6th Gen Monitor Wire Fix.

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This is a step by step method to do the monitor wire fix. It guarantees a solid and direct connection to the positive battery post from the black wire coming off the RR.

Step 1:

Get your tool kit out. Spread a hotel towel down – so you don’t lose tools. Spread another down, to receive the bolts you will be removing. Sounds gay – but it’ll help long-term.

You need to get the fairing off: Here are the bolts and fasteners you need to remove. Any fasteners or bolts shown in the picture HAVE to come out. At the end – I took a picture of ALL the fasteners I removed. Make sure you got them all covered.

Under the bike – two fasteners. If they are round and have a “button” in the centre – push the button, then pull the outside part of the fastener out. I only have one on my bike- it’s a pain to remove as often as my fairings are off.

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Three bolts you see here. Remember where each bolt came from – the bolts you will be removing are of different sizes.

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The bolt on the side comes out as well.

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The two bolts on the black plastic centre fairing – the one on the top left, and the one about 7 inches down from that. Next to the mud stain on this picture.

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Looking to the inside of the right fairing, at the tip of my finger. Another of the mushroom type fasteners – press the centre, then remove the whole fastener.

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The two bolts at 10 o’clock, and 6 o’clock.

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Now the fairing isn’t attached. The best way to get it off is to be careful and pull the fairing out – away from the bike from the back part – the part furthest backwards from the handlebars. Then – take the fairing somewhere that you won’t step on it.

Step 2:

Locate the Regulator/Rectifier. Here’s what it looks like OFF the bike:

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The part you are interested in is the connector that has the Green red and Black wires. The BLACK wire is the one you will be messing with.

The RR is located here – on the right side of the bike. Carefully follow the wires coming out of the RR. Follow the wires to the connector.

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Here it is. There is a plastic rubber shield – just move it up and away from you – it’ll reveal the connector that you need to simply separate.

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Here is the connector in one piece:

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In the picture above, you will see green wires, red wires, and a white wire (actually a white/black wire.) That is NOT the half of the connector that you want to mess with. The side you need to manipulate is under my finger in the above picture.

Push the tab in, and separate the connector.

You should then see this:

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The wire connection you want to look at in the above picture is the top right connection. Notice the rectangular open space on top of each connector? This is where you insert a paperclip, a very small screwdriver, etc…. and press in with the tool of your choice. At the same time – pull the black wire out the other end. Here’s a couple more pics. I used a nail to push the tab in:

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Ok – the hard part is over. Now reconnect the plastic connectors, leaving this black wire out and on its own.

Now here is the what you need to create to complete the fix:

Get yourself about 3 feet of 12 or 14 gauge wire and strip off a bit of cover from each end: the following 3 pics illustrate: You will also need a RING terminal that is destined for the POSITIVE side of the Battery, and a female spade connector that connects to the Black male connector you just removed from the plastic connector.

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In my pic above – my index finger is on the wire with the female connector, and my thumb is on the ring terminal. Make sure you look at the size of the bolt on your battery (positive terminal) to make sure you get a ring terminal large enough to attach it.

I attached the female connector to the black wire first, then routed the other end back toward the battery. Something like this:

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And here’s what it looks like at the connection to the black wire: I used an insulated female connector – that is a good choice if you can find them.

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Next – remove the battery cover, and remove the positive battery connection – and slip the ring terminal onto the bolt. Reattach to the battery.

Next – button everything back up…… here’s the bolts and fasteners you removed:

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Some of the guys in other threads were using a 10A fuse on this wire.

I installed with a fuse on mine, but I think I may remove it to ensure it always reads accurately and terminal corrosion is not a concern.

What should I do?

Is it necessary for the fuse?

Q-DawgSome of the guys in other threads were using a 10A fuse on this wire.

I installed with a fuse on mine, but I think I may remove it to ensure it always reads accurately and terminal corrosion is not a concern.

What should I do?

Is it necessary for the fuse?

SOrry - I did install an inline fuse as well, with a 5 amp fuse. THe inline fuse I used was with 10 gauge wire - I hoped that any voltage drop caused by the extra connection, might be "saved" using heavy wire.

Probably a dumb question, but what does the monitor wire do and why do I need to fix it?

Jeremy explained it to me best, so I will try to share the reasoning as best I can...

THe black wire coming out of the RR, connects with a white wire with a black strip. that wire is about 12 inches long, and connects with an uninsulated connection with a red power wire. That red wire continues on through the wiring harness, passes through another uninsulated crimp connection, a fuse, and then back onto the positive terminal of the battery.

