All,

I posted this over in the "Ignition" section, but figure I may get more advice/heckeling over here in the Evo section. . .

Disclaimer: I would refer to my owner's manual, but I am in the military and all of my household goods, including the service manual, have already shipped to my next duty station.

I know this is probably a relatively stupid question, but for all my years of riding, I have always started my 1993 Heritage Moo Glide in the "Lights" setting with little issue. I never even thought to ever use the "Ignition" setting. (Seems kind of silly now, but I am just being honest.)

Then, my bike would not start during a motorcycle safety course where mine was the only Harley in the class. When it failed me, I had to jump on a rice burner to finish the course. Everyone started calling me, "All Show & No Go!"

I had to have the bike towed to the local Harley shop where it spent three weeks and a little over a $1,000 later with a new coil, battery, etc., I left it outside the dealer while I went to run some errands with my wife, then when we returned at approximately 15 minutes after the dealership had closed, I hopped on my bike, switched it to "Lights" like I had always done, hit the starter and . . . NOTHING. Needless to say, my wife was NOT very happy after spending all that money to have it repaired.

To make a LOOOOOOOONG story shorter, after sitting outside of the dealership for approximately two hours trying to get a hold of someone to lock my bike back up until they could re-look at it today, I finally reached one of the mechanics who came up and he started it RIGHT UP. I was flabbergasted and he watched me try to start it and it was only after about the third try that he diagnosed what I was doing wrong.

The bike started EVERY TIME in the "Ignition" setting and all of my lights, signals, etc. still work fine.

So, I have deduced there is a reason it has an "Ignition" position on the dial!

Now, my follow on question is, if I start it in "Ignition" do I leave it there for the entire time or do I switch it to "Lights" at some point?

I want to ensure I have the proper procedure down because this has shown me you CAN teach an old dog new tricks!

Thanks for any and all help/advice,

Stranger

 

Just before you shift into 1st, you flip it to "lights"

 

+1 on above, perhaps the switch is/was getting worn. Where is your new duty station, someplace nice I hope??

 

On older bikes the "ignition" position was just that, no lights except dash and brake lights. No headlights, marker lights or signals. Later on it became mandatory for the lights to be on anytime the engine was running, so Harley added a little jumper wire between the circuit breakers of "ignition" and "lights" so the lights were on in either position. This is most likely how yours is set up. That's how my 90 was originally. I snipped the jumper wire on mine to go back to the old style. That way the lights aren't robbing the starter of needed amps to turn the bike over. I just have to remember to click it over to lights before I start riding off.

 

I'm not sure how your '93 is set up but my '95 has lights first and then ignition to start the bike.

 

Might be different here in Oz as all my bikes have been ignition one click right,one more then it's lights.

 

I think the way our bikes were wired was different in some markets. Certainly on my 1990 Glide the lights don't come on in the Ignition position, but at the time here in the UK it was not a legal requirement to have lights on in daylight.

My more recent bikes don't have a separate lights position, but they are wired up so that when pressing the starter button the lights dim, presumably to reduce load on the battery while the starter is doing it's stuff.

Despite having a modern high spec battery, probably far better than the original one, I start in Ignition mode and only turn on the lights when the motor has settled down.

 

Forgive my ignorance please, but can you elaborate as to why this is the procedure? Thanks.

 

Does not matter what position you put the switch in, they are the same on all modern Harleys sold in the U.S.(mid`80s and later).

 

The older Ignition switch (mounted on the tank) were wired so there was the "Ignition" setting and the "Lights" setting. Then when the government decided that they knew better and required the light to be on when running, Harley just wired the Lights to the Ignition. On my older models, I would go into the wiring and just cut the wire that Harley installed to get the separate switch position back. This way I could ride with the lights off in the day time. Now with my newer models I can't do that. (Harley does have the switch that turns the light off on Police Models. But they are required to change to the civilian switch when sold to Non-Police use, if so equipped. That switch is a Highly Restricted Part.)

After a few years, Harley just designed the switch to use the "Lights" position as an "Accessory" position (No lights or ignition). I bet the dealer replaced your ignition switch with a later model switch that had the "Accessory" setting. This way you would need to have the Main Switch in the Ignition setting to start your bike.