Key not turning power off

[Guest]

Hi, I have a 1981 GS850. Very recently I noticed that the power from the battery to the front headlight and instrument cluster is continuous (if the fuse is in the power is on, even if the key is off). Just wondering if this is likely just the key switch being faulty or if anyone else has had this problem and can offer some advice on what other causes may be possible.

Any help is greatly appreciated (new to this forum and new to motorcycle maintenance).

len100

[Gorminrider]

Unless you have turned the key all the way to the right, to "Park" which does leave tail lamp on as well as locking the forks, but doesn't power the ignition ,turn signals etc, then the next possible is:
that the key barrel is not actually turning the switch.... You will have to take the keyswitch apart to see for sure . But possibly too, someone has changed the wiring or switch (to steal it? as in "hotwired") ....consult the wiring diagram for the bike and compare it to your bike... Properly, the red wire (main fuse ) goes from fusebox to the key switch where it is turned on to the orange wire which itself returns to the fuse box and powers all secondary circuits including the headlamp.

[turbojonn]

I just had this happen to mine 2 days ago. In my case it was 2 wires in a r wire connector that were loose at the plugs and intermittent ly touching. The connector was behind the headlight. Your case may be different. The two wires in mine were basically bypassing the ignition switch and hot wiring the ignition when they touched.