electrical help needed

[Jonesy :-)]

Hey Ev
only thing I noticed with the rec/reg in the link to the US site was mine has elongated mounting holes and comes from a different seller.
my seller has already dispatched a replacement....fingers crossed.

[Jonesy :-)]

ok some answers in no particular order
yes this was a plug n play unit.
plugs on new unit were perfect match to the existing oem harness and wire colours corresponded across the plug.

this cooked rec/reg bike is #581, the good actor & the bike that reluctantly donated its rec/reg to the bad actor 594.
594, as discussed with Eveready offline, now makes 14.3 V at idle and 14.6 when revved with 581's rec/reg

gunna check Ev's link and digest the info

[Eveready1100]

Hi Jonesey,
            Just found a thread on the Dotcom site that has a familiar tone to it. - CLICKY
As Jeff had stated, looks / sounds/ and probably smells like the wiring may be skew-wiff going into the connectors.

[excess.11]

Did the colours and connectors and number of wires match the original unit and wiring harness same for same ..........and has the changeover unit from your surplus bike been working on this bike ok ?

[Jonesy :-)]

the saga continues, bought a modern unit that went up in smoke as soon as I turned the key on. just fired off an email to the US based seller to see how this can be resolved...............
image shows stuff oozed out of the unit and deposit left on rag underneath

[Jonesy :-)]

swapping out parts? it'll never catch on, crazy in the coconut concept ya got there Jeff..........
581 tacho is a bit suss too, wont go past 5,000.
but I do have a brand spanker in the box that I've been saving for a special occasion

[excess.11]

I have an idea.........I know it may seem outrageous........but to pinpoint and determine if your problem is the tacho or other ........you might try swapping the good tacho off the other bike 
I know ....I know.....it s a hairbrained idea ........but humour me and give it a try .

Initially when I recommissioned my bike after many years of neglect ....my tacho went wacko ( windscreenwiperesq ) somewhere betwixt 3,700 and 4,700 rpm .....as the clean up of all connections and ground straps progressed..so did the improvement of it s operation.
Sort of like "magic".........but not.
FWIW .....my assumption of the root cause of your reg/rec unit fail........ was the faulty melted connector block . If any of the 3 white wires had at some point become fused together due to the hot connection..........the collective voltages would of been sending the internal components into overload .
For every action...there is a reaction.

Quote
thanks all for letting me waste your time, breath and type writering.
now i'm off for a ride to see if that tacho is steady........

No probs Mud...err Jonesy..........it sure would of been a totally boring resolution to your problem had you followed my first reply at the start of the topic.
How else do we get our post count up on the forum ?
And why in the hell would you have wanted to take  a perfectly good, quickly repaired, running bike to Bourke...... and had one less story to tell around the campfire?
 

[Jonesy :-)]

SEE, I TOLD YA!
there, that saves you blokes saying it.
Quickly interchanged the 4 rec/regs I have on hand.
Measured at the battery results=
Original 594 (this problem machine) 18 volt o/put
ute load of spares No1 rec/reg.....18V
ute load of spares No2 rec/reg..... 12.6 or zero v
Gulp, fingers crossed put in the Old faithful 581 rec/reg........hey presto 14.5V 

thanks all for letting me waste your time, breath and type writering.
now i'm off for a ride to see if that tacho is steady........
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
EDIT
well it didn't fix the tacho but hopefully I wont be boiling anymore batteries

[Miti]

This is a right laugh, ain't it..?   Glad it's not my bike...

What Jeff is saying makes damn good sense... No matter what you do to check and re-check what's wrong with the regulation system on bike "A", if bike "B" is AOK and bike "A's" rec/reg makes it sick, then bike "A's" rec/reg is at fault... All the other "symptoms" are of little consequence...

Testing through substitution has been, and still is, a tried and tested (sic) method for electronics fault diagnosis over many decades... Take the suspect one off and substitute a known good one...  Best way forward.

Re: 7 or 8 wire rec/reg units...

There are original "Shindengen" units with either one or two black wires.  I think the 7-wire type are earlier examples and these appear to be more sensitive to corrosion around the mounting bolts and harness ground tags... I think (no proof here, just what I've seen on various bikes) that Shindengen added the extra ground wire to be certain their devices were getting the best possible ground reference and providing the best possible regulation because of that...

Here's an interesting test that shouldn't blow anything up....

Set your DVM to DC Volts and, with the bike running on an aux tank, connect the two leads to:

The battery -ve terminal...
The bolt securing the harness ground tags to the rec/reg and frame...

(doesn't matter which way around).

