I thought replacing my handlebar-mounted electrical switch module would be easy. My friend Ed, who doubles as my spiritual and mechanical guru, told me there was more to the job than I thought, and boy was he right.
You see, it’s not just the module on the handlebar. That part is easy, or relatively so. It’s the four-foot long wiring harness attached to the module, the far ends of which attach to connectors buried deep in the guts of the motorcycle. That’s the hard part. To disconnect and remove the old wiring harness — and install and connect the new one — we had to strip the bike nearly to the frame.
Why replace the switch module at all? Because some of the switches were sticking, and because we thought a problem I’ve been having with my cruise control — yes, my motorcycle has cruise control, just like your car — was due to one of the switches making intermittent contact.
Here’s what the inside of a Honda Goldwing looks like:
A few hours later we had the bike all buttoned up, with no parts left over (always a good sign). But when I rode the bike home, I found that the cruise control was still not working. After talking it over on the phone, Ed and I concluded the problem must lie in one of four microswitches designed to disconnect the cruise control.
You know how the cruise control in your car disengages when you touch the brake pedal? There’s a microswitch on the pedal. On the Goldwing, there are four: on the foot brake, the hand brake, the clutch lever, and the kickstand. Touch any of those controls with the cruise control on and it’ll kick off. Tomorrow we’ll start replacing microswitches one at a time until we find the one that’s sticking.
All this is by way of getting my motorcycle ready for a long California trip in October. And now to the question everyone is asking: how gay is it to have cruise control on a motorcycle?
Both my Harleys had throttle locks. It didn’t take me long to learn to use the lock to hold my speed on the freeway — it was a poor man’s cruise control. If you ride a Harley, I’ll bet you’re pretty handy with that thumbscrew. Unless you ride a really fancy Harley, in which case you have an automotive cruise control, just like the one I have on my Goldwing.
I’ve come to rely on that cruise control, not just to avoid wrist strain on long rides, but to control my speed. When I work my own throttle, I tend to speed. When I let the cruise control work the throttle, I stay at the speed I’ve set. If I set it at the speed limit, I stay out of trouble.
When I first got the Goldwing I picked up two speeding tickets in three months. I quickly learned to use the cruise control to keep myself at the limit, and now I use it all the time — on the freeway and in town. Gay pride, baby — I won’t have another motorcycle without it!
So wish me luck, dear friends and fellow motorcyclists, and may the first microswitch Ed and I replace turn out to be the culprit!
Update (9/8/10): the culprit was the microswitch on the clutch lever. It’s all fixed, and I’m ready to hit the road.