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Clicking circuit breaker

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sonnyusmc74

New Member
:worthy:eam On the way home on my 99 Fatboy last night my head light and tail light went dark and then would occasionaly flash back on for no more than a second. Today I went to check it and heard a circuit breaker( 15 amp next to the fuse ) Found that the headlight would work when switched to high beam and the breaker would hold. I am confused, what is happening ?
 
A circuit breaker works on the principle of load going through it causing heat and that is what opens the contacts when they overheat which opens the circuit to what ever they are powering. They then cool off and close restoring power to the circuit.
Over years of running hot and adding the engine temps to the mix that the breakers are exposed to, the breakers will fail and do what is happening to you barring any grounded wiring in the circuit.
There was a recall on the early models for this problem but it's easier to just go to an auto parts store and get the proper replacement and do it yourself. Just install it the same as the current one when it comes to the copper and silver color of the terminals being on the right wires as the present one is.
 
sonnyusmc74 said:
:worthy:eam On the way home on my 99 Fatboy last night my head light and tail light went dark and then would occasionaly flash back on for no more than a second. Today I went to check it and heard a circuit breaker( 15 amp next to the fuse ) Found that the headlight would work when switched to high beam and the breaker would hold. I am confused, what is happening ?
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If the breaker trips when you have your low beam on, but holds when you are using the hi beam, I would look for the wire between the breaker and the low beam to be shorting to ground, or possibly the plug on the head light to be grounding the power feeding the low beam.
Without looking at a schematic, I'm not even sure that the high and low beam are fed thru the same circuit breaker, but it is evident that the problem lies in that low beam/taillight circuit. I would look for a wire rubbed thru and touching metal or, at that headlight plug.
 
Thanx to all. The bike has spotlights and the problem went away when I disconnected them. I found a worn wire grounding in the harness by ( not recommended procedure ) by removing the cap on the circuit and holding it closed with an insulated needlenose plier and waited till I saw smoke :D The spot lights only work when the low beams were on. Hey Dick Tracy I am not but you can't argue with results. :newsmile03:
 
sonnyusmc74 said:
Thanx to all. The bike has spotlights and the problem went away when I disconnected them. I found a worn wire grounding in the harness by ( not recommended procedure ) by removing the cap on the circuit and holding it closed with an insulated needlenose plier and waited till I saw smoke :D The spot lights only work when the low beams were on. Hey Dick Tracy I am not but you can't argue with results. :newsmile03:
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I've seen a little stranger, but not much. All that counts is that you found it.
 
Smoke detector troubleshooting...I remember my old electronics lab teacher discussing this, and I quote "--tune for maximum smoke"...a troubleshooting technique, not recommended, but as a last resort when a short cannot be found using a meter set to low ohms (resistance checking) and tracing to an small area. You isolate the circuit (so no sneak currents can back flow and damage sensitive circuits) and "zap it" viola. Needless to say, you were lucky, as you just let the current flow and "damage what may"!
 
LOL! Crude, but effective. Really takes a chance of causing major damage though.
Once you start to let that smoke out, you never know how much or how long it is going to keep coming out!!!
And it's next to impossible to put it back in there.
 
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