Electrical Problem

[Gilk51]

My son rides the Kawasaki ZR-7S and it just conked out on us a couple of weeks ago when we were going to take a short ride together. It was interesting, only the turn signals worked. Turned out that a push on the key switch wire bundle fixed it but, of course, it happened again.

Last Friday I took a serious look at it, expecting to replace the key/switch assembly (not a cheap part). After buying a 30mm socket to get the upper triple clamp off, I found some funky fasteners holding the wire bundle covers down. I took the whole thing to our local Ace Hardware and the guy there said "security Torq". He ended up selling me a set of 1/4" nut driver ends that was very interesting (and the reason for this post):

http://www.texasarlingtoncs.us/pics/tools/security_bits0936h.jpg
This has some 3-prong Phillips bits, offset Phillips, Torqs with a hollow center (what I needed) and a couple of others. Very interesting.

This piece has the security Torqs plus headless bolts to keep from tampering with the ignition key. I was hoping for a wire bundle problem so that I wouldn't have to spend $100 minimum on the whole part. And, ta da! this is what I found:

http://www.texasarlingtoncs.us/pics/zr7s/broken_wire0915q.jpg

The white wire (one half of the main 30 amp main power) was broken! :-D
Got that re-soldered and we are back in business!
As one guy said on the ZR-7 forum "Gotta love a simple fix!"
:mrgreen:

[Texas T]

Chuck, I'm looking for a set of drivers like that. What was the cost?

[Gilk51]

Chuck, I'm looking for a set of drivers like that. What was the cost?

I remember it was $13 something. I also bought a 1/4" driver for the bits so my total cost was $21 for both.

If you can't find 'em, I am pretty sure they have more & I could get them to you.

[scratch]

"Security and Tamper-Proof"

- yet anyone can walk in and buy a set. Seems like that kind of defeats the purpose! ;-)

Thanks for the tip - might have to add that to my tool kit too. 8-)

[kurt]

"Security and Tamper-Proof"

- yet anyone can walk in and buy a set. Seems like that kind of defeats the purpose! ;-)

Thanks for the tip - might have to add that to my took kit too. 8-)

I found that Suzuki uses a screw that breaks the driver head off when it bottoms out. You have to remove the top triple, turn it over and use a drill press to remove fastener head. :angryfir:

[scratch]

I found that Suzuki uses a screw that breaks the driver head off when it bottoms out. You have to remove the top triple, turn it over and use a drill press to remove fastener head. :angryfir:

Well, there's no doubting their sincerity about making it tamper-proof. ;-)

Problem is, the typical bike is so easy for a thief to simply carry away without even having to bother with trying to start it up. That break-away screw head mostly serves to frustrate the owner or mechanic who has a legitimate need to work on it. Does this seem kind of obvious? :shrug:

[Gilk51]

True, Mr. Scratch. I was looking at drilling out the same type of security screws if I needed to replace the key-switch assembly - I was glad that I only needed to open the cover with the security Torq and resolder the wire.