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Failing ignition switch and repair.

13K views 13 replies 6 participants last post by  vf1000ride 
#1 · (Edited)
I figured I can’t be the only sportclassic owner that has had an ignition switch problems over the years but I have never heard of any complaints from the forum and figured I would tell my story to help others. My bike is the ’07 model and you can see the mods I have done in my sig line. As part of the back story I have had my ignition switch replaced once already due to the bike not turning on when you turn on the key. It felt as if something was either broken or just dirty inside the switch because if you turned the key on and off several times it would clear itself up for a while. I had the first one replaced under factory warranty but it started to happen to me again and the bike is now well out of warranty. Being I tend to be good with my hands and kinda cheap I figured I would try to take the darn thing apart and clean it this time versus buying a new one for a few hundred bucks. I am including the pictures and the procedure for anybody that wants to try this on their own to save some cash.

I am starting with the ignition key switch assembly already removed from the bike. As you can see, not terribly clean.

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The view from underneath before cleaning the outside.

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Here is the after cleaning but what you need to notice is the two fasteners on either side of the housing in the small recessed holes. I had originally figured on them being some form of a rivet. They turn out to be a special kind of screw that the head snaps off of after they are torqued down at the factory.

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Here is a picture of the special hole cutter bit I used to drill out the screws and what is left of those two screw style fasters after I drilled the heads off them. I would think that any standard drill bit would be fine to remove the screws as long as you took your time and was sure to be centered on them. You may be able to unscrew them if you can make a special tool that could bite into them and spin them counterclockwise and skip the whole drilling part from the beginning.

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The next image shows the level of dirt inside the bottom cover and all over the contacts.

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Disassembly from this point is very straight forward. All parts will slide out of the bottom with very little effort. There are no other fasteners in this part of the switch and all the parts are keyed so they can only be put back in one way.

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Closeup of the dirty contacts.

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I cleaned them with regular rubbing alcohol and a very light scrub with a scotchbrite pad to get the dirt and oils off the contacts.

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Check the next post for the continuation.
 
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#2 · (Edited)
After this was to start the reassembly process. I used a dielectric grease on the contacts and also on the bottom of the switch housing where the detents are located. I have Dow corning DC-4 but anything from an autoparts store will do fine. It’s just to help prevent corrosion in the switch and to lube the parts without introducing anything conductive. Here is a picture with things going back together. The new screws can also be seen in this shot. They are standard metric 4.7mm x 7.0 and 10mm long Phillips head screws.

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The view with the switch wiper installed back into the body.

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And finally with the back cover plate installed. I also decided to fill the void where the wires enter the body with RTV. This looked to be part of the access the dirt had to get into the switch and figured the small hole in the cover would do fine to drain any moisture that may get in it. You can also see that the smaller head on the screws I purchased fit nicely up inside the recess where there factory fasteners used to sit.

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If you don’t include the trip over to the hardware store to get the screws the whole process took me roughly 35 minutes. From the best I can figure I am having these problems due to the removal of t
he factory airbox assembly when I installed the TPO Beast intakes. This leaves the bottom of the ignition exposed and it looks like a straight line to the back edge of the front tire. Being I have been in the rain with my bike on several occasions I am thinking the front tire does a good job of getting the ignition wet and forcing water up in it from the bottom. Hopefully now that it is easy enough to take apart and clean some of the worries with my bike will be eased off my mind.
 

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#3 ·
Did you ever think of the antenna in the cover? If the bike turns on but wont turn over, your antenna might be damaged. Slightly. Especially since you need to remove it when accessing the ingnition. Mine was glued in.
 
#4 ·
Amazingly enough the problem was not with the ring. I never had problems with it turning over but more so that when you turned the key to the ON position, nothing would happen. The lights and gauges would all stay dark. This could also be reproduced once the bike was successfully turned on that if you wiggled the key, sometimes the bike would turn off. The lights, dash and engine would shut off. You could push the starter button and nothing would happen. The only way to fix it would be to start turning the key on and off until it stayed on.
 
#6 ·
Thanks for the post! I just had to repair the switch on the old ladies Monster and you took all the guess work out of it. Very helpful to see the those are bolts and not a rivet of some sort. The repair worked perfectly. Thanks again:grin2:
 
#7 ·
Glad it helped. I took it back apart this summer while I had the tank off just to see how it looked and the insides were still clean. Filling the large opening the wire harness goes into with RTV certainly helps keep it working smoothly. I haven't had any electrical problems relating to the key since I posted this thread.
 
#10 · (Edited)
Sorry to say I can't edit the first two posts to replace the broken links. Here are the photo's in the same order as they originally were above.


Edit 11/4/2022, was able to reattach the photo's back into my original posting so deleted them from this one.
 
#14 ·
Sorry for the delay in re-upping the photos to this thread. I haven't been in the sportclassic section of the forum in a few months and missed your reply. Hopefully they are all visible again, above ^.
 
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