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G8 stator - plug or solder?

3K views 43 replies 17 participants last post by  guelli02 
#1 ·
This will probably start a small religious war, but so be it. I'm in the process of installing a new G8 stator from David Silver in anticipation of a Rae-San hall effect ignition system. As it turns out, the stator came with a set of plastic male & female three-blade plugs that appear to match the stock plugs, along with the appropriate spade & female lugs to assemble them. My question is whether there would be advantages to simply hard-wire the yellow wires from the stator to the voltage regulator, with soldered splices in shrink tubing, as opposed to wiring up the supplied plug to retain the stock configuration.

I've seen comments that the plugs represent a source of eventual corrosion, increased resistance and resulting heat that can damage the plugs. My bike started with a G47 stator, so I'll be getting higher current from the G8. On the other hand, having the plugs in the wiring harness obviously facilitates various maintenance activities. I'm interested in others' experience.

Comments are invited.
 
#29 ·
Re Marettes: I just remembered that there is a little drawer of the old style Marr connectors in the shop I inherited from my Dad. They have a sort of brass tube with threads on the outside of one end and a threaded hole in the side for a set screw. You twisted the wires together, put them inside the tube and tightened the set screw, then screwed a plastic cap onto the outer threads to insulate it. For many of us who learned with those the later style ones like the Marette (plastic cap with spiral spring inside) didn't seem to be as secure until we learned the trick: They work very well if you follow the instructions and DO NOT twist the wires first.

Old habits die hard. Dad never stopped calling Marettes "Marr Connectors".
 
#32 ·
The problem with crimp & heatshrink is that moisture can sometimes still get in, especially if you rely on the heatshrink that comes on the terminal or connector. I always put a squirt of silicone in, then crimp and heat the heatshrink so that the silicone makes the connection absolutely waterproof. Or so I thought.

I had a problem with the voltmeter reading jumping up & down as I drove down the road on Eccles once and spent over an hour chasing it down. It turned out that the crimping tool had put a tiny hole through the heatshrink on a butt connector that didn't show before or after shrinking. And since the silicone was through the middle of the barrel where the wire goes it did not seal moisture from getting between the barrel and the heatshrink so over the course of a winter and a half it corroded through the barrel and into the wire. To make things worse, the hole was on the back so it looked perfectly good sitting there but had green goo coming out the hole on the back. When I replaced it I put a second layer of heatshrink over the supplied heatshrink so that it would seal any holes.

Being regularly used on salted roads, Eccles is a pretty good testbed for what does & doesn't last electrically. If carefully crimped on terminals in an original type connector survive there they should be OK for most other bikes too.

BTW: I used to use a sticky black dielectric contact grease designed for use by electrical utility people but I still sometimes found corrosion, which was difficult to see because the grease was opaque. A few years ago I started using either Rustcheck Coat & Protect or Rust Cure (another sticky oil spray) in electrical connectors and I don't seem to find as many green connections now. I think it could seal the moisture out better because it flows initially when sprayed.
 
#35 ·
If we're talking about Scotchlok IDCs, they are OK for temporary connections but I wouldn't trust them long term. And I've never seen one with silicone of any sort inside.

Got a link?
 
#36 ·
Hmm.. good to note. Just been lucky so far I guess. Bikes been covered in snow and drove in rain so far. I'm collecting a few parts here and there to do a triple bypass and some modifications someday. So until then maybe it'll still get me down the road and back. I know one thing, it's been more reliable than my 02 FZ1 I have. That thing needs constant pampering. And is about to hit the auction block.
 
#38 ·
3 words

Adhesive Lined Heatshrink.

nothing gets in there once its shrunk - of course getting it off requires sharp blade and CARE.

Rayman
 
#44 ·
Adhesive Lined Heatshrink.
Thats good stuff.

For emergency cases on the road i bought this.

1:1 googletranslated
Insulating Solder
Cable extend - clean and simple! By heating with a heat gun (if necessary with a lighter) connects the solder in the interior of this insulating connector cable ends. At the same time, the shrink sleeve coat the soldering closes watertight.
Only bad when you don't have a good filled lighter in the pocket and it's too cold for the propan/butan in the lighter :eek:
 
#39 ·
#40 ·
Goshamighty! (as my maternal grandmother used to say, when she was sober), I didn't expect to launch such an extensive debate, but it's gratifying to capture so many viewpoints. Having considered the multiple alternatives suggested, I'm starting to think of a middle ground that offers sort of a compromise condition, to wit: using insulated bullet connectors on the individual wires between the stator and the voltage regulator. This offers reasonable convenience for occasional checks such as measurement of resistance between the stator wires or dismantlement of the wiring system for various & sundry motor maintenance procedures, along with pretty solid electrical contact for the connections between the stator and regulator.

I'm intuiting that the bullet connectors provide a little more robust electrical contact than the three-prong Hitachi plugs, due to having cylindrical contact surfaces rather than spade-lug blades, but I could easily be wrong about that. Comment? In application of the bullet connectors, my practice is to both crimp and solder the connectors to the wires. I would do the same with the connectors to be inserted in the Hitachi-type plugs.
 
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