Cooked Headlamp Harness

[EricV]

@Roy - We all get that you're pissed. And I know from first hand experience talking to the Yamaha customer service that they are maddening to deal with. First you get pleasant, clueless girl, then you get product specialist, that doesn't know dick about the product, but has better access to computer files and what he does is perform a search of warranty issues that have been reported. If his search foo is poor, he again claims there is no known problem like yours, often giving the classic "This is the first time we've heard of that" response, even to well documented problems years old.

Eventually, with a good dealer working for you, they end up doing the right thing, or at least offering to cover parts costs if it's not a Yamaha issue, but a problem caused by dealer service or you're well out of warranty.

My sincere advice to you is to stop calling Yamaha. All you're doing is pissing yourself off. It's not going to help with anything. Let your dealer do his job and take care of your problem. After all, you just want your problem solved, right? No one at Yamaha is ever going to tell you "wow Roy, you're right and we screwed up and thanks to you we can fix this problem for everyone. Thanks for bringing it to our attention."

Don't let the Customer Service phone people cause you to have a bad opinion of the brand. After all, the CS peeps have about as much to do with Yamaha Corporate and the manufacturing of the bike as the pimple faced kid at 7-11 does with stocking the shelves with the brand of snack you like. They are just reading from the book and doing what they are told to do. Mostly taking information and blowing you off.

 

[creggur]

And for the passive types I'll refrain from updating any more you are own your own do what suits you lay down with the enemy.

::009:: + ::002:: + ::010:: + =

 

[Dallara]

Look I am freaking out and pissed off because it's yamaha stirring all this up...

Nah? Really? OTOH, from here it looks a lot more like you're the one who likes to keep things stirred up beyond reason... ::002::

I do not like to be played with...

Blah, blah, blah... Yadda, yadda, yadda... :

I have fought Suzuki for 35 years on worse things than a few wires and a plug...

So let me get this straight... You've had one, rather minor, basically easy to solve issue with your Yamaha, and now it's a POS, right? But you've had multiple problems that were much worse with Suzuki's, and a lot of Suzuki's, and over 35 years, but they're the greatest thing since sliced bread, canned beer, and internet porn? :question:

I always won too!!

Yep, you seem obsessed with telling us what an internet and telephone bada** you are, how you kick collective online butt, and make switchboard customer service reps cower with fear... Ad infinitum. :

I am convinced this company does not honor their warranty very well if at all. Pass the buck to the buyer. No hostility until I had the pleasure of talking to Mr. Product specialist.

Don't know about others, but it seems to me you're more than a bit paranoid, and went into this deal with a chip on your shoulder.

I am on the defensive now and will be until I get this thing home and a for sale sign on it. That is more against Yamaha than anything. I don't support a company as crude and rude as this one.

"On the defensive"? I thought you were telling us, in about 15 or more posts, that you took no guff from anybody and were on the offensive... What happened with that?

Honestly I get the impression you never liked the bike, and are just looking for a reason to sell it. So sell it then. Not all bikes work ideally for everybody. I've owned literally hundreds of motorcycles over the years (I own 13 right now), and some just didn't work for me. Blaming Yamaha because you don't like the bike gives the impression you don't take responsibility for your own actions.

The Denali's couldn't have been easier to hook up. I didn't hook it up wrong it has been working fine for 5 months. No issues except Yamaha's cheesey wiring loom and chinese plugs.

So fix it and move on, or let the dealer fix it and move on... like the rest of us who had the problem did. ::017::

And for the passive types I'll refrain from updating any more you are own your own do what suits you lay down with the enemy.

Oh, yeah... We're passive all right. We've all already fixed the problem, and without all the excessive melodrama you seem to enjoy. The only thing remotely "passive" I can see in this thread is how long everyone's been so patient with your rants.

Oh, well... Maybe someday, somewhere, Roy, you'll find a manufacturer, dealer, and motorcycle where you don't feel you have to threaten all of the above to be happy.

Good luck! ::001::

Dallara




~

 

[Tremor38]

Very large egos are easily bruised...that's the bottom line here...not Yamaha.

 

[stevepsd]

I am on the defensive now and will be until I get this thing home and a for sale sign on it. That is more against Yamaha than anything. I don't support a company as crude and rude as this one.

