Indicators on a 1990 Tenere 3AJ
 

Hi,

I've been lurking on the HUBB for a while trying to decide which bike to buy and i've finally bought myself a 1990 XT 600 Tenere 3AJ. The idea is to get it mot'd, use it through winter, then a rebuild in the spring, and possibly a rtw trip after that. It was bought off ebay and I had to travel down from Scotland to Birmingham to get it, which took about 12 hours on Friday. Typically on the first corner the bike fell over, but after some readjustment was fine for the rest of the trip, and no damage was done.

I got home at almost 2am so left the bike in the van overnight, as i had been pndering how i was going to get it out when i have no ramp, or handy plank like the guy i bought it from. Fortunately where i live in Bathgate is still under construction so i chose the highest kerb i could find which meant parking the van diagonally across a junction, then sitting a pallet at the rear doors to make an easier step down. Luckily the road is very quiet. At this point i realised that i couldn't undo the ratchet straps so i had to run home, get a pair of scissors as a last resort, and a socket set. I managed to undo the bolts holding the eyes in the floor of the van so it saved me cutting the straps. After that the bike came out easy, i was surprised to find it so much easier and lighter to move than my CBF1000, despite the extra height.

I've read through all 85 pages of the Yamaha section and managed to find an owners manual to download, but i've not been able to find a working link for a workshop manual. Could anyone point me in the direction of one please? I'll try a Yamaha dealer tomorrow in the hope they have one but i'm doubtful.

The bike is complete, but looks a little rough, most of the fairing bolts seem to be missing but that should be an easy fix. More pressing problmes are the indicators do not work, neither does the speedo, nor the tacho, and all the dash lights except for the high beam indicator.

I've found and replaced the fuse, and taken apart the switch box on the handlebar to check for loose connections, but nothing so far. I've ordered a flasher unit in case it's that, and it'll let me test out how one of the online parts places are. If it's not that does anyone have any idea's what it may be?

I'll try to add a pic when i've cleaned the bike up, the colour is a deep blue so not like the normal pale blue and yellow these bikes mostly seem to be.

Safe riding.

Euan

Welcome to the madhouse!!!:thumbup1:

theres a couple of bits in here that might be relevant for you.

Owners Manual

Pete

Hi, I live in Edinburgh and have a 1989 3AJ, if there's bits you want to swap off etc to check that yours work then let me know. On mine the neutral light has never worked, I assume it has something to do with a previous owner disabling the "won't-start-in-gear" switch that lurks in the gearbox somewhere and is prone to failure.

My dash lights go off sometimes because the connector plug gets pulled apart from time to time when turning that bars. There are a lot of connectors down there and the tacho and speedo can be working without the dash' lights connector.

Dodgy connections is the most likely cause of not working indicators, maybe a duff earth or connection on the flasher? If only one indicator is working it will turn on and then never flash, so you must have something that is affecting both.

The speedo is cable driven so if the cable is connected ok then perhaps there's something up inside the speedo/tacho casing?

This is me sort of thinking out loud to you, apologies if it's all stuff you've tried already. It sounds like the kind of thing you'll have to go through with a test lamp/multimeter though:-(

Thanks for the replies so far guys, i've checked out various things but not found a fault yet. I'm tempted to think it's the flasher unit as none of the indicators will flash at all, but all the other lights are fine. The flasher unit may arrive tomorrow and i'll retest once thats been fitted.

I called a dealer today and they said they had a service/maintenance/workshop manual for my bike so i bought it and i should get it in the next few days. I'm tending to look at this as i get to play with my cake then i get to eat it, so it's a healthy fun experience troubleshooting like this.

Alex, once my bike is up and running with a new mot i'll be taking it in to the city centre most days, so it would be good to meet up and have a look at yours. Or having read your post, if you still need a garage to do the work on your choke cable you're welcome to come out and use mine in Bathgate.

Euan

Fixed
 

I managed to solve the problem with my indicators tonight. It turned out it was the switch that was faulty, so i'd taken it all off the bike for a better look.

A dealer quoted me £75 for a new one, and there was one on ebay for around £30 secondhand, but i wanted to try to fix it myself. The actual problem turned out to be the centre contact on the sliding part of the switch itself. The middle contact was worn and was therefore not being touched and not creating the circuit. I tried to cut a bit of copper to shape but it was too thick, so i resorted to adding a piece of solder to make the circuit.

It's all back on the bike now and still working, so roll on the MOT at the weekend.

Euan

The solder blob trick!
 

I just came up with the same solder blob bodge on mine a few weeks ago too. I had a slightly different failure mode so I didn't think of it as the problem you had.

I managed without a garage the other weekend, and now the choke seems to be working again.

Some of us Edinburgh (ish) types are meeting at Cafe Royale tomorrow night if you wanted to meet up. Otherwise, join the Edinburgh HUBB community mailing list to fid out the date of the next pub meet.