We were planning on riding this weekend but then, a disaster occurred. While riding to work Wednesday I noticed my speedometer and tachometer lights were flickering. I ride every morning in the dark so the flickering was very noticeable. Great, what's going on here? At first, it was just a few little flickers on and off, but as the commute progressed the flickering became very pronounced and everything that is powered on both gauges was also losing power. I asked Margaret to set up an appointment at Fort Worth Harley to have it looked at.
Taking It Into The Dealership
Without an appointment, your bike might sit there a few days until they have time to work it in. I was supposed to drop it off Thursday evening but on the way home, it got even worse. In the daylight, I wasn't able to see the lights flickering to know how bad it was. I didn't need to though because halfway home the indicators started flopping around and finally went dead. No power to both speedometer and tachometer. The odometer wasn't even displaying anything. Apparently, both gauges are on the same power feed that had gone out. I pulled over and called Margaret to meet me at the dealership because I was going to go ahead and drop it off instead of waiting.
The Good And Bad News
Late Friday Nick from service calls and gave me the good news and the bad news. The good news was they promptly found the problem. The speedometer had gone out. Dead. The tach went out because the power feeds through the speedo first and then the tach. Easy enough to replace. A wire connection and a few screws. The bad news was they had to submit the warranty information and order the part. It was too late to do that on Friday so he won't be able to order it until Monday. Nick also needed my mileage so they could program the new speedometer with the current mileage. I had just done an oil change at 52,500 and had ridden some since doing it so we decided to have it set at 53,000.
Thankful For The Warranty
Fortunately, I had made the decision to purchase a 4-year extended service plan. I talked a bit about that in the Loco Coyote post and video. An electrical issue is one of those breakdowns that I don't want any part of trying to troubleshoot and repair. It was for this exact type of breakdown that I purchased that extended warranty. This will cost $50 which is the deductible. This single problem alone will end up paying for my first year of the extended service plan. So this weekend we didn't ride again due to my bike issue. Again we worked on the house and got a little bit more done.
Sorry to hear about your bike. I just bought a street glide, and I'm loving it so far.