Hey gang,

I'm getting close to firing the '97 FLSTC up. Got the exhaust installed yesterday (V&H Big Shots Long), and man what a pain in the *** that was. Extremely tihht fit everywhere, so if you plan to get these pipes remember it.

For the hell of it, I turned the ignition on to check all my lights (I put LED's in *everything*). All seemed to be working nicely except the light on the front fender.

I looked at the wiring disgrams in my factory repair manual, but thst stuff's like reading Mandarin Chinese to me.

Then I followed the witing back from the fender and it led to a connector sitting between the tanks. I don't remember disconnecting it from anything when I took the right side tank off, nor can I find anything to connect it to anyway.

I thought about maybe direct wiring to a power source, but I wouldn't know where to hook it to so that it comes on with the lights.

Anyone have any ideas why this is like it is? Is it *not* supposed to be connected and is just for looks? Any ideas how I *can* somehow connect it to the place it will work with the lights like it's supposed to?

Here's a picture of what is under the dash between the tanks:

 

I have no book or hands on so just a (very) wild guess - look on the bottom of the dash at the harness for the speedo etc and see if there's a connector that's lonely.

 

That is not the connector for the fender lamp.

The connector that powers the fender lamp also has the wires for the low beam, high beam, ground.

4 pin connector:
Orange/White wire (Tip Lamp)
White wire (High Beam)
Yellow wire (Low Beam)
Black wire (Ground)

Find this connector and unplug it, read the voltage at the O/W wire.

If there is power, reconnect and go to the small two wire connector for the tip lamp, read voltage at the O/W wire.

Have you checked the bulb?

 

Did you put a new LED bulb in the fender tip?

You know that LED bulbs need to be installed with the correct polarity, right?

(Unlike incandescent bulbs that don't care which pin of the bulb is connected to the "hot" wire.)

I haven't had to replace the tip lamp in my '96 FLSTC yet, so I don't know if they can only go in one way or if you can put them in the wrong way, polarity-wise.

I don't know if the '97 and '96 FLSTCs have identical wiring, but according to my '96's FSM, the small two wire connector for the fender tip lamp is located "behind the left fuel tank".

If it's stock wiring, the two wires should be Orange/White and Black at that small connector.

 

Start with probing the light connector with the bike on, to see if you have power or not. If you have power, then LED was installed the wrong way,and just need to install it with it pins the other way in the socket.

If no power at the socket, then start working your way from the socket, through the fender, the wire should come up the primary side of the bike out of the fender, and as stated, goes to the front main light connector in the fairing. My guess if no power to the socket, then wire is broken between where it leaves the fender, but before it gets to the connector fairing (had this on my 97 road king that I had to repair the wires where it broke just above the lower triple clamps).

 

Lift the bundle directly below the circled plug and see if it has an open port on it.

 

Hey guys, sorry it takes so long to get back to my threads, but my satellite went out almost a week ago and I'm aggravated and frustrated as hell because 1) it's nothing but an absolute PITA doing this on a friggin' phone, and 2) they told me they can't get a technician out here until the 31st of this month. That, and I badly need to get this bike back together because I ride it as my main transportation because of disabilities I got from work and a cager t-boning me last year this mothers day, and I think I put the cam in 180 degrees off as trying to fire it up yesterday it blew out the carb twice like a shotgun blast.

Anyway, sorry about that...okay, I also followed the wire from the tip out the fender up alongside the front brake line to the neck where it's zip-tied to several other covered bunches of wires into the space between the tanks and the plug in the picture unfortunately really is the wiring for the front tip.

As for making sure about any bulbs, I ran into that problem - the polarity thing - years ago when I turned every light, except the gss gauge bulb, in my '98 FXD to LED. It took a few weeks just researching which bulbs would replace which, and a couple tries at brightness of the bulbs replacing the dummy lights (turn signals, oil, etc) so they wouldn't blind me at night but I could still see them much better in the daylight than rhe stock bulbs.

When all was said and done, I knew about LED bulbs and the way some bulbs needed to have the correct polarity, lol. It was a PITA getting it all done, but another long story proved it was more than worth the trouble replacing everything wit LED's.

So, I tested several bulbs I could or would use in the tip, in the rear fender tip, and they all work fine. That means no power to the front tip.

I need to check one more thing I just remembered might possibly have something to do with this problem...a week or so ago I put in the little wire plugin thing that H-D sells that lets one use the passing lamps when using high or low beams. Really nice to finally be able to do that on the back roads! I'll check to see if maybe I messed or missed anything putting that in, but I doubt it.

 

The connector above your circled connector looks like the light connector, (red arrow), follow the orange white to the fender tip light connector (blue arrow)

 

If the marks are lined up, it can't be 180 out, one cam mark on the small line between the teeth on the pinion (2 teeth clockwise from the key slot), while the other cam dot lined up on the breather gear.

Are you sure the timing cup is in the slot?
Do you have adjustable pushrods? If not, from rear to front, the pushrod colors should be Purple, blue, yellow, green.

 

The cam is an EV13, and the ignition in the bike is new. This one: https://www.denniskirk.com/v-factor/...rd/2000210.sku

The pushrods are S&S quickee (two long for exhaust, two short for intake).

The single fire coil has three terminals for the wires. The center is positive, the two ends are negative. The center holds the stock bike ignition wire with the 12V.

I"ve checked and the ignition wire has 12V and when I put the other wires from the cam sensor on the coil, when I turn the ignition on and the handlebar switch to 'run', the center terminal has 12V and the other two terminals have 12V too...the spark plug holes in the coil each have 12V too, which I presume means the sparkplugs are getting spark.

Does this sound right?