Went to warm up the bike before putting on my gear this morning so I could ride her into work, but all I got was silence.  Pushing the button and no click, headlights don't dim or anything, no cranking.  I went to grab my multimeter to test the battery voltage, but alas the batteries in it were dead.

I pulled crank button and safety switch appart, jump'd them incase for whatever reason they went bad, but still no luck.

You guys just think its a dead battery?  I'm thinking its something else because I've drained the battery on this bike before, and when i'd hit it to crank the lights would die, and it'd click.  I drove the bike to my new place last thursday w/o any problem.  Are there any other switches I need to check that would cause it to not want to crank?  Is there a switch on the clutch handle?  I always hold the clutch in when I start, but I can't remember if I *have* too or not.

Thanks Guys!

On the 98 there is a switch in the clutch handle and in the sidestand. Both have to signal safe condition before she will crank. When in neutral the sidestand is irrelevant.

cool, she's in neutral so I'll pull the clutch handle appart and see if I can jump that one.  I should have hooked up my battery charger before I split for work just to be sure.

On '97+ models there is no need to pull the handle apart ... IF you just plan to "jump" the switch.

Pull these connectors ...




... and push a paperclip (or something) into both connectors.  You may want to tape the assembly together.



Another bypass method involves getting into the headlight bucket, but it leaves the bike looking the same.  Ask if you're interested.

While you're at it, you may as well remove the switch that the connectors were attached to, and see what's up.  If the switch is broken, a new one will cost you about $10.

appreciate the pictures, I just want to jump all the safety switches to find which one is open and not letting me start the bike. 

Hopefuly its just something silly, this is the first real problem the bike has given me so far.

I've got a pet peeve with safety and security type measures like this.  I understand why they're there, but the failure cases kinda scare me.  The clutch switch doesn't bother me because it only affects starting, so it's just an inconvenience.  What happens if my sidestand spring weakens and shuts off my engine while I'm going through a corner?  That would be far less fun.  I had a friend whose very expensive sports car stopped working because a $1 relay failed, making the car think it was stolen.  PITA.

I was right about it being a safety switch.  It was the clutch handle safety switch, jumped it and it cranked right up.  I'll probably just leave it jumped.

In the meantime I had the other switches all torn appart, and then the cut-off switch split into 3-4 different parts all over my garage.  Had a fun time finding the little spring and figuring out how to put it all back together

Quote from: Chuck on May 30, 2006, 01:40:04 PM
................What happens if my sidestand spring weakens and shuts off my engine while I'm going through a corner?  That would be far less fun.  ....................

That's why there are two springs, one inside the other, to make sure that doesn't happen.