Author Topic: Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k  (Read 5337 times)

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Timrek

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Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« on: October 13, 2010, 03:22:44 PM »
You all rock and know way more then I do so here it goes.

Can any one tell me the difference between the wiring diagram for the 1976 CB750 and the 1975 CB750?

OR

Point me to a source for good / technical wiring diagrams? I have a Clymer Manual and it has the different diagrams in the back. Are those really sufficient to get down to the differences?

I think TwoTired had mentioned a while back that the color diagrams in the books don't always show how everything is connected.

Even looking at these 3 diagrams on this site show different things and may not be year and bike specific.
http://data.sohc4.net/WD750/CB750WiringDiag.pdf
http://data.sohc4.net/WD750/CB750_K3-K7_WD.jpg
http://data.sohc4.net/WD750/cb750k6.pdf

Ok, so the reason I am asking. I can not find a new harness for my 1976 CB750 K6. I can find one for the 1973-75 at http://www.cb750supply.com and a couple other places. They say right there that they will not fit other models. So, can I start with one of those and modify it to work on a 76?

Offline Elan

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Re: Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« Reply #1 on: November 26, 2010, 07:38:14 PM »
I wish someone could answer this. I have a 76, and I can only find a harness from partsnmore.com for a 75. It says it wont fit other models but I dont believe them. I wouldnt mind doing some mods to it, but only if its worth it.
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76 750k

Offline HondaMan

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Re: Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« Reply #2 on: November 26, 2010, 10:21:05 PM »
The only place where there are issues:
1. The 1975 "K" harness is the same as the 1976 "K" harness until the last 3 months of "K" production, when it got the "F" harness. The 1976 "F" harness changed by separating some wires out of the headlight and sticking them in a little plastic box under the triple tree. So, some of the wires were a little short to reach inside the 1975 headlight as the result. Extending those 3 or 4 wires about 2" apiece is enough to fix it up. A few rare late 1976 "K6" bikes (actually retitled leftover K5s, with different decals, sold in 1976) have little extension wires that do just this, and they do not color-match the originals, but have little white bands on them near their end connectors. These were adapter wires. Most of these that I remember working on were Planet Blue in color, too.

2. The 1976 harness changes in the headlight and keyswitch areas. While the wires did not change colors, they came fitted with 4, 5, and 6-position connectors instead of lots of little bullet connectors. The aftermarket harness you are looking at will work fine with these, but you have to change some connectors to get it all plugged together. Also, there are a couple of wires to the fuseblock (middle fuse) that are a different color in the 1976 and later harnesses, as compared to the ones in that aftermarket harness. You can either bypass that fuse and plug the headlight directly into the BROWN at the hedlight shell, or else figure out which 2 wires go back to that middle fuse for the headlight circuit. Either way works fine.

As an example:
I just fixed up a 1976 K5 that had the right handlebar switch from a 1976 "F" and the left one from a K4. The wires and colors are all there, but if plugged directly into the matching colors for the K4 switch, the headlight will not come on when the Start switch is released (i.e., when it should). So, the Black/Red wire from the Start switch then goes into one of the 2 Brown/White wires that go back to the middle fuse, and the other Brown-White return wire goes into the left handlebar Hi/Lo switch. Sometimes, depending on how far into Frankenbiking the PO got, the switch on the left might have a Brown/Red feeder to the Hi/Lo switch instead of a Brown/White: the later "K" bikes (K7/8) sometimes had these, but the switches fit the earlier bikes, too.

