Hi gang,

I finally spent sime time and installed the lights made by Knifemaker and a small voltmeter/temp gauge/clock on the Vulvan.

The are the devices:
Headlights:
http://www.metriccustomcreations.com/Main.html
Freeze-Alert Thermometer from Big Bike Parts: (http://www.bigbikeparts.com/)

The installation did not take long, the instructions from Knifemaker and Dianne (in the Vluvan verses) were very useful. Knifemaker's kit was of high quality and the price was right (he forgot to include a couple of washers but provided a lot of wire). There is so much extra wire (almost a yard) that I had to cut it, becuase I mounted the switch close to the headlight. I liked playing with it and am not complaining, but allow some extra time for that unless you want a large spool of wire to be residing under your headlight. I am very satisfied with the result. I installed the switch on the left side of the front plastic cover right above the yellow reflector. Install it on the flat vertical side right above the yellow reflector, not on the tilted side because it won't fit. Don't ask me how I know. ;)

The thermometer/voltmeter/clock is a useful (and elaborate, for $22)device, shrink-wrapping it is excellent weather protection idea, but the wires are so thin that you cannot splice them (like Dianne said). So I took some bullet connectors, put them on thicker wires and solder the thick wires to the device's thin wires and then pluged the bullet connectors into the power outlets under the head light. I also cut the brown wire to the tach in the light bucket and soldered the the orange wire from this gadget into it. For some of this I used the extra leftover wire from Knifemaker's kit.

I am thankful to this forum for the useful information.

Question - what is the best way of heating black heatshrink tubing? What is the best way of dealing with it if the two wires soldered together are of substantially different diameter or if I want to put it onto a crimp connection and a wire?

Hromit

i just finished fusing my stator and i had different gauge wire to connect and shrink wrap. i used two sizes of shrink wrap. before connecting and soldering the wires, i put a 1/2 piece of small shrink wrap on the smaller wire and the larger shrink wrap on the larger gauge. i soldered the connection and slid the larger wrap over the connection and the smaller shrink wrap. i used a heat gun to shrink and then being anal as i am i covered it with electrical tape. if it wasn't for the fact that i was working by gasoline, sometimes used a bic lighter and pass it near the shrink wrap, that works real good, just keep the lighter moving. hope it helps

ride safe, john

another thing you can get at walmart, its a crimp connector with shrink wrap plastic housing, that works good and is in the auto section

john

Why fuse stator??

Hi - I just bought three 15-amp and three 20-amp fuses to avoid future problems with my stator (I think this one is blown), but can someone tell me where those fuses go? I looked in the junction box and I have three 10-amp and one 30-amp fuse (plus a replacement for each). Am I missing something?

Thanks.

Cindy Robins

Yep. You have to "make" where the fuses go. I uploaded a picture of someone elses fused stator in the gallery under modifications.

You cut the yellow wires coming from the stator to the r/r, and put in fuse holders. If your stator is blown, then there isn't any reason to do this because your new stator will come with new wires.

Bilyum - here's your answer:

If the r/r is fried, as in shorting out, it will cause the stator to "burn up" from the heat it creates from making electricity. This equation, V=IR, voltage = current X resistance, can be reconfigured as V/R=I, or voltage divided by resistance = current. One equation for watts (heat) is VI, voltage times current. If the r/r is shorted, the resistance of the r/r = 0 (shorted to ground), so the current from the stator is 50 volts divided by 0. By theory, this would mean that the current being produced by the stator would be infinite. Watts, then, would be infinite, or at least hotter than the sun. The wires and insulation making up the stator would melt, thus decreasing the voltage output to nil. And there you have it, a shorted r/r kills the stator. This is why it's important to do the modification of "fusing" your stator, so that a current output of more than 15 amps will kill the fuse, as opposed to killing the stator.

Ok cegodsey! Makes sense ,thanks for the info--

Well the new thought is that you really need three 7.5 amp fuses. This was actually obtained through calculation as opposed to assumption.

I Tried To Order The Light Bar From Knightmaker, But Was Told That They Would Not Be Making It Any More. Something About The Quality Of The Light Bar. Did You Order Yours From Knightmaker Just Recently?

Last I heard, KM's material supplier raised their prices quite a bit on him, and he wasn't going to buy lower quality material at the old prices.

I purchased several items from by KM recently and he is basically out of the manufacturing business for a while. He said he hoped to be back in business soon.