Then I guess you won't be replacing it with a BMW then......

Don't cut-off-your-nose-to-spite-your-face. :'( :'( :'(

 

[adogarza]

Hello to everyone; I am being following this topic for a while and monitoring my harness since the first time I read Dallara's incident. I do not have any problem yet whatsoever. However I did some test my self; with a digital infrared laser thermometer, I measured the temperature in both sides, after a short a 10 minutes ride and ambient temperature around 90 F; the connector area was reading close to 194 F; so all this heat from the bulb and metal projector housing inside a reduced space with no ventilation are contributing to eventually melt the connector and wire jacket and also increased the resistance in the already thin electrical wire...So my humble opinion is that probably the harness itself was designed properly to work in a less demanding environment but no inside an oven and hot climates (as Texas spring-summer). So based in my findings I did upgrade the connector (ceramic) and wire (14) with a pre-fabricated extension (H7) that I found in ebay as Islano from this forum already suggested and did; this upgrade will decreased the possibility of melt the connector and wire; although the harness still the same, the new ceramic connector and more robust wire will handle better the heat generate by the bulb and metal projector housing. The temperature of the new connector after a short ride was 149 F; a significance reduction in temperature that may prolonged the life of the original harness. The extension from ebay was plug and play and is a cheap insurance against future problems..Now the best option is to upgrade the harness as Dallara did or wait to see if Yamaha recalls the harness in the future...my two cents...

 

[Checkswrecks]

Hello to everyone; I am being following this topic for a while and monitoring my harness since the first time I read Dallara's incident. I do not have any problem yet whatsoever. However I did some test my self; with a digital infrared laser thermometer, I measured the temperature in both sides, after a short a 10 minutes ride and ambient temperature around 90 F; the connector area was reading close to 194 F; so all this heat from the bulb and metal projector housing inside a reduced space with no ventilation are contributing to eventually melt the connector and wire jacket and also increased the resistance in the already thin electrical wire...So my humble opinion is that probably the harness itself was designed properly to work in a less demanding environment but no inside an oven and hot climates (as Texas spring-summer). So based in my findings I did upgrade the connector (ceramic) and wire (14) with a pre-fabricated extension (H7) that I found in ebay as Islano from this forum already suggested and did; this upgrade will decreased the possibility of melt the connector and wire; although the harness still the same, the new ceramic connector and more robust wire will handle better the heat generate by the bulb and metal projector housing. The temperature of the new connector after a short ride was 149 F; a significance reduction in temperature that may prolonged the life of the original harness. The extension from ebay was plug and play and is a cheap insurance against future problems..Now the best option is to upgrade the harness as Dallara did or wait to see if Yamaha recalls the harness in the future...my two cents...

Wow, REAL DATA.
Thank you very much!

 

[creggur]

Wow, REAL DATA.
Thank you very much!

::026:: ::026::

 

[adogarza]

Ok guys more real data.. playing with the bike tonight I got some numbers.. low beam amps one side= 4.7. The high beam one side=4.3 amps.. so there is a drop of .4 amps running the lights on high bean per side...why? my only explanation is that the shutter is open a reflect less heat to the bulb..lowering the amps...so if we add two bulbs in low beam with have 9.4 amps plus 0.7 amp from the position lights = 10.3 amps.. now assuming the wire is awg 18 for each side with have a surplus of 8 amps per side..now if the wire below (where the two wires coming from the projectors merge with the main wire) is a 16 awg; we have a surplus of aprox 7.3 amps...instead if the wire is 14 awg with have more than 14 amps to spare..so my opinion is that the harness seems to be ok from the electrical point of view...so I think that the main factor contributing to melt the connector and wire jacket is heat from the metal housing, bulb and the small non-ventilated light assembly; which also help to lower the wire amp capacity with the extreme heat...solution, ceramic connector and thicker wire.. Also, I think that adding a heat resistance (insulation) wire cover to the main harness (on each side in contact with the projector housing) may help to preserve the main harness from the scorching temperatures from the metal projector... Yamaha should made the harness with ceramic connectors, thicker wire and better protection (insulation)...as on my triumph 800XC...my recommendation is to add the extra extension (as I expressed before) or upgrade the harness as Dallara did...my two extra cents...

 

[Checkswrecks]

I'm with your thoughts on the fix.


As for the extra capacity, there is something missing from the conversation. As you are probably aware, when the load approaches rating, any wire will heat. The rating is for internal heat and does not count for external heat.


The way that our headlamp harnesses feel and the way the insulation has deformed with heat, I'm pretty sure it's the typical automotive PVC. That means it's only intended to see about 225F maximum. Add the heat from the lights, plus the enclosed environment with no cooling, and I think that you are right on target.


Great opportunity for a plug-n-play swap!

 

[pqsqac]

Just some 2 cents worth here but I was sitting on a Yammi R1 the other day at the dealer and it seemed to have the exact same sealed set up as our XTZ. I wonder if this problem affects other models as well?

 

[hojo in sc]

I wonder if running a 35 watt HID would put off less heat in the headlight assembly area, or just take longer for the heat to build up.

 

[creggur]

And would it be better to just run the brights during the day (legal in Florida) while ambient temps are higher.

Wonder what the temp difference is with the shutter up (lights on bright)...

 

[stevepsd]

Just for grins I checked mine and everything looks brand new. The bike has only been exposed to ambient temps of around 100F so far. We will see in the middle of summer when it gets to be 115F+ here in the Mojave desert, assuming I have to make a trip down from the Oregon coast in the middle of summer (I try and avoid that if possible!)

 

[houndman]

It still makes me scratch my head that some will have a similar problem with thier machine while others may go the life of that machine for many years with heavy use and no problem at all. Just today learned that my transmission is going, will get a reman. trans. While others I know drive the same pickup with 3 times the mileage and no probs. I guess when things are mass produced/put together that exact redundancy is not always possible. Oh well at least there is a solution for the wiring thing ::008::. And a heck of a lot cheaper than a 4000 dollar trans for a diesel pick up :'(.

 

[EricV]

It still makes me scratch my head that some will have a similar problem with thier machine while others may go the life of that machine for many years with heavy use and no problem at all.

Bummer about the transmission.

It's not really that big a mystery. Manufacturing is about tolerances. Nothing is made to an exact size, it has a range or tolerance that is acceptable for that dimension. Under the best of processes, parts still slip through that are slightly out of tolerance, but still fit together and work fine, when new.

Other times it's possible for tolerance stacking to occur. Where a series of parts in an assembly are all at the edge of tolerance, in specification, but together they create an assembly that suffers increased wear under normal conditions.

Then you have the individual humans that build the units, or the machinery that does so, in some cases. Good days, bad days, distracted people, machines in need of adjustment or service that aren't shut down before issues due to production demands, etc. All kinds of reasons to have parts that someone declared 'good enough' to go through 'this time only' and were shipped out to customers.

Fore a fairly simple part like the headlight harness, it could be as simple as some of the female connectors in the bulb plugs are a little loose, creating extra resistance, heat and eventual failure of the harness. This could have been a run of connectors that was all at the edge of tolerance, could have been an intermittent problem with the machine, could have been one machine of several stamping these out that wasn't set up quite right or even something where a batch was rejected by Yamaha's harness building vendor, only to have the supplier of the terminals just take them back, fix the issue, then throw a few handfuls of the rejected terminals into each batch going out after that to get his money back, rather than adding to the cost by having the terminals sorted and corrected, or just throwing them away. This happens. ::005::

 

[Dallara]

Bummer about the transmission.

It's not really that big a mystery. Manufacturing is about tolerances. Nothing is made to an exact size, it has a range or tolerance that is acceptable for that dimension. Under the best of processes, parts still slip through that are slightly out of tolerance, but still fit together and work fine, when new.

Other times it's possible for tolerance stacking to occur. Where a series of parts in an assembly are all at the edge of tolerance, in specification, but together they create an assembly that suffers increased wear under normal conditions.

Then you have the individual humans that build the units, or the machinery that does so, in some cases. Good days, bad days, distracted people, machines in need of adjustment or service that aren't shut down before issues due to production demands, etc. All kinds of reasons to have parts that someone declared 'good enough' to go through 'this time only' and were shipped out to customers.

Fore a fairly simple part like the headlight harness, it could be as simple as some of the female connectors in the bulb plugs are a little loose, creating extra resistance, heat and eventual failure of the harness. This could have been a run of connectors that was all at the edge of tolerance, could have been an intermittent problem with the machine, could have been one machine of several stamping these out that wasn't set up quite right or even something where a batch was rejected by Yamaha's harness building vendor, only to have the supplier of the terminals just take them back, fix the issue, then throw a few handfuls of the rejected terminals into each batch going out after that to get his money back, rather than adding to the cost by having the terminals sorted and corrected, or just throwing them away. This happens. ::005::

Amen, EricV! Amen! ::008::

People just don't seem to grasp the fact that even today things designed and built by humans can be flawed. Whether it be the design itself, the implementation, the hands or machines that make it, the process that checks it, or whatever else. Perfection may be the goal, but it has goalposts that are forever moving.

My headlamp sub-harness melted down. I was making up a much more robust and higher material grade one. The new one from Yamaha under warranty came in before I finished the re-designed/re-built one. It *APPEARED* to absolutely no different whatsoever from the original one that melted, which didn't make me happy or give me much confidence. Still, I wanted to be riding with two headlamps so I installed it... One, to see if it failed like the first one, and two, to give me some more time to finish up my rehabilitated one more to my liking.

Now the warranty replacement one from Yamaha has been in the bike, trouble-free, for months, and thousands and thousands of miles. My trick, super-high-grade one still sits, unfinished, on the bench. I been too busy riding and enjoying the motorcycle to worry with finishing up the rehab harness. Oh, I can do so in an hour or so, so it's there if I need it, but right now the harness that looks just like the original one is doing fine, and none of the connectors, wire, insulation, etc. are showing any signs of distress.

So I think you have hit the nail right on the head, EricV. And we shouldn't forget that Yamaha was rushing to get these bikes out after a bad disaster. Been my experience that when you rush, quality control is often the first thing that suffers.

BTW, I just had the transmission on my '02 Chevy Suburban explode, blowing a hole in the case, etc. I bought and installed a new one for $4-K... ???

Dallara



~

 

[Bigbore4]

And let us not forget the rumor mill was calling out the US DOT spec headlight assy as the main hold up that delayed the bikes. If that rumor is in fact true, then we KNOW they were rushing.

I have upgraded to 100 watt bulbs in mine, so far so good.

 

[Zmydust]

I agree with RoyQ that dealing with Yamaha warranty issues is nearly enough to make you want to switch brands, I do not think he is overreacting one bit . This is in the grand scheme of things a fairly expensive but very capable bike that I think Yamaha should be appreciating its buyers and doing what they can to build a brand in America of the Tenere.


As for the problem , after years of working around electrical issues, it sounds to me to be a two fold issue. One is wiring , connectors, and the harness itself being right on the edge of what was needed rather than being slightly over built. That problem is then being compounded on certain bikes by an ill fitting connector which is in turn not making proper contact 100% of the time and overheating the circuit.


Just my .02 cents

Jonathan

 

[Tremor38]

Re: Re: Cooked Headlamp Harness

I agree with RoyQ that dealing with Yamaha warranty issues is nearly enough to make you want to switch brands, I do not think he is overreacting one bit . This is in the grand scheme of things a fairly expensive but very capable bike that I think Yamaha should be appreciating its buyers and doing what they can to build a brand in America of the Tenere.


As for the problem , after years of working around electrical issues, it sounds to me to be a two fold issue. One is wiring , connectors, and the harness itself being right on the edge of what was needed rather than being slightly over built. That problem is then being compounded on certain bikes by an ill fitting connector which is in turn not making proper contact 100% of the time and overheating the circuit.


Just my .02 cents

Jonathan

Part of an this is an attitude problem with the 'product specialists' In the U.S. I live in a country where the customer truly does come first, and is almost always 'right.' Nobody here needs coaching or to be overseen to understand that. They keep their composure and remain professional no matter how the customer treats them. You would be amazed at the contrast, and I don't think Yamaha Japan would be happy with the way some of the stateside reps do their job.

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