The key: if you install a new harness, the most likey thing to show up is the lack of a headlight if your bike has the K3 or later Start switch on the right side. These came in 3 flavors:
a. In the K3 the Start switch had 2 wires on it: Yellow/Red and Green/Red. The Green/Red "grounded" through the Safety Module if the clutch was pulled in or the bike was in Neutral, which then grounded the Yellow/Red wire to the low side of the Start solenoid when the button was pressed. This version does not kill the headlight when starting, but instead has an ON/OFF headlight switch on the right.
b. In the (late) K4 the Start switch got 3 wires. These were Black, Yellow/Red, and [either] Black/Yellow or Black/Red (depending on which Honda factory made the bike). The Black is Ignition power, the Yellow/Red is [again] the Start solenoid, the last one is the "switched headlight" that goes Off when the Start button is pressed. This circuit puts Ignition power into the Start switch, and when the Switch is relaxed it connects that power to the Black/Red (or Black/Yellow) wire, which then connects in the headlight bucket to go back to the middle fuse, then back again to connect to the Lo/Hi switch on the left handlebar (which then actually returns to the headlight, whew...). Most of these bikes had the matching Black/[whatever] color going back to that fuse, but it changed to Brown/White before it got there, just to confuse folks, in many harnesses. It then came back to the headlight bucket as Brown/White to go into the Lo/Hi switch (NOT into the multiport Brown/White connector there: that's the tailights). When this Start button is pressed, it puts power to the Start solenoid on the Yellow/Red wire, and these Start solenoids have one wire are Yellow-Red and the other as Green/Red (which goes to the Safety Module or to a diode, to get to Ground).
c. The bastardized versions: starting in the K5, Honda seemed to use whatever combination of switches and fuseblocks and body harnesses they had that day, literally. The headlight's electrical circuit was the same as the earlier K4 bikes, but since the published wiring harnesses often did not match [even] the customer's bike, it got challenging to alter things for fairings and the like. In these bikes, the [formerly] Black/Red (or Black/Yellow) wire might be found to be just Black, or Black/Brown, or even just Brown, coming from the right handlebar. There are often short Black wire jumpers found in these headlight buckets, with little bands around one or both ends of the jumper to [sort of] indicate which way they were supposed to go. This is where most of the confusion seems to reign. In most of the very late "K" bikes, though, the middle fuse of the block has 2 Brown/White wires to that fuse, so at least it is easy to hook up, as it makes no difference which Brown/White is used.

To make matters worse, the 75/80w halogen headlight appeared about this time (1975) in the right physical size, and many Start switches got melted internally from trying to source too much power to those beams. The only solution there is to remove the headlight, or use a relay and let the Start switch toggle the relay for the headlight power.

Then came the "new keyswitch", up on the instruments. This one usually combines the Brown/White circuit and the Brown circuit inside the white connector on the back of this switch, or in some cases the switch itself replicates this connection via the internal contacts. This means that if you have a bike with the Brown/White tied to the Brown in the plug, you can use any version of the switch. But, if you have the one where the switch does the connecting (typically the 1976 F0 had these) and you use a later model switch ($18 from PartsNmore), you have to jumper the Brown/White and the Brown yourself. This can be done either inside the headlight or with a blue 3M splice behind the headlight shell where both wires are near each other.

If you're confused and have a mixed bag of parts: unplug your headlight and get a $1.99 multimeter from Harbor Freight. Connect the meter to the Green and White wires of the headlight plug, turn the Hi/Lo headlight switch on Lo, and key ON, Kill OFF, and start plugging and unplugging the colors mentioned above. Soon the meter will show 11.5 volts or so (which means the headlight will work), and you'll feel like a genius again. Then you can use the ohmmeter part of that meter to figure out which wires go to your middle fuse. :)
See SOHC4shop@gmail.com for info about the gadgets I make for these bikes.

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Re: Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« Reply #3 on: November 27, 2010, 04:07:00 AM »
What he said....

Offline Toxic

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Re: Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« Reply #4 on: November 27, 2010, 04:31:43 AM »
That's the best explanation of a very confusing subject ever.
That needs to go into the FAQ section.
I'm going to print that for sure

Timrek

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Re: Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« Reply #5 on: November 27, 2010, 07:52:45 AM »
I think Honda Man just shorted my brain to ground. But in a supper good way. Thank you for the info! If you are ever in Minneapolis I owe you a lot of beer! And while your hear you can look at my bike!  ;D Most of what you said is going to take a long time for me to figure out. I am more mechanical and very little electrical inclined. I have a good multimeter, I guess it is time to learn how to use it.

I have my eye on a used harness off ebay and a new fuse box and connectors from Oregon motorcycle parts.

I figure I can go though the harness this winter and test every wire then wire it up on the bike parallel to the existing and unplug one wire at a time.

My bike is a franken bike. The switches are off all kinds of different years and models. Not to mention the front end is off a totally different year. bike pic

I know I do have the black/red and black/brown out of the run / start switch and I think I have it hooked up right now. I also have the brown/white (edit) multi connector in the headlight bucket and I believe I have the black brown hooked into that multi connector. I know cuz I hooked it up wrong once, I think I plugged the black/brown into a black multi connector, and got nothing.... I also have the square plug for the ignition switch, replaced that with a new aftermarket one. I thought it was causing my electrical issues. I also found a lot of water in the weather proof tube that goes around the wires for the start/run. I don't know if that was causing the short in the main 15A fuse? I do not have the little box under the triple tree. Everything connects with bullet type connectors behind the headlight, and man is that a rats nest.

