Electrical failure, help !

[tomo]

Pulled into a gas station last night, turned off ignition & topped up the tank. When I turned the key, no ignition light. Tried a couple of times, dead. Got off, got out tool kit, tried again & hey presto, ignition light. Fired her up & went home. This morning, turned key, no ignition light again, and this time won`t come on no matter how much switching on & off. Checked main fuse, ok, earth seems fine. Any suggestions ?. Only things I can think of are dodgy kill or ignition switch. Any advice appreciated, as electrickery ain`t my strong point !.

[Mark whiz]

Do the headlight, taillight, and dash lights come on when you try to turn the key on??
If the lights come on but no ignition, I would suspect the kill switch.
If nothing comes on then I think you're dealing with the ignition switch and/or connections and wires going to & from it.

[Kcwiro]

maybe stupid as well but make sure your battery leads are tight... mine backed off once and left me scratching my head for a couple minutes. Then I quietly and slowly tightened downt the connection and had no problem since.

If after that look at the starter button/kill switch, you know age and these old connections somtimes get gunk in them.

Good luck

[bonanzadave]

Do the easy stuff first...

Check the battery terminals. Then....

I would get a can of electrical contact cleaner, pull the headlight, disconnect / spray & reconnect all the connectors in the headlight bucket. Spray the kill switch and fuse box along with any other connectors you can get to. This is cheap and easy and should be done anyway. If that dont fix it then you can start to troubleshoot.

[Shin-Ken 1074]

Had a similar problem, ignition "on" no starter motor action, left the ignition in the "on" position and pressed down and rotated the starter button and she fired into life. Starter contacts need a clean on mine. Didn't check the light system, cheers.

[Redman]

Tomo,

What model/year? Maybe someone can send you an electrical schematic (pechance that would be of any help).

What specifially do you mean by "Ignition Light"?

For testing, do you have a volt meter ? Or a 12volt test probe/lamp?

.

[rpickle]

Have a looksee where the wires come off of the ignition switch.

Rick

[tomo]

Think I found the problem. Turned out to be a dodgy connector block, the one the wires from the ignition switch go to in the headlight housing. I had the switch turned on, everything was dead still, but when I took off the headlight I suddenly had an ignition light !. I pushed the wiring in the shell back and it went out. Eventually tracked it down to that connector, so replaced it and fingers crossed eveything seems to be ok now. Thanks for all the advice, much appreciated.