If the DVM reads anything at all, that's a voltage difference twixt the battery earth potential and the frame earth potential.  I had an old 5K7 that gave me 3V dc difference when the headlight was on (more current through the harness).  I ended up removing the rec rec and using a flap-wheel to get rid of the rust underneath... I cleaned out the threads with an M6 tap and replaced the securing bolts with stainless jobs... The voltage difference was just a few millivolts after that - saved me ?50 for a replacement rec/reg (which wouldn't have worked anyway...

HTH

Miti

[excess.11]

I may of been delusional at the time  ......but somewhere.. sometime ago...I thought you queried me about there being no connection to a black wire at the connector for the reg/rec unit.........or was it from the wiring harness plug at that same connection ?
Re your last query......As most Magicians already know........magic does nt last forever (especially when it comes to an intermittent elect problem on an XS1100 )......I did nt have the heart to tell you...... as you seemed too over the moon ....at the prospect of..... "somehow it had fixed itself".

Ta dah presenting the magical mystical self repairing bike........
went through all the tests again with the original rec/reg installed and got the right results on all points and never exceeded 14.5v
turned the bike off went to walk away spun around quickly and yelled BOO at it then did the tests again....faultless,
oh let me tell you how much I love these bikes, and auto electrickery even more so, ahh! frustration with a capitol XS.
she's all back together  again now, ready for Nymboida 

[Jonesy :-)]

Jeff,
glad you got that off your chest about the rec/reg.......first I'd heard of that 
anyway fired up this arvo with a borrowed battery from 581 (also a yellow Motobatt) and got 18 volts
So the melted white wires weren't a contributor to this overcharging problem..........so next
whoa, wait! (screeching tyre noise.)
just to go back to your previous post.

....there is a  unconnected "ground"/black wire in the short harness on that component ....would nt hurt to run a neg wire to that even though the unit picks up a ground point through the 2 holding screws to the frame of the bike.
 

do you mean run a black wire into the sealed rec/reg unit?....too good for me

I also got pretty fancy with the multi meter and selected the ohms mode and tested Miti's theory of dodgy earth/ mount and got zero resistance from the Phillips head screw holding the rec/reg down and the battery earth.
Ok, press play again
tomorrow I will try the good rec/reg from 581
tell me true can a rec/reg fault be intermittent? coz I did get totally normal readings a while back before the rally

[excess.11]

If you follow the red wire from the reg/rec unit on the schematic below....you will see that it does goes to the battery as this is how the battery receives its charging current.There are no components in line.... aside from the main fuse..... of which  if there was a fault...it would show as undervoltage.....not the overvoltage your experiencing.
 https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-4OedWlgOS6k/TV0DVJ1VCzI/AAAAAAAAAR4/Klh2zgUBGro/s2048/XS11G_US.jpg
Ever wondered why the headlight goes slightly brighter when you rev the motor from idle ?.......it s compensating for load and charging at a higher rate.
This is a rough basic test to see if your alternator is putting out charge and the reg/rec unit is converting it to the battery.

Another basic test I may not of mentioned....is...........TO CHANGE THE FRIGGIN REG/REC UNIT FROM YOUR SPARE BIKE!!!
There...... I got that out of my system........

Any other tests regarding other colored wiring do by the book...as there are many variables which I can t control from sitting behind this computer......such as......back feed through components .....testing in or out of circuit......state of connections and wiring on bike.....

[Jonesy :-)]

A voltmeter connected anywhere else....... will only show voltage on that particular line at that point

Hey Jeff thats what I want to see.......if 18 volts is coming from the rec/reg.

I'll also run the extra earth wires you and Miti have suggested

Another suggestion from Christian was to check that none but the black wire (brown, green, red & black )connected to rec/reg go to earth.

with meter in beep mode, black probe on earth, all 4 wires beeped with ignition key turned off. only the black beeped with key turned on.

Does that suggest anything to the nerds.......said in a most respectful tone

[excess.11]

Re.... where to connect the voltmeter .......the battery is the heart of the electrical system........if you are nt getting correct voltages there..........you sure won t be getting them anywhere else on the bike .
A voltmeter connected anywhere else....... will only show voltage on that particular line at that point .......which is where we go checking if component are not working as they should .

[excess.11]

I have .....epiphanies. ....sorta like a eureka moment....but my brain has no control over them
If I m not thinkin about a problem....thats when I get a "light bulb" moment.
 On subject.....re the reg/rec unit....there is a  unconnected "ground"/black wire in the short harness on that component ....would nt hurt to run a neg wire to that even though the unit picks up a ground point through the 2 holding screws to the frame of the bike.