EL005 ELECTRICAL

I have been using the bike and as it gets dark earlier have been using the lights. The metal dip switch on the Miller horn/dip unit touched a screw on the valve lifter lever causing a short. Obviously I moved the items so this did not happen again, but this should not happen and I can not find a fault in the wiring. I was wondering if anyone had any ideas where I should concentrate my efforts to find this fault. Also possibly unrelated - the ammeter (Lucas) in the head light shows a steady discharge when the lights are on (as expected, so I think this shows that the ammeter works) but when the revs rise to about 3000 (a bit high but I don't know) there would appear to be some movement towards charging but instead of a staying steady the needle flicks from one side of the scale to the other so as to make it impossible to tell if the system is actually charging. Has anyone any ideas what I should do? - John Allen 16/12/2001

Your Miller dip-switch might not have the rubber insulating pad that goes between the body of the switch and the handlebar - this can allow shorts, as can a very worn arm (that moves the contacts) and in particular the stops that control the limits of its sweep. The latter usually means flickering lights because the arm travels beyond the proper contact position but I think it can also cause shorts. I know I have had to address all these to stop a worn switch shorting and flickering.
If you have a fully charged battery and a dynamo in good condition the ammeter needle will flick between charge and discharge, sometimes quite rapidly as it gets asked by the regulator to provide some charge then immediately not to. So let the battery run well down and see if it then becomes almost a steady charge for a while - initially for a few mins with no lights on then with them on. If it still flickers rapidly with a low battery then the regulator is playing up, or there is a loose contact somewhere; or indeed a flickering short that briefly takes all the charge from the dynamo. - TW 16/12/2001