Tenere Headlight
 

Hi - new to all this so excuse if I have this in the wrong area.

After much research (mainly from this forum) I have managed to successfully modify my 2009 Tenere to have the low beam on at the same time as the high beam. This gives a better spread of light on high beam (with the low as well) especially when cornering.

The mod involves bridging the high / low switch (#49) by connecting wires LW and LG as discussed earlier in ths thread. It still maintains the feature where the lights are not activiated while starting (which is not achieved if you wire the low beam via an accessory power supply - the accessory power supply is activated prior to starting and so you are trying to start the bike with the low beam on - some bikes do this normally, but it's not a good look if you have a low battery and are desperately trying to start the bike).

Best of all apart from the time to do it, the mod costs about 10cents and is reversible.

Didn't take any photos, but the mod is very simple...

-Become a supporter of this site ($10) and download the workshop manual
-Remove the seat and fuel tank. Be careful removing the tank - particularly the fuel line connector to the fuel pump on the base of the tank. Don't put any strain on the fuel line as the white plastic outlet from the tank doesn't look like it will take much abuse (You have been warned!!!)
-Locate the wiring loom bundle coming from the headlight switch on the handlebars.
-Follow this bundle to its first connector / plug under the tank. It is cable tied to the frame and covered in a flexible rubber boot just behind the top of the radiator on the right hand side.
-Snip the cable tie, and pull back the rubber boot to expose the connector.
-Undo the connector (not essential, but helps identify the wiring).
-Refer to the workshop manual wiring diagram on page 8-15.
-Identify the wires in both sides of the connector blocks... (note the wiring diagram is a little confusing but simple nonetheless). On the wiring diagram, #51 (the connector block) the wires leading to the connector are labelled Br, RL, LW, BrW, G, Ch, Lg, Y and P. This relates to the collours of the wires on the female side (engine side) of the connector block. The corresponding colours of the wires on the male side (handlebar side) of the connecting block are Br, RW, LB, BrW, Dg, Ch, G, Y and P.
-Identify the LB (Light Blue) and G (Green) wires coming out of the male side of the connector block and gently adjust the lay of the wires so that they can run side by side about 2cm from the connector block.
-Use a "Scotchlock" type connector to connect the two wires together side by side about 2cm from the male side of the connector.
-Reconnect the the connector block, recover with the rubber boot and relocate and cable tie the loom back in position to the frame.
-Replace the fuel tank and connections (two electrical plugs, the fuel feed line, and the filler overflow pipe)
-Replace seat, test ride and enjoy the light!!!

The reversal of the modifcation is simply the removal of the Scotchlock connector and taping over the small breaks in each wires' insulation with electrical tape and you are all back to factory.

As mentioned earlier in this thread, the lighting relay (#44) now carries the full current for both high and low beam together (when high beam activated) and thus the current for both 55W bulbs are going through. As Jenny mentioned she ran a single 100W bulb for many miles in the US and the relay coped well. I would advise however not to do this mod and use 100W bulbs as well - then the current is significantly increased and the relay may have a hard day.

So far with this mod and standard bulbs all is well and a decent improvement achieved. After this I would recommend going to accessory lights.

Now go ride and enjoy...
tony

:HeyHey_GOO2MN:

very nice indeed !

Thanks Tony - that's very well explained, and using a scotchlock connector on the loom under the tank is a great idea - simple!

J xx

My pleasure - now I can see the possums before I run over them.

tony

I took a somewhat different route as I wanted to wire in a seperate relay for the low beam light which will provide the full battery power to the headlight..

This is what I did...

OK, so I sent the night in the garage nutting this lowbeam/highbeam thing out..


1. Remove tank - beware of the main fuel hose leading into the tank as mentioned above.. the plastic bit that is part of the pump seems a little fragile..

2. On the right hand side (brake side) of the bike near the top of the radiator is a bunch of connectors covered with a black plastic cover thingo and attached to the radiator brace with a cable tie.. cut the cable tie and pull back the cover to expose the connectors..

3. Find the connector that leads up to the hedlight switch block..

4. Pull the connector apart..

5. On the male connector (the one on the headlight side) is a blue with black stripe wire - this is the wire that provides power to the headlight switch block when the engine is running

6. take a look at the diagram below and wire accordingly.. you will need to cut the positive wire running to the globe and attach the wire from the relay PIN 87 .. I folded the wire coming from the switchblock back over onto itself, cable tied it and then covered with heatshrink

7. read these instructions backwards to reassemble everything - and you're done.. a low beam that stays on with highbeam (why oh why didn't Yamaha do this)..

