Motorcycle Safety & Driveability: elect.shorts, sportster 883, professional dealer

Question
do you know of any tsb for a short in a 1998 sportster 883 At times when starting the breaker will blow. Turn the front end up straight and it works fine. One time the starter would crank when the key was turned on and would not stop cranking even while running. I stripped all the casing wiring from the head lamp to the ign switch and found nothing rubbing or shorted ?

Answer
James,

Thanks for the question.

It's a bit out of my league technically, but you obviously have a very bad electrical problem. I suspect it's in the ignition somewhere rather than in the wiring, since somewhere the juice is being allowed to flow. The blown breaker indicates that the power is not shutting off to the starter. The problem could possibly be a bad starter swith on the handlebar, or a stuck starter selenoid.

The turning of the bars may be taking up slack in the wiring just enough to make things good again, but if that's the case it still needs to be rewired (it should work at all handlebar positions).

It's an odd problem to be sure, and a dangerous one. I'd get some professional dealer help for it as soon as possible. If for some crazy reason the starter were to engage while you are riding at highway speed, it could "gernade" and possibly lock the engine, causing you to crash most likely, or get run over from behind, which is worse.

Get it fixed as soon as you can.

Good luck,

Bill Roberson