Hot tip, or "How To Keep Your VMax From Starting On Fire".

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Bill Seward

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I took the plate that previously held the coils (I've got COPS now) off to put the battery back in the bike. Stupidly, I misplaced one of the 6mm bolts that hold the plate in place, and after tightening the remaining bolt down well with a 10mm socket, promptly forgot about it.

I'm riding to work a couple days ago, and I noticed the headlight was flickering when I hit a bump. My gas light was on, so I pulled into a station. I've got a recovered Corbin seat that no longer has the porthole to get at the filler, so I take the seat off to fill up.

The seat just lifts off, and when I got it off, I noticed a couple sparks by the positive battery terminal. You guessed it, the plate came loose and was grounding to the battery terminal. Then, the sparking became a dead short, and the whole bracket started glowing red! The rubber grommet holding the 30A fuse block started burning, and the small ground wire off the negative battery cable flamed out. I got the short circuit broken by moving the plate away from the battery terminal, and the small fire was put out with a puff of breath - like blowing our a birthday candle.

A cop pulls up beside me, and asked if my bike was on fire, he was a bit concerned because I was at a gas pump. I assured him it was out, and he lent me a pliers to bend the bracket away from any possible contact with the battery. A quick check of the lights, and I was on my way, after getting gas.

Got a 6mm bolt from work, and immediately replaced the missing bolt. I fixed the burnt ground wire and all is well....

Moral: If something is held on with 2 bolts, use 'em both!
 
Glad everything worked out good for you. That is scary stuff. I was helping Garrett last weekend and we put a charger on the battery terminal and the clamp made contact with the main fuse bracket. It started to spark like crazy. Scared the shit out of me but no damage thank god.

Thanks for sharing your story !!!!!
 
Looks like I'm not the only one with loose bolt hahaha.
But yeah that one is a bit scary.

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk 2
 
Glad everything worked out good for you. That is scary stuff. I was helping Garrett last weekend and we put a charger on the battery terminal and the clamp made contact with the main fuse bracket. It started to spark like crazy. Scared the shit out of me but no damage thank god.

Thanks for sharing your story !!!!!

was just gonna mention this! it was weird with us because there was 2 of us looking at the damn thing and couldn't figure out where it was grounding to for a good 5 seconds...
 
Wow, sure glad you paid attention and got it off the road to check things over.... Could have been much worse......
 
Way too close a call and could have been worse.....Glad it was a minor problem......Should we nominated you for a 2nd DOH award? :eusa_dance:
 
Way too close a call and could have been worse.....Glad it was a minor problem......Should we nominated you for a 2nd DOH award? :eusa_dance:

Geez, that would be a first! I'm just glad someone thought to post up about what can happen. Glad it wasn't any worse.
 

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