flow in one direction only. LED's are a byproduct of this. There are many diodes on your motrcycle, and your car, for that matter. There are in fact, FOUR(4) in your Regulator Rectifier. It's called a Full Wave Bridge Rectifier. The charging system utilizes this arrangement to convert AC current to DC current. The correct terminology for this is Rectifiying the power. If you Google a full wave bridge rectifier, you can see the arrangement.
I certainly hope I didn't step on any toes here. Just my 2 cents worth. Which I believe are now worth 17 cents, if you recycle them for the copper! Of course, those of us with stockpiles of pennies are patiently awaiting Congress to take up the current Itiration of the bill, allowing an amendment to make this legal. The Copper Penny Lobby is currently penniless!

[Steve]

If you'll listen to some info from the "Peanut Gallery", an incandescent bulb with a single terminal doesn't "care" which direction the electrons flow from. It is in fact simply a piece of Tungsten that acts as a resistor, and as result, gets hot enough to "Glow". As we all(should) know, in a 12V Negative ground system, electrons actually flow from "ground" to positive. So the original incandescent bulb doesn't care where the power comes from, as long as the cicuit is closed. An LED on the other hand, does care. By it's very definition "L"ight "E"mitting "D"iode(LED), by it's very nature only allows electrons to flow in ONE direction. The whole purpose of a DIODE is that, allow power to flow in one direction only. LED's are a byproduct of this. There are many diodes on your motrcycle, and your car, for that matter. There are in fact, FOUR(4) in your Regulator Rectifier. It's called a Full Wave Bridge Rectifier. The charging system utilizes this arrangement to convert AC current to DC current. The correct terminology for this is Rectifiying the power. If you Google a full wave bridge rectifier, you can see the arrangement.
I certainly hope I didn't step on any toes here. Just my 2 cents worth. Which I believe are now worth 17 cents, if you recycle them for the copper! Of course, those of us with stockpiles of pennies are patiently awaiting Congress to take up the current Itiration of the bill, allowing an amendment to make this legal. The Copper Penny Lobby is currently penniless!

Mostly good information there, except that there are SIX diodes in our rectifiers and the pennies are only copper-clad aluminum, making them worth considerably LESS than 2 cents.

.

[AirCooled]

Mostly good information there, except that there are SIX diodes in our rectifiers and the pennies are only copper-clad aluminum, making them worth considerably LESS than 2 cents.

.

Steve,

I will have to take your word on the correct diode count for the GS series of rectifiers, as I am a NEW owner of Suzuki M/C's I currently have two, both puchased within the last 3 months.
Now......... as for the pennies, it's true what you say about the value of what's in circulation TODAY. Us Hopeful Hoarders have literally TONS of pre-1970s stocks. MOST ARE FOUND ON THE GROUND!

I thank you for correcting my errors, and I've now learned even MORE from this site!
By the way, anytime you feel like correcting me, please feel free, I learn more from reading your answers to posts than just about anywhere else on the web!

[rustybronco]

Copper clad zink.

[trippivot]

With flasher units it is usually a current flow issue ie. the flasher unit needs enough current to make it work.
Use a step by step approach starting from the beginning again.
Put every thing back as it was and see if that works. This will eliminate any wiring/ground issues.
Now start adding new stuff again and work from there.....

let's get the basics correct!! ok?

old style FLASHER units need a specific RESISTANCE to operate -- signal just lights up? no flash? higher wattage incandescent bulb fixes that. more resistance -- test my theory put 3 bulbs in the circuit and watch it flash fast!!

LED flashers are necessary and you are going to need 2 of them L and R and keep the sides isolated away from each other and fully remove the old flasher unit from the wiring.

[Steve]

let's get the basics correct!! ok?
...

LED flashers are necessary and you are going to need 2 of them L and R and keep the sides isolated away from each other and fully remove the old flasher unit from the wiring.

Not sure why you would need two flasher units.

On a bike that has a single indicator bulb in the instrument panel, you will have to do some trickery there, but you can do quite fine with one flasher.

The old-style flashers actually need to see the correct amount of current running through them, not resistance. The current will heat up a strip that is made of two different metals that expand at different rates. As the current flows, the strip warms up. When one side expands more than the other, the contacts are opened. As they cool down, the strip comes back and makes contact again, turning the lights on, letting current flow again.

LEDs do not draw nearly enough current to 'trigger' the old-style thermal flashers. The "LED flashers" are actually just little electronic timers that turn the output ON and OFF at pre-determined times, and really don't care how much of a load is there. You can light up a single LED or a headlight bulb, it really doesn't matter.

Because the LED flashers are timers, they need a supply (hot) wire, a ground and the switched output. The self-cancelling systems on the larger GSes from '80 and newer have three-prong flasher units, but that third prong is NOT a ground, so it is not "plug and play". You have to make an adapter to run the hot and load wires to the new flasher, then add a ground wire.

.

[Steve]

Steve,

I will have to take your word on the correct diode count for the GS series of rectifiers, ...

You were sort of correct earlier. Many full-wave rectifiers do have four diodes, but we have three-phase stators on the bikes. Each phase requires two diodes, for a total of six.

By the way, anytime you feel like correcting me, please feel free, I learn more from reading your answers to posts than just about anywhere else on the web!

Not so much "correcting you", just supplying the correct information.

.

[Killer2600]

let's get the basics correct!! ok?

old style FLASHER units need a specific RESISTANCE to operate -- signal just lights up? no flash? higher wattage incandescent bulb fixes that. more resistance -- test my theory put 3 bulbs in the circuit and watch it flash fast!!

Steve has it right, one more thing to note is more bulbs in parallel or higher wattage bulbs is actually LESS resistance in the circuit.