So yesterday I finally decided to tackle my RFID ignition system. It was pretty intimidating for me because I never really liked electrical. Most will say thats its not hard and they are right. The thing that gets me is that A) I cant see where the problem is like a mechanical system and B) If you let the smoke out thats it, buy new parts. So easy to screw it up. Anyways...
I started on the Custom-Fighters forum and found the parts I needed. RFID kit and a latching relay (80$ CAD, shipped, total). After I got these set up I started with a low amp 12v power source to get all my wiring figured out. First I got the RFID relay working, that was cake. I just wired the red to +12, black to the negative terminal and tested funtionality.l Its nice because you can hear it click, signalling successful operation. It actually works really well for how cheap it is. The RFID tag is pretty cool. From the diagram I found the Normally Open circuit in the small, first relay and verified with my multimeter. After that, I wired up the signal wire (+12v) to go through that first relay into the second (latching relay) to the signal wire. That relay had a 3-wire harness and a two-wire harness. The three wires were red/black/green. Red went to +12v, black to ground (negative battery terminal) and green was the signal, coming from the first relay. The two other wires were the ones that went from the +12v, through the third (automotive, 40 amp) relay and to the ground. Finally, the ignition wires went to the other two points on the third relay and everything worked perfectly. Sounds simple, took me like 3 hours.
Testing:
Success:
I'm not quite done yet, I'll only fully install after I finish the seat as I need to mount the LED somewhere, signalling that its live and the antenna needs to go inside the tail too.
Among that, there are two other things I'm going to do:
1. Install an in-line kill switch which will disable the rfid from sucking power during storage/no-riding periods. I hear it will take over a week to fully drain the battery when sitting and waiting for an RFID key but for any storage period I'll just switch it off with a hidden toggle behind the tail-light.
2. Install a momentary kill switch at the bars. It will be powered in front of a relay so the relays power will essentially kill itself, ensuring that the switch only works to kill power, not to start er up. This simply saves the time of swiping the rfid again to turn er off.
The coolest part of this is that I popped open the key fob, exposing the laminated, paper-thin coil. I'm simply going to tape it to my business card and keep it in my wallet, flip my wallet open, touch the tail, she is live. I'm super stoked on this, works like a damn charm!
Also, if there is enough interest I could put together a full write-up with wiring diagrams, parts lists and the like for the CB750 specifically. The custom-fighter forum is actually quite difficult to learn anything from, everything is very convoluted...
