Topic: Ground wire melted from rectifier?

[1974cb550k]

I noticed today that the green ground wire from the rectifier, (74 750) was melted from the inlet of the rectifier, back through the connector, and 4 inches into the harness. I am getting a new harness anyway but was curious if this was a common issue. I will also be replacing the regulator. The burnt wire I suspect was a dead short to ground through the rectifier. Any thoughts out there?

[Spanner 1]

The usual cause of this melted ground wire is the event of a P.O. connecting jump leads/ car charger with reverse polarity to the bikes battery, never done by the C.O. by the way 

P.O.= previous owner
C.O.=current owner 
Oh and, the rectifier may be fried... do a search 'testing rectifier'.... good info.

[grcamna2]

When you replace it I would scrape off all the spots on the rectifier mount where the unit attaches and where the rec. bracket mounts to the battery box and make solid ground connections.I would then completely clean all the mounts on the battery box and also any ground wire connections to that battery box to give the rectifier an uninterrupted flow of ground connections all the way to the bare frame.Shiny metal to metal w/ a little dielectric grease to keep them nice;the battery box always gets a lot of extra corrosion from that acid.

[Danno]

make sure you check the battery to the engine/frame ground but with that much being burnt i agree someone hooked a charger or jumper up backwards too it  I had this problem on my 750A  and it did it again from riding turned out to be a bad ground to the frame