WHat the wire (or set of connections) does is measure the voltage coming out of the battery so as to "tell" the RR how much juice to flow back into the battery, from the RR.

HEres the "WHY". With all those connections, and lengths of wire - often times there is a severe drop in voltage being read at the battery - versus what is really there. THe RR then doesn't send th eappropriate amount of juice back to the battery.

By doing this simple modification, you are simply making a very direct route to the battery - from the black wire of the RR.

If there are others with a better technical reason to do the mod - please feel free to add. thanks.

Ken pretty much summed it up. The R/R will see that your battery voltage is low and pump out higher voltage in order to charge it. As the faulty monitor wire gets worse it will give lower and lower voltages until the R/R is pumping out over 16 volts which will burn up wires, light bulbs, fuses, and your battery (probably not good for things like the PGM-FI either).

If your R/R is putting out more than 15 volts at 5KRPM with the brights on, I would recommend doing this fix. I have so far not seen any 05+ model with this problem. I don’t know if that is because they fixed the wiring problem, or there are simply no bikes with enough miles to yet experience any symptoms. Mine took 20K miles before it had noticeable symptoms.

Good write up Ken! Do this now before any long trips!!! My bike is still down, thanks to the fine highly trained Honda tecs at ______________ Honda!!!!! Add in the Honda dealer of your choice! "Honda the new Yugo"

jeremy556Ken pretty much summed it up. The R/R will see that your battery voltage is low and pump out higher voltage in order to charge it. As the faulty monitor wire gets worse it will give lower and lower voltages until the R/R is pumping out over 16 volts which will burn up wires, light bulbs, fuses, and your battery (probably not good for things like the PGM-FI either).

If your R/R is putting out more than 15 volts at 5KRPM with the brights on, I would recommend doing this fix. I have so far not seen any 05+ model with this problem. I don’t know if that is because they fixed the wiring problem, or there are simply no bikes with enough miles to yet experience any symptoms. Mine took 20K miles before it had noticeable symptoms.

The mod looks to be rather straight-forward and well within the skills of most riders.

And the explanation about voltages also makes sense, but I do have a question ...

where is the voltage actually being measured that determines if there is a problem?

I will check my own 03 and I am assuming I should measure voltage between the black wire and ground ?

Or can I simply monitor the voltage showing at the battery terminals, the R/R output or maybe some other point ?

Resistance buildup in the wiring harness would suggest inadequate protection from corrossion and oxidization.

I am a little puzzled though as my 28 year old Honda CBX does not seem to be suffering this problem.

Is the problem perhaps aggravated by age or is it more an issue of use in nasty conditions?

I never ride my bikes in the rain and they are stored in a dry garage, should I be particularly concerned ?

Good writeup Ken, I will be documenting your directions for my bikes service manual.

thanks, good one :thumbsup:

Larry

You can measure the voltage at the batter terminals.

jeremy556Ken pretty much summed it up. The R/R will see that your battery voltage is low and pump out higher voltage in order to charge it. As the faulty monitor wire gets worse it will give lower and lower voltages until the R/R is pumping out over 16 volts which will burn up wires, light bulbs, fuses, and your battery (probably not good for things like the PGM-FI either).

If your R/R is putting out more than 15 volts at 5KRPM with the brights on, I would recommend doing this fix. I have so far not seen any 05+ model with this problem. I don’t know if that is because they fixed the wiring problem, or there are simply no bikes with enough miles to yet experience any symptoms. Mine took 20K miles before it had noticeable symptoms.

I have an 06 and there appears to be a few changes in the electrics compared to what I am seeing in this forum. R/R is mounted on the frame up the front of the bike, and the 30amp fuse has the same size cable coming into, and out of it. That is two things I have noticed so far.

The best way to diagnose if this fix is needed is to test the voltage at the battery, then again at this connector. The two should be the same. If the RR connector is lower, it will be forcing the RR/Generator to produce more energy than is needed.

Nice writeup Ken, too bad it came a few days too late to save me about an hour worth of looking to find mine. I also relayed mine(the original is switched power) and fused it(the original is fused as well)

PKPKOK, I performed the monitor wire and front harness ground bypass mod this afternoon. The monitor wire mod did buy me a few tenths of a volt but the voltage drop still occurs with the high beams and cooling fan running. At 2000 RPM it drops from 14.3 to 13.7 with both running and the grips powered. This is very acceptable so I'm not going to fret the drop. Dunno why it behaves differently than Jeremy's (and I don't care as long as it isn't discharging.) :goofy:

I would suggest that a voltage of 13.7 with all those things pulling juice is a VERY good result. You would find that it can't maintain over 14 volts since at those revolutions the stator can't pump out enough to keep the volts up that high. 13.7 is still charging the battery - so this is excellent. As for myself, my charging system can't reach 12.6 volts at idle when the engine is hot, and I think it's the stator. At all other conditions (higher revs, or cold engine at idle), mine hits 14.3 volts.