A few tips to make your job easier and neater... I bought from Jaycar (an electronics shop in Oz) a relay holder that is prewired with tails.. I prefer these to the spade lugs as I know the relay is properly wired - spade lugs sometimes have a knack of falling off

I chose to put the realy in the panel behind the indicator.. there is enough room in there and it saves having to try secure it under the seat which as we know is already lacking in storage space..

There you go chaps.. have fun http://s3.amazonaws.com/advrider/lol8.gif

http://web.aanet.com.au/%7Elandyman/.../headlight.JPG

Nice job.

Just looking at the wiring I realised that you dont need to use the wire under the tank, just use the wire you cut off the low beam, saves pulling off the tank. That's put the bulb end of the cut wire onto pin 87 and the other end onto pin 86.

Must say I got some 100w bulbs from Jmo and they work a treat you almost never need to use full beam as the spread on dipped beam is so good now.

I still fancy fitting some low spots from the forks so that I get light on turn in. I have some mountain bike spots and may rig these up they work from a battery pack and mean I am not using up any of the bikes electrics.

I fitted a similar system to my TTR worked great until I hit a tree :)

Don't supose you have the details on the 100w bulbs do you........I've gotta do something non-technical to improve the lights, they are the worst I've ever had on any bike I've ever owned.......and I've had far more than I could really afford :119:

cheers!

If I want the low beam and the high beam on at the same time I just use the flash button for the amount time that I need them on, which is not long usually in the lanes/ back roads. Simples :017:

No you can't do that.. that wire has no power going to it when you switch to highbeam..

in Australia we have very large animals on our roads at night that will most certainly kill you if you hit them.. every bit of light helps..

Sorry about that, your right, I mixed up Tuscan's mod and your mod in my head.

In that case I would fit auxiliary lights :emoticons:

Just a quick note on these to let you know how ive been running them on my own bike (not a tenere, but the principle should be the same).
I have a 'wide' beam lamp(sharp cut-off on the beam top) and a spot. I wire the wide beam into the feed for the TAIL light, this way it always stays on whether im on high or low beam. I then wire the spot into the high beam.
I now have an extra low beam and an extra high at the flick of the standard switch. Happy Days!

Ive been riding with these for a while now. I really like the combination of light temperatures from my standard 55w H4 headlight(warm yellow light) and the Vision X's (cold white light). I find standard headlights tend to have inconsistent light patterns and dark spots. This is what makes seeing hard. The LED lamps white beam is very even and really picks out detail. The wide beam doesnt appear very bright against the standard light, but when you turn it off you lose an enormous amount of clarity and i find myself straining to see. With the high beam flicke i have three sources, my standard high beam, the wide Vis X and the Spot. Straining to see at night is a thing off the past, i just get on with concentrating on my riding at pretty much the same speed i would do during the day.

Next step is to wire a helmet light into my high beam as well for serious night trail riding fun, without having to worry about batteries going flat.

I quickly flicked through this thread and there seems to be a lot of chat on how to get both beams running at the same time. I imagine you could use the tail light feed to trigger a relay for an always on low standard lamp as well.

We have made a bracket for the VisX lights on the Tenere

http://wonky.smugmug.com/Other/Visio...28_MyciX-L.jpg

http://wonky.smugmug.com/Other/Visio...02_Z8iDW-L.jpg

http://94.100.118.203/954200001-9542...46_6_ForV.jpeg

http://94.100.114.87/927250001-92730...73_6_PMI7.jpeg

Glad I've found this thread . . . .

Whilst riding my bike up from Birmingham and getting north of Perth in the darker hours, I found, as others have, that the light gap left when main beam is on, especially when cornering, leaves much to be desired. I used the pass switch to help fill the gap, but when you've got another 140 miles of Highland roads to cover, thats a lot of switch pushing. Running into dense fog with rain and having to ride at 20 mph with my visor up for 20 miles didn't help the night pass quickly either though!

I'll be trying one or tuther of the wiring mods to get dip to stay on when main beams selected and let you know how I get on.

Thanks to all that have put the effort into writing about there efforts onto this thread.

Steve T

:cool:

I like the idea of both lights on, however;

does anyone know why the dip is designed to go out when the main is selected?

Is there enough power to supply both?

Is there enough cable/fuse to support both?

