Quote:
Originally Posted by SpudRider
How did you add the neutral indicator light?
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(My memory is a little fuzzy on this and I've just had a couple of beers, so i might have a few details wrong.).
There are about 7 wires coming from the gearbox. These wires go to a connecter under the fuel tank. On the street version of this model, with a full instrument cluster, these wires go to a neutral light plus 5 LED's indicating each of the gears. I had none of those luxuries, not even a key, but I do have electric start so the neutral light wire (light green and red in my case) instead goes to the safety shutoff switch and starter motor relay, so the starter motor won't work unless its in neutral.
(So if you have an electric starter, or some other thing that prevents it from starting 'in gear' you'll probably have a neutral wire somewhere).
I cut the green/red wire at the connector, put a 12v light and a key in series, then completed the circuit back to the wire I had previously cut.
(Correction. Only the key is in series. The light is connected to the key but takes positive from a red wire somewhere.)
One blunder I made was that the key doesn't actually switch the engine off. It just completes the neutral light / starter motor circuit. I still have to use the safety switch to kill the motor, and the bike can still be kick started even when the key is removed. But I'm not worried about that. Its enough to confuse people and its a bit of a pig to kick start anyway. The main thing is it now cant be electrically started without the key. But the real reason I had to add a key or switch to the circuit was that without it the neutral light would ALWAYS have been on when the bike was in neutral, even when not running.
Now I'm getting really fuzzy ... The neutral wire and 5 of those other wires from the gearbox are basically just continuations of the negative circuit. The 7th wire is the negative 'in' wire. So you can easily identify which is which by tapping into them at the connector then running to the positive pole of the battery, (with a 12v light in between of course.)
Theres probably a few different ways to add a neutral light circuit. The basic thing to remember is that the neutral wire from the gearbox is a negative wire not a positive wire. Youve just got to tap into it, add a light, then complete the circuit to a positive wire somewhere.
By the way, my old 84' Honda CT 125 only has kick start but it does have a factory fitted neutral light. In this case it only has one or two wires coming from the gearbox. I think it would be pretty rare for a reasonably modern engine not to have a neutral sensor of some sort even if it doesn't have a light.
I hope thats some help and not too confusing. Are you thinking about this for a bike with electric start or some other type of neutral sensor?