Today I finally installed the Signal Dynamics voltage monitor in the instrument cluster of the Ulysses. I used a walkthrough that FT_BSTRD posted over on the Adventure Rider forums (read his Advrider post here).
The install took roughly an hour, and there were very few hiccups on the way.
First step was to remove the instrument cluster from the bike, and bring it inside to where I was less likely to lose any of the small parts.
Here you can see the necessary ingredients: Instrument cluster from a 2008 Buell XB12X, Signal Dynamics voltage monitor, little blue electrical splicers (worthless, I ended up splicin into the wires themselves), and my Dell Mini 9, which was displaying the post referenced above.
This is what the voltage monitor itself looks like. The black box houses the electronics, and the LED is the output. Depending on the voltage it senses, it glows green (good), yellow (not as good) or red (bad). This alerts you to the health of your battery and charging system.
Disassembling the instrument cluster, you end up with this piece. Notice the two extra circles at the bottom? The LED will fit into one of those, which I have marked with a center punch so the drill bit doesn’t wander across the plastic face.
Drilling out the holes in this piece, the circuit board that holds all of the instrumentation, and the back of the cluster took only a few minutes. While threading the wiring for the LED through all of the necessary pieces I slightly mangled the heat-shrink tubing surrounding the LED, but I figure it will be protected by the rest of the cluster. Several screws later, I had this:
The wiring exits the cluster through a vent port on the back that would normally allow moisture to escape. Now it allows moisture and wiring to escape. The electronics adhere to the back of the cluster with double sided tape. The only part left to do is to wire the positive red wire and the negative black wire to somwhere that receives power on the bike when it is running.
I chose the two leads that come out of the accessory plug. Since the accessory plug is only hot when the bike is running,it is the perfect location. Incidentally, the two blue wire splicing plugs seen in this photo didn’t work at all, so I threw them out and spliced directly into the wires themselves. A few tight wraps of electrical tape, and I should be good to go.
The final step was to test the monitor to see if everything was working correctly. Turn the key, set the ignition to on, and thumb the starter.
The bike coughed to life, and the LED flashed green, then yellow, then red, then settled at green and stayed lit. Perfect.
Now I know at a glance whether the battery is in good shape or not, and it samples in real time, so every time I plug in a GPS, heated vest, or turn on the heated hand grips I know what the electrical system is doing.
