First let me quickly introdude myself and my bike: 50, french born, brazilian (bahia) resident for more than 25 years, so please forgive my english. Bought a 2000 ls-650 in august 2007 with less than 17000 km. It now shows 50.000.
Today something weird happenned: the bike tried to start by itself and kept trying until I took of the seat and loosen the wires. There was no key on the bike, and switching on/off had no effect. The start button seemed to be moving normaly. As I was late to work and tomorrow is holiday I did not investigate anything. I can only say that at first sight I could not see any nude wire. IŽd appreciate any hint from the experts on where I should start the investigation.
TIA
Andre

My virago did it, when running down the highway @80 mph. Never even heard it till I slowed to ~35 to get the exit.
Burnt the starter ... to a crisp.
However much of the rest survived with only minimal damage.
The problem turned out to be a bad diode (in their words) but I call it a dead end plug. It plugs into the wiring harness has 3 inches of wires and ends in a rubber cap. That itself is stupid enough ... but the metal of the wires are poking through the moulded rubber encasing it. The thing has a idiotic cap on it, and if it were to take in water inbetween the cap and the rubber ... it will short one thing to another ...
If like in my case the cap slid out and the mounded rubber hit the frame ... it will ground any circuit you're unlucky enough to ground.
Starter may be the worst ...
Anyway I would look into some crap like that in the savage ... though I've not seen one in my 80's savages ... newer may have it, euro/South american bikes may have em ... no idea.
Cool.
Srinath.

Ohh, Itll start it if the ignition is on, but even iggy off, itll turn it over.

I forgot to say that untill yesterday I had the feeling that I should need to buy a new battery shortly because it was weak to start the engine and almost did not respond anymore after 3rd or 4th shot. Surprisingly today it lasted running the start motor at full steam continuously for around 3 mn until the motor burnt out. And even after the black smoke escaped from the motor and it stopped rotating there still had energy. There was a "tictictic" noise that did not  stop until I wired off.
Andre

The starter motor circuit does not have a fuse.  From battery to solenoid to starter, and that's it.
However, an emergency disconnect switch on the line between the battery and solenoid might be an idea.  It would need mounted so you could get to it quick though, and it would need to handle some pretty hefty amps.
Hmm.. could also put it between the solenoid and the starter.  Right where the lead goes into the starter.  That would be the best place IMHO.

No fuse, I think the motor hung. justin_o_guy2 wrote on 04/20/09 at 12:20:43:

Assuming this is the problem, how can I get the solenoid back to open position? Is it possible to get jammed by itself while the bike has been stopped during whole night?
Andre
youzguyz wrote on 04/20/09 at 08:24:28:

Tropical Savage wrote on 04/21/09 at 06:30:22:


First, you need to make sure the solenoid is jammed.  You will need a multi-meter.
Unhook all the wires from the solenoid.  Measure the resistance between the 2 large connectors.  It should show OPEN if it is not jammed.  If it shows SHORTED(closed), then it is jammed shut.  Even if you DO fix that by lightly hitting it, I would NOT use it in the bike again.  Odds are the contacts inside are damaged and will tend to jam again.
Buy a new one.

You asked if it jammed by itself.  I doubt it.  When did it start this behavior?  Did you just try to start it? and the starter would not stop spinning?  I have a hard time believing you were just standing there and it started spinning on it's own!
When this occurs, it normally happens right when the starter switch is pressed.  The surge of current through the solenoid to the starter can arc the contacts and "weld" them together.