So opinion time. Is it better to buy a used harness for $30.00 or just spent the $75 and go with new or fix the old one?

« Last Edit: November 27, 2010, 05:07:48 PM by Timrek »

Offline octagon

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Re: Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« Reply #6 on: November 27, 2010, 10:43:55 AM »
what a great post from hondaman. god. certainly cleared up a lot of questions I had.
my 76 750k had electrical problems when i bought it - it was almost comical really - the usual sitting-up-for-ten-years deal, no contact with the actual previous owner. the bike had aftermarket high bars with improv extended wiring, plus the voltage regulator had failed, the battery had boiled over, and there were melted wires and fuses, and signs of panic from the po - swapped around wires, taping, glue-gunning, radio shack switches, etc.
i printed out several diagrams and taped them on a board and kept referring to them and making notes. also did searches on the forums and printed out any relevant info and made a file.

Offline petersan

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Re: Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« Reply #7 on: November 27, 2010, 06:14:37 PM »
HA -- this is hilarious.

I just wired one of these new 73-75 harnesses into a 76 with the black/red third wire out of the starter switch. Wish I would have known about this post BEFORE I went through that.

Got everything to work properly except for the electric start - may work on that tomorrow.

Offline Dirtyenginehugger

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Re: Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« Reply #8 on: November 27, 2010, 08:26:09 PM »
Just finished up wiring some free 76 cb750f controls into my frankenstein cb350f, the original starter switch on the CB350F worked by connecting the red/yellow solenoid wire temporarily to ground, probably the same on older 750 controls. The newer 750F starter switch worked by temporarily connecting Red/yellow to ignition hot (black). I simply wired the black lead from the starter switch to a green (ground) input in the headlight bucket which makes the Black/red wire dead so I taped it off and tucked it away. Maybe this will help you out Petersan.

Offline HondaMan

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Re: Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« Reply #9 on: November 27, 2010, 10:17:46 PM »
I think Honda Man just shorted my brain to ground. But in a supper good way. Thank you for the info! If you are ever in Minneapolis I owe you a lot of beer! And while your hear you can look at my bike!  ;D Most of what you said is going to take a long time for me to figure out. I am more mechanical and very little electrical inclined. I have a good multimeter, I guess it is time to learn how to use it.

I have my eye on a used harness off ebay and a new fuse box and connectors from Oregon motorcycle parts.

I figure I can go though the harness this winter and test every wire then wire it up on the bike parallel to the existing and unplug one wire at a time.

My bike is a franken bike. The switches are off all kinds of different years and models. Not to mention the front end is off a totally different year. bike pic

I know I do have the black/red and black/brown out of the run / start switch and I think I have it hooked up right now. I also have the brown/white (edit) multi connector in the headlight bucket and I believe I have the black brown hooked into that multi connector. I know cuz I hooked it up wrong once, I think I plugged the black/brown into a black multi connector, and got nothing.... I also have the square plug for the ignition switch, replaced that with a new aftermarket one. I thought it was causing my electrical issues. I also found a lot of water in the weather proof tube that goes around the wires for the start/run. I don't know if that was causing the short in the main 15A fuse? I do not have the little box under the triple tree. Everything connects with bullet type connectors behind the headlight, and man is that a rats nest.

So opinion time. Is it better to buy a used harness for $30.00 or just spent the $75 and go with new or fix the old one?




If the used harness still has good black plastic coverings, $30 isn't bad. But, the new ones come with far more flexible black jackets, which may make a difference in your installation: they flex much more at the steering head.

The ratty-looking plug-together business in the '76 bikes was due to the collection of too long and too short wires from the differing pieces and parts that were in the transistion toward the "F" series bikes. I'd bet the production folks really enjoyed them, too...

Yeah, that Black/Brown that you plugged into the Black and got nuthin': it came from another Black on the other side of that Start switch. So, you were just plugging it back where it came from.  :o

In my book, I laid out all 4 scenarios of the Start switch, showing just the Headlight, Start, and Lighting as a circuit, so as to try to help with this particular problem. It causes more confusion than it should, but it's just 'cuz most riders are wrenchers, not electricians.  :)
See SOHC4shop@gmail.com for info about the gadgets I make for these bikes.

The demons are repulsed when a man does good. Use that.
Blood is thicker than water, but motor oil is thicker yet...so, don't mess with my SOHC4, or I might have to hurt you.
Hondaman's creed: "Bikers are family. Treat them accordingly."

