Harley-Davidson Road King Handlebar Removal and Installation Manual

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If the wire length appears to be too short, you will have to lengthen the wires. If that’s the case, I must stress that soldering your wires is far superior to using butt splices. Wiring can be pulled from the splices and the splices themselves will take up a lot of room, making your harness bulky. To extend your wires, ensure the wire segments you are going to splice into the harness are of the same gauge as the original harness. Also, it’s a good idea to cut all of the wire segments now, ahead of time, to the same measured length. This will ensure that once all of the new wire Figure 4. Handlebar harness plug wires as they appear from the back of the plug (where the wires enter the plug from the harness) segments are spliced in, all of the finished wires are of the same length and the pins are lined up. Work from wire to wire, cutting them by staggering the cuts about an inch or so apart (see figure 5). This will prevent a bulge in your harness where all the soldering connections are. After cutting each wire, slide on a two-inch piece of heat shrink tubing before starting your soldering. Remove about ¾” of insulation from the ends of the two wire ends (one wire end being the harness, the other being the segment of new wire being spliced in). Halfway down the length of its exposed section, bend each wire 90 degrees and hook the two wire segments together at the bends. Holding the wires securely with a pair of pliers, twist them in opposite directions around each other. Make sure the ends of the wires are wrapped as tight as possible so their sharp points will not cut through the heat shrink tubing when it’s applied. Apply some soldering flux (a little is all you need) and solder the connection by first applying your soldering iron (or gun) to the wire and then applying the solder to the wire. You should not apply the solder directly to the iron as overheating the solder can lead to poorly made solder joints and improper conduction of electricity. When the connection has cooled, slide your heat shrink tubing over the joint and heat it so that the tubing shrinks, making a nice tight seal.