Starter help and Fuse Box

[thegunner76]

Hi folks
(S4R '04)

So, I brought the old lady out from her hibernation and she, quite reluctantly i would say, complied in the end. Cleaned her up, but the issues got worse - like needing even more tries before starting up, adjusting the joke immediately after fire... (you probably know the drill).

Next day she was as grumpy as ever, and didnt even cough - only cranked. Battery had been charging over night, but suspected it could be the problem anyways - So I tried fire her up with the charger still connected. She immedialtely fired up and my concern with the battery was confirmed. Ordered a new battery, got that installed, but no... Same issues... No Fire. The fuel pump made his preparations, all lights went normal, cranked, but thats that. I even tried connecting the battery to the charger, but still no glory. Not even a cough.

Got some advice it could be the relay, but didnt quite understand how.. checked the spark plugs, opened up the kill switch and started checking wires. Then i noticed the bottom fuse was broken. When I replaced it, it immediately blowed up again, ignition of.

I guess this isnt related to my main problem and that I made a mess out of it. Not sure how, but as the bike stands now, not even the fuel pump starts on ignition, and both the check engine and immobilizer light stays lit when I try to fire it up. NO sound at all...

I dont even understand what the bottom fuse is for. The cover on the fuse box says "Right switch", but my manual says "Speed sensor". Ive checked and tripple checked all the wires and connections on both, but cant find the culprit of the blown fuse.

ANY help would be great! I plan to dismantle the bike enough to be able to inspect the fuse box properly later today. I`ll have to run through the wires again to see if there is something I missed and start disconnecting things to eliminate/ locate the problem. Guess I`ll need to buy tons of fuses on my way home 

[stopintime]

 Owner's manual vs actual fuse box vs it's lid .... When/if your combo makes sence put in or take out, one after the other. Check which functions/loads change, as you go along. Fuse blows? Check it's circuit and content.

Battery+/- correct? Stand alone big fuse? Yellow wires from dynamo to RR black/burnt?

I'M JUST THE NEIGHBOUR COMING OVER, OFFERING WORTHLESS ADVICE 😅😅 LISTEN TO THE OTHERS!

[Howie]

You need to do proper diagnosis before tearing things apart.  Let's start with what tool do you have?  You will need a digital multi-meter with an inductive amp probe, a circuit breaker of the same rating as the blown fuse and a test light.  Also some jumper wires to bypass relays as well as the side-stand and clutch switch if they have not been bypassed.

A starting point would be disconnect each circuit controlled by that fuse, one at a time until the circuit breaker stops blowing.  That is the circuit with the short.

Another option is find a good shop.

[Duck-Stew]

What amperage is the fuse?

Speed sensor (I believe 3A and pink in color) only powers the speed sensor.  Therefore, wouldn't cause a non-starting or difficult starting condition.

Side stand switches get weird.

More info please after you've addressed the valid concerns above.

[thegunner76]

Cheers guys! I need all the neighbours on this one, so every tip and question help me out a lot. Im not even in the slightest form, a mechanic myself...

After some research yesterday I managed to located the fuse as designated to the fans! I also noticed a break in the wire, so was pretty sure that was the culprit! I was so certain about this, that I didnt even test it yesterday, but dived straight into my actual conundrum. Thinking about it twice makes me wonder though... That exposed wire alone wouldnt blow the circuit, so I'll need to check further...
(Im quite blown away, pun intented, that its normal for the information on the manual and fuse lid to be completetly different from the actual settings, but anyways...)

The starter on the other hand seems more tricky. I do have access to a multimeter, but need time and practice to be able to use it properly (lots of YT-videos around). I discovered that both relays close to the battery (the Siemens A-303/B1008 ones) function. Theres also continuity beteween all the important wires and they seemed "healthy" (no corrosion/ burn marks etc). Both plugs and coils seemed okay with the multimeter. What I didnt check was the starter motor itself, nor the starter solenoid. I know how to bypass the solenoid to check the starter motor, so will do that later.

Im struggeling with all these tight spaces, thats why I try to dismantle as much as possible. The bike and wire harness is like 20 years, so Im terrified of twisting and breaking more wires to get access. That fuse box for example... what a **** that is... and solenoid?? Italians must really have tiny hands patience is a virtue, i know.

I did a visual check on the stand switch, but will investigate further. My clutch switch is a preassure switch, but will check with the multimeter (thought having the bike in neutral bypassed this anyway?) There is now visual problems with the RR wires.

The connections and wires going to the ignition seemed ok, but I cant access the connections inside the actual ignition "box". So did the ignition antenna by the way.

Plenty of work and possibillities left. For all I know, the bike need that fan circuit to be able to start, even though that seem a bit far fetched even in my head.

I did read something about the ground wire having a tendency to build up charge and not dissipating enough on old Italians, so maybe a new wire wouldnt hurt.

[thegunner76]

Sorry for taking so long to come back to you guys, but its all good now! Seems to me I should have taken Howies advice as I made this a lot harder and time consuming than it should have been.

For those interested - what I probably did while checking wires, was accidentally trigger a flaw in my relay-socket for the fuelpump. I didnt see that while inserting the relay it pushed the contact out enough to create a bad connection. This whole clusterfcuk of problems led me to install a new pump, filter and levelgauge, togheter with new spark plugs. After finding my own error (and installing new parts) the bike finaly started. SO... my main problem was solved, but if it really was the pump or sparks, or even other connections that I cleaned and checked, I have no clue.

A good thing that came out of this, was me going over all the fuel-line changing them to a better standard (so now my bike wont catch fire if I'll have to use the new E10 petrol )

Another lession learned is how the bike needs to be taken care of, during the winter. The first ride was like riding a furious bull, as I guess gaskets and such needed a proper re-heating to perform? I asume the ECU tried to overcompensate for false air into the system (or the injectors itself needed some cycles on their own to perform normal?), but it was floding the bike with gas the first couple of runs. This might actually be the reason why it didnt want to start in the first place, i dont know... I adjusted the C02-trim in the JpDiag program and it runs smoothly now, compared to an old Saab motor in a norwegian "Snekke" that it did at first.

Anyways, thank you all for trying to help a complete noob

[Howie]

Glad you got the bike running.