LegbaI just got a recall notice from Honda saying that some wiring components need to be replaced and I should not ride the bike. It goes on to say that if I must ride the bike I should not use the high beams.

see recall post:

http://www.vfrdiscussion.com/forum/index.p...c=35937&hl=

I have 04, and was wondering after I get the recall on the electric harness done, will I need to do the mod? or will the replacing of the harness fix this problem

PurvisI have 04, and was wondering after I get the recall on the electric harness done, will I need to do the mod? or will the replacing of the harness fix this problem

I would say that Honda's recall is extremely unlikely to fix the monitor wire and the 30 amp fuse problem. They make no mention of these issues, and will only replace the main harness if it has damage from the ground issue at the blue connector.

I was wrong. The recall does appear to fix the blue connector, r/r monitor wire, and 30 amp fuse problems.

K. Can't find my post. Just wanted to update you-all. I did the monitor wire fix w/5amp fuse in-line. Also ran 2 pwr wires to R/R with inline fuses. One was 20 amp, the other a 30. (not to vex myself), but ALL IS WELL. :thumbsup: Thanks Ken, Jeremy, and Jason!!!!!!!!!!!!

Question for anyone who has done the RR monitor wire fix and has the front harness replaced under the recall----Someone may have already answered this already, but will the the monitor wire fix still work after the recall wire harness is installed--in other words, do I have to undo the fix? :unsure:

Bump.

Question for anyone who has done the RR monitor wire fix and has the front harness replaced under the recall----Someone may have already answered this already, but will the the monitor wire fix still work after the recall wire harness is installed--in other words, do I have to undo the fix? :fing02:

vtecalBump.

Question for anyone who has done the RR monitor wire fix and has the front harness replaced under the recall----Someone may have already answered this already, but will the the monitor wire fix still work after the recall wire harness is installed--in other words, do I have to undo the fix? :fing02:

no issues...i have both as i wanted to add the relay for accessories and actually added it AFTER the recall was complete.

turtlecreek

vtecalBump.

Question for anyone who has done the RR monitor wire fix and has the front harness replaced under the recall----Someone may have already answered this already, but will the the monitor wire fix still work after the recall wire harness is installed--in other words, do I have to undo the fix? :biggrin:

no issues...i have both as i wanted to add the relay for accessories and actually added it AFTER the recall was complete.

THANKS!! :biggrin:

TightwadThe best way to diagnose if this fix is needed is to test the voltage at the battery, then again at this connector. The two should be the same. If the RR connector is lower, it will be forcing the RR/Generator to produce more energy than is needed.

Nice writeup Ken, too bad it came a few days too late to save me about an hour worth of looking to find mine. I also relayed mine(the original is switched power) and fused it(the original is fused as well)

How do you relay it?? Please explain for idiots!!!

And shouldn't the cable you made up be connected to the blck and white cable from the R/R?? The way it's done here it looks like you create a loop and the information (in the form of a more accurate voltage from the battery) neveer reaches the R/R... or have I got my cables back to front??

AuspañolAnd shouldn't the cable you made up be connected to the blck and white cable from the R/R?? The way it's done here it looks like you create a loop and the information (in the form of a more accurate voltage from the battery) neveer reaches the R/R... or have I got my cables back to front??

Maybe it's a stupid question... it's not that I don't trust Kanadians, nor Kanadian Ken for that matter... the thought just came into my head... it's a feedback wire... does it give feedback to the R/R or some other device?? Hmmm... somebody... please tell me I've missed something... :fing02:

AuspañolMaybe it's a stupid question... it's not that I don't trust Kanadians, nor Kanadian Ken for that matter... the thought just came into my head... it's a feedback wire... does it give feedback to the R/R or some other device?? Hmmm... somebody... please tell me I've missed something... :blush:

Did you buy the VFRness? If so that does the Monitor wire fix. Your 98 wouldn't have a monitor wire.

[image: View Post]Tightwad, on Apr 2 2008, 11:00 PM, said:

[image: View Post]Auspa�ol, on Apr 2 2008, 07:54 AM, said: