Bonneville America Forums Forums Technical Forums General Tech Speedometer/Tach on speedmaster

Does the speedo/tach on a 2003 speedmaster have a backlight for night riding? The reason i ask is mine is not lighting up. Ive only had the bike 2 weeks and last night was the first time ive had it out at night, and i noticed i couldnt see the speedo/tach. Thanks!

Yes both are illuminated.

Thanks! Wonder what the problem with mine is? This was a salvage bike (dent in the tank.) All the other lights on the bike are fine, there may be a wire loose or something.

are both out or just1 and if so is it the speedo or tach? I assume your headlight works since you said you noticed it so I guess you were riding in the evening.

Both are out. Headlight and all other lights function fine, strange. Seems unlikely that both bulbs are out, probably has something to do with a wire not being connected or something.

That's what I would look at but check the bulbs just to make sure, don't count the bulbs out without making sure. Also look at the fuses ,not sure what those lights are fused with.

I bet your rear light isn't working either. Not your brake light but your running light.

Therefore, either Fuse 10 is out or Fuse 8 is out as fuse 10 is in series with fuse 8.

Your speedo isn't lit up. So fuse 8 is blown and no matter if fuse 10 is good or not, the rear tail lamp will not work. However the brake light is on a separate fuse from fuse 8 and fuse 10.

I now nothing bout lectrics either. Really. I just had to fingure out a simliar issue a while back.

Heads up: If the leads to the position indicator lamp in the headlight bucket are reversed you will have a dead short.

Edited: for what it is worth, there are two bulbs in the speedo gauge. the odds are lottery weak that all the bulbs are bad.

Want to thank everyone, especially moe. It was fuse 8, i replaced it and all is well!

I hate starting new threads for lil questions so I'll put it here. I hope Doc doesn't mind me piggy-backing onto his thread. It is related.

Am I right in thinking that the red wire to the tacho is the 'pulse' and the red/green is a live?

I want to install a Datatool Revlight and don't wanna zap anything when I fire her up.

From the tech vault......Whitt wrote:

Quote:

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There is a 2 wire plug under the dash the red wire is to the coil and the green and read wire is hot with the ignition on. The tach has 4 wires. You wire it Green to the Red coil wire, Black to ground (I used the Brown ground wire for the clock), Red is hot for the tach and Blue it hot for the light I wired them both to the Green hot for the tach.

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Hope this helps.
I did a Drag Specialties a couple of years ago and used his notes.

Thanks, Tony. I PM'd Whitt directly and he confirmed. I wasn't 100% sure so thought I'd ask, rather than forge ahead and break something. I initially thought the other wire must be a negative, hence my doubts.

Ride safe.