All I know is I ran 100w bulbs in both high and low beams for over 10,000 miles without any meltdown... I'd say it should be fine, I think a number of people have already wired both (stock) bulbs to come on together?

Jx

FYI on Australian Delivered Teneres, the two wires to connect are the Blue with Black stripe, and the Light Green wire. They are a bit thicker than the others in the loom, so are easy to spot. Works a treat!

Anyone riding a Tenere at night deserves a medal. If I'm going to be out after dark I use my other bike (also a Yamaha, so if they can get that right, why not the Tenere?). I want to see the road more than 10 yards ahead, not the top of the hedge.

You know about the headlight adjustment knob?

If that doesn't help: put HID's in low and main beam + do the double headlight mod. You will have plenty of light; drills a hole in the night. Gives me enough confidence to do 100+ km/hr on a back road in the dark.

HJ

I regularly travel approx 25km in the dark to work at 5:30 in the morning in which 18km is 100km/h along a outback road with Kangaroos being a regular sighting along with the smell of the ones that have been hit already. What I have found is if you set high beam to work good low beam is too low and if you set low beam to be good high beam is too high. Also the high beam indicator light is very bright and is a distraction when on high beam. I just did the rewire to have both beams on together and although I have not tested on the road yet it has made a big difference in the backyard shining the light on the fence. I am yet to place some tape over the high beam indicator with a small hole in it to block some of the light.

I used to do a lot of night riding on my other bike (98 Yamaha WR250zk) if you think the light is crap on the Tenere you should try bush riding the WR, a candle against a mirror would be brighter.

Has anyone tried these?

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/OSRAM-NIGH...item53eefdbf86

Yep, I've run those bulbs for the last two and a half years (in both dip and main) and they've been really good and still going strong too, which isn't bad when you think the dip is burning 24/7!

Good news just trying to find out if that is a two pack or single pack so I order the right amount to change both bulbs

I've gone for HID's and fitted these:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/SLIM-HID-C...item33611eb2e1

Mainbeam bulb holder needs a slight mod, but all working okay and a 20W power saving!!

Masgra...

What mod did you have to do?

:)

.

it's pretty simple, but would need new bits to reverse it!

the mainbeam bulb holder is a twist in fitting that the original bulb sits it and the wire connectors are a moulded part of the fitting, so what you have to do is to cut the connector block off of the bulb holder. this creates a hole that the HID bulb and its wiring can fit through. the original wiring has to be cut and 2 spade connectors fitted to power the slimeline ballast.

the dipped beam is more or less a straight swap as it uses the sprung wire fitting, but again i cut the original connector block off and replaced with spade connectors to save space.

the slimline ballasts are stuck under the petrol tank on each side with velcro tape.

Thanks for the info...

:)


.

Just found this thread, thanks for the info. You do not have to remove the tank to do this, you can access the loom and plug from underneath the front cowl, just have the steering over to the left. Done in 5 minutes :)

Lights
 

HI,

Are you still able to supply light kits for the Tenere as i will need some for winter.

Mike

So having owned my Tenere for five years and travelled many miles on it, sadly it met with a sudden demise when it parked itself under a sewage cart. The plus side was that I got to buy a new 2014 Tenere.

What has this to do with headlights? Well, it gave me a chance to stand the new 2014 bike side by side with my old 2009 bike. Incidentally there was very little damage to my old bike other that a bent rear subframe so I bought it back from the insurance company. There are very few difference between the bikes but something that was apparent after the first night ride was the headlight. The main beam actually does what it should. Upon closer inspection you can see the moulding of the headlight lens is slightly altered.

So if you want to solve, without significant additions or soldering etc, the age old headlight issue with the Ten, get a new bike! Or possibly just a new headlight unit which might be cheaper!

Any chance of pictures of the difference between the shapes.
Neither is particularly cheap. But it may well be worth the investment.

I would, but when I tried it does not show as there is loads of reflection (ironically). Also the shape of the whole unit is basically identical, its just the angle of the moulding of the reflector for the main beam that differs. In the original headlight unit the reflector is just a smooth concave. In the newer unit, there is a 'crease' horizontally through it. Very subtle, but makes a big difference. Best thing to do is see if they have a 2014 model in a local show room.

Sorry.

The ABS version and non-ABS 2010 to 2013 lists

11D-H410A-10 Headlight Unit Complete

The 2009 is just 11D-H410A-00

Anyone with access to 2014 spare parts catalog that can confirm that the headlight is available in a 3rd variant ?