Well it turns out the LED's with the threaded mounts are not going to work.  The blue one is easily seen in daylight, the green is just barely visible if you really look closely and stare at it while you turn it on/off, and the yellow are invisible in direct sunlight as the sun lights up the lenses more than the light does.  Out of the sunlight the lights are visible but not great......however the blue one would be too bright at night and would be distracting when the high beam headlight is on.

The LED's with the black plastic mount are kind of cool - but waaaaay too bright and they leave spots in your eyes if you look straight into them.  The mounts are nice as the light snaps out the back, then the black collars push into the front of a 1/4" hole - and the LED snaps into the back.  The yellow and green are visible in daylight - but the blue is just blinding day or night.  At first I thought I wouldn't be able to use them - but then I decided to use a hole punch and make a round dot with a piece of electrical tape - and I stuck it on the top of the blue light so it blocks the light coming out the center and you just see the light around  the perimeter of the LED - it makes a blue halo.  I think this will work better than having yellow turn signal indicators that you can see.  It may also be possible to use some kind of tint to make the light dimmer.

I did find out that you can put resistors inline and reduce the brightness of the DC powered LED's....but I have no idea what value of resistor to use.  I can buy a whole bunch of resistors pretty cheaply from retailers on eBay.....I might just have to do that and then just trial and error to find the right one.

In the photo below you can see that there already is a small resistor inline to reduce the 12v down to the 3.5 to 5.5 volts that the LED uses......when I did a search I found out that different colors need different voltages to operate at the same intensity....so hopefully I can drop the voltage down on the blue light and make it more user friendly.

Here's a random pic I pulled off google. Wire the middle terminal and either side terminal. Depending on which side terminal you use, you increase the resistance by turning the knob CW or CCW. I forget which terminal goes which direction. It won't matter for testing. You can't go wrong.

The potentiometer is a good idea.....however I just bought a set of 600 resistors for $ 3.45 and $ 1.45 shipping.  If anyone needs some resistors let me know.....I am sure to have some left over!

http://www.ebay.com/itm/281538447855?_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=...

I don't think it will take very long to find out how big of one I need.  I will just pick one that makes the blue light "glow" instead of "glare" at night.....I really don't need to have it very bright as I really don't need to see it much in the daytime - I can always just take my thumb and see what position the switch is in on the handlebar control.

You too?  . I have a box of probably useless components that I've unsoldered from different boards.

I got the bike all back together Saturday night, and all the electrical parts work.  I don't yet have the resistor in the high beam indicator light, I expect the resister bulk package to come in the mail this week.  The only weird thing I noticed is when the key is on and the GPS speedometer is energized, and I blow the horn.....the tachometer goes from 0 to the top end of the scale and the shift light come one.  I don't know if that happens when the bike is running or not.

Sunday I was going to take the bike outside and put fuel in it, and when I lowered the jack the front tire was flat!(?).  This is a bit weird as a month ago when I mounted the tire....it aired up and I could not get one bead to seat.  I let the air back out, put a bit more RuGlide on the bead, and then when I went to blow up the tire the tube had a hole in it.  I took the tube out and patched a  tear on the outside of the tire where the tread would be.  It was not a hole or slice but looked like a jagged tear about 1/8" long, and it did not look like a pinch....and how does a pinch occur on the outside away from the rim?  I always put the tube in the tire and blow it up to straighten out the tube - then let the air back out before I mount the second bead.  I patched the tire and it held air, seated the beads, and balanced fine.  It held air for a month - but for some reason it went flat in the last two days.  It has never been ridden on this tube - and it has another tear on the inside of the tube about 1/2" from the valve stem.

I don't trust this tube anymore.  I have not pinched a tube in more than 30 years during installation....and for some reason this tube has failed twice and I have never ridden on it.  The tube is an IRC and it looks fine - it is a 2.75/3 - 18 and although it works fine in a 90/90-18 tire.......it might be just a tad small for the 100/80-18 tire.  I can only find one company that makes a tube listed at 100/80-18, and it is a Heidenau HT30018.....so I will get one ordered.

I disconnected the Passing light switch from the headlight high beam, and now it runs an LED strobe in the front (under the headlight).  If I don't think someone sees me....I pull the Passing Switch and the strobe blinks with 2 yellow strobes and 2 white strobes.  It has 21 different patterns it can flash...I picked one that looked like it would get attention.

http://www.strobes-r-us.com/closeup.asp?cid=32&pid=923&offset=0

botticelli wrote on 05/04/15 at 20:49:34:


I use it mostly when approaching an intersection, or if someone is pulling out of a driveway and it doesn't look like they notice me coming.  You know the ones...........the folks that just keep creeping forward and make you wonder if the see you and are going to stop or pull out in front of you at the last minute.

I found the thread written about this light.
http://suzukisavage.com/cgi-bin/YaBB.pl?num=1372162554/0

Today I took the bike up to Ronnie Price upholstery in Fairfield to have a new seat padding and cover made.  He is a really cool dude and really dedicated to knowing what you want....I am glad I found him.  He is going to do the padding first and then I need to go up for a test fit, and then eh will do the cover.

I also started the bike up for the first time since I installed the new tach and speedo.  Everything looks like is is going to work.

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