Topic: first ride

[hymodyne]

New tires mounted, I took my first ride on my bike, right to the gas station. As I hit the turn signal at the end of this two mile virgin journey, my fuse (15 amp) blew. I've had this bike running in neutral and for short trips around my driveway for about two months with no issues with the fuse. I installed driving lights which have their own 20 amp fuse, and I had them running on this trip. at the moment the fuse blew I had my low beam, turn signal and running lights on...

I'm going to check for shorts as FAQ suggests, and replace the wires that lead to the fuse case.

any other suggestions?

hym

[kghost]

Hmm, The twenty amp fuse on the driving lights didn't tip you off? 

Its probably twenty amps for a reason. Those lights probably draw some serious amps. 10 would be a good guess based on the fuse being a 200% overload.

Now Low beam+turnsignals+running lights=more than 15 amps. Main Fuse blows.

What you could do since the running lights have thier own fuse is wire them to the battery. Bypassing the main fuse. Them when you run the running lights you won't pop the fuse on the main.

You'll probably just drain your battery at low RPMS. 

[Dennis]

You'll probably just drain your battery at low RPMS. 

maybe at any RPM

Typical fog lamps = 55 watts each, approx 4.3 amp X 2 lamps = 8.6 A

I'm not sure that a 550 charging system can handle that much additional load. You better hava a battery tender to charge that battery whenever it's not running.

And be sure to rewire following ghosts recommendations if you decide to keep the lights.

[joeb]

You can step down the fog lamp lights to a lower wattage and still get alot of loght I use Pia lights  in my 1200 aspencade for the same reason to many watts in the big bulbs. I went with 35 watt h-3 bulbs in my running/fog lights they give off as much light as a reg 55 watt h-3 bulb. With this reduction you will not tax the electrical system as much either.  Hope this helps. Flame suit on.    

[77F2cb]

You can't run all that thru the same fuse.  If the extra lights have their own fuse, you could even run them straight from the battery with the inline fuse in between, but the problem is still....you're really pushing the limits of the alternator wattage.  I think your 500 has the same basic alternator as the 750 which is only 120 watts.  With lots of extra lighting you may not even charge the battery, even a little until you're over 4000 rpms.

[kghost]

You can't run all that thru the same fuse.  If the extra lights have their own fuse, you could even run them straight from the battery with the inline fuse in between, but the problem is still....you're really pushing the limits of the alternator wattage.  I think your 500 has the same basic alternator as the 750 which is only 120 watts.  With lots of extra lighting you may not even charge the battery, even a little until you're over 4000 rpms.

Yeah, thats what I said. 

[Dennis]

joeb, what did you say that you expect to get flamed for?

Ghost, I thought that was what you said, too!