Power cutting out when wheel is turned ??

[apaiva]

hey so my R65 did a curious thing yesterday.  It did this a few times last night as I rode around and took me a few minutes to figure out when it was happening but it seems like the power would cut off at times when the wheel was turned in a certain way.  It would happen when I was either idling in neutral at a stop, and also happened as I was slowing down to stop but still in gear.  It never happened when I was really moving, only either at a stop or coming to a stop.  As you can see in the video, all the power seems to cut off when the wheel is turned from the left to the right.  In the video it happens before I turn the engine on but doesn't do it once I have the engine running but it happened a few times before that when the engine was running as well.  Also, the low battery noise is just from me starting the bike a bunch of times as I was trying to diagnose the problem, or re-starting at every other stop light when it was cutting out.

I'm guessing I have a loose connection somewhere and when the wheel is turned some which way, the connection gets disconnected.  It was dark and I didn't have time to inspect things last night but what component/connection would make it lose power completely like this?  Where should I start?

Here is a video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIu7pijtFO8

[Ed Miller]

Are you talking about just the light cutting out, not the motor?  

My lights flicker sometimes under similar circumstances.  I figured I would track it down when I re-do my Windjammer hookup, as I was blaming that.  But you don't have a 'Jammer.  

[apaiva]

no, not just the lights. The engine dies as well as the headlight and dials/dashboard lights.  In the video it only happens when electrics are on and engine isn't running, but other times it happened with the engine running and everything went dead. I would then move around the handlebars and dash came back to life and I was able to start the bike again.

[apaiva]

someone else suggested they thought it might be something with the key ignition unit since everything goes completely off, not just the engine.

[nhmaf]

It  could be a loose or semi broken ground connection as most all the dash indicators share the same brown ground wire - but as it seems your headlight is cutting out also, that seems more like a bad connection to/from the ignition switch _I'd start with the red wire going to that (should be +12V) and other switch poles and functions get their power from that.

[apaiva]

i figured it out. it was really stupid. just a bad connection at my battery.