Link to Hondaman Ignition: http://forums.sohc4.net/index.php?topic=67543.0

Link to My CB750 Book: https://www.lulu.com/search?adult_audience_rating=00&page=1&pageSize=10&q=my+cb750+book

Link to website: www.SOHC4shop.com

Offline HondaMan

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Re: Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« Reply #10 on: November 27, 2010, 10:38:44 PM »
HA -- this is hilarious.

I just wired one of these new 73-75 harnesses into a 76 with the black/red third wire out of the starter switch. Wish I would have known about this post BEFORE I went through that.

Got everything to work properly except for the electric start - may work on that tomorrow.

If the Start switch has the Yellow/Red wire (most do) coming from it, match that to the same on the Start solenoid under the seat. Then, if the Start solenoid has a Green/Red wire coming out its other side, try unplugging it from where it is now, and plug it into that spare Green female socket hanging under the seat. Then it will start anytime, not just when in Neutral or de-clutched.

If instead of a Yellow/Red wire, there is only a Black/Yellow wire, try mating that to the Yellow/Red on the Start solenoid, and repeat the above Green/Red to Green switch. For a brief while in 1976/77 the Start switch came from another Honda bike (I think it was the new CX500 family) and it has no Yellow/Red, but instead a Black, Black/Red, and Black/Yellow. There's not a lot of these out there, but since the little plastic switches do fit into the 750 switch housing, they seem to find their way onto these bikes (maybe from junkyards?).

Before the K4, the Start solenoid had a Black and a Yellow/Red wire. The Black is, of course, Ignition 12 volt power. The Start button on the earlier bikes simply grounded the Yellow/Red to the handlebar to kick on the solenoid. the headlight had an OFF/Lo/HI switch on the right side.

Then (actually during the late K3, to be accurate) the Safety Module showed up, which required the clutch be pulled in or the tranny be in Neutral: it then created a "switched on Ground" to the bike on the Dark-Green/Red wire. Since (one side of) the Start solenoid was then connected to this "safety ground" wire to disable starting unless the government (DOT) thought it was OK, the Start switch had to change to supply the 12 volts to the solenoid when pressed, instead of grounding when pressed. So, the Start switch then got 2 wires instead of one, and one of them connected to the Start solenoid (still Yellow/Red) and the other "Black" to the Ignition inside the headlight bucket. This essentially reversed the current flow through the Start solenoid. These bikes had the headlight ON/OFF switch on the right, with the Hi/Lo switch moved over to the left (which I still can't get used to, old dogs...).

The Start-with-headlight-ON issue drained the battery quickly in cold climes, so the Start switch in the late K4 received yet another wire, which is described above. This added 4 more wires to the main harness, though, and it got bulky at the steering head, which often causes chafed wiring right there.

So, a new harness may often be the best fixup, as the old ones may have worn wires in this important area. If you get a used harness, remove the jacket in this section and look over/fix up these wires, then go to www.vintageconnections.com and get some of the newer black jacket (it's cheap) to slip over the harness again.
See SOHC4shop@gmail.com for info about the gadgets I make for these bikes.

The demons are repulsed when a man does good. Use that.
Blood is thicker than water, but motor oil is thicker yet...so, don't mess with my SOHC4, or I might have to hurt you.
Hondaman's creed: "Bikers are family. Treat them accordingly."

Link to Hondaman Ignition: http://forums.sohc4.net/index.php?topic=67543.0

Link to My CB750 Book: https://www.lulu.com/search?adult_audience_rating=00&page=1&pageSize=10&q=my+cb750+book

Link to website: www.SOHC4shop.com

Offline Don R

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Re: Wireing Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« Reply #11 on: November 28, 2010, 10:44:08 AM »
Hondaman you da --hondaman.
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Offline GammaFlat

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Re: Wiring Diagrams 75 vs. 76 CB750k
« Reply #12 on: November 28, 2010, 09:28:55 PM »
How lucky are we to have such talent on hand?  HondaMan is one of the folks that rode 'em, raced 'em, wrenched 'em and had the opportunity to be in touch with Honda through the early years of the SOCH4.  His generosity in sharing what he knows is matched by his curiosity, raw abilities and love of the bikes.  (Yeah Mark, I do find you to be a curious fellow :P.)  The current state of SOHC4's in the world is GREATLY impacted by this forum and contributing members like Mark. 

To all those that "contribute to" and support this forum, Thanks for the ride... so far.  ;)

Now I'll try to fit some '77 left and right controls to a '74... hmmmm.
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