Coleman 200 Electrical

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akfonzy

New Member
#1
#1
So I’ve got an electrical question, but here’s some back ground before I ask. I am in the process of making my Coleman street legal. I have added a Horn, Tail light, brake light, front and rear turn signals, and a high beam. My Coleman came with an LED bulb and rectifier from the factory. I added a high beam by installing a high/low beam, LED bulb and running an additional wire for the high beam function. Everything works and looks great.

While wiring the system up, I noticed that none of the electrical would work until I realized that the ground/negative coming out of the rectifier is NOT connected to the chassis. No big deal. I just wired all the negative terminals to the rectifiers negotive lead. Anyways, I had a Chinese 4 wheeler with the same basic rectifier and the rectifiers negative lead WAS grounded to chassis, which must have been done by the previous owner because it didn’t look factory. I had issues with rectifiers going bad on that 4 wheeler and I’m hesitant to ground the negative lead on my bike.

So for the actual question: Does anyone know if they intentionally segregated the negative lead from the chassis? My thought is if they did it intentionally it’s due to noise or voltage back-feed running through the chassis from the ignition system. My other thought is that I’m looking too deep into this, and they just ran the negative lead from the rectifier directly to the headlights negative terminal because it is the cheapest and easiest thing to do.

the reason I’m even thinking about grounding the negative lead from the rectifier to the chassis is because I’m going to install a battery and starter and want to use the bikes electrical system to charge the battery. This can not be done while segregating the negative lead of the rectifier from the chassis without complicating things a lot via relays and or solenoids.

Thanks for any info you have.
 
sparkwizard

sparkwizard

#2
#2
Wow, so many questions...
How much current do you think your electrical system puts out?
Have you checked with your DMV about requirements to make a mini bike legal? Things like DOT legal tires, front brakes, suspension come to mind.
I think the ground was left on the engine because it is a utility engine and meant to run a small LED only.
 
Charles S

Charles S

#3
#3
Have you found DOT certified tires that fit the Coleman 8" wheels? I don't think anyone on here has ever been able to find any. Tires are probably the first thing an inspector would check because if they aren't DOT certified, he/she wouldn't need to check anything else. You may need to replace the wheels.
 
massacre

massacre

#6
#6
I found DOT tires for my Trail Flite. Even wired up brake light front and rear.
Went as far as test wiring up directionals and hazards with switches. Horn i could never get to work, prob needs a relay. Good luck on your quest, unfortunately i can't help you with your question.
 
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akfonzy

New Member
#7
#7
Charles S said:
Have you found DOT certified tires that fit the Coleman 8" wheels? I don't think anyone on here has ever been able to find any. Tires are probably the first thing an inspector would check because if they aren't DOT certified, he/she wouldn't need to check anything else. You may need to replace the wheels.
Click to expand...
Minnesota is a little different. A bike can be street legal, and classified as off highway. To be classified as on highway, there are a few more hoops to jump through that I’m not going to worry about, seeing as I’m never going to take a mini bike up to 65mph, even if I could. All that to say, off highway bikes have no requirement for DOT certified tires.
 
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akfonzy

New Member
#8
#8
sparkwizard said:
Wow, so many questions...
How much current do you think your electrical system puts out?
Have you checked with your DMV about requirements to make a mini bike legal? Things like DOT legal tires, front brakes, suspension come to mind.
I think the ground was left on the engine because it is a utility engine and meant to run a small LED only.
Click to expand...
How much current do I think it puts out? I’m not sure. Probably only a few amps, MAYBE 10 amps? I have check with the DMV and I’m good to go for “off highway use” so technically, because it already has a headlight, I could get away with just the high beam mod and a tail/brake light. Horn not required and hand signals are acceptable.
I’m a bit confused about the last part: you think the ground was left on the engin? The negative terminal on the rectifier is not grounded to the engine or anything ,
 
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akfonzy

New Member
#9
#9
creia said:
What state do you live in? No way in hell you would you get that bike "street legal" in California...
Michael
Click to expand...
I live in Minnesota. They allow for “off highway use” or dual purpose “on highway use”. I would never take a mini bike on the highway with crazy people flying around at 85 mph. So “off highway use” is good enough for me. All that’s required for off highway use is a low/high beam headlight and a tail/brake light. Hand signals and no horn are acceptable.
 
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akfonzy

New Member
#10
#10
massacre said:
I found DOT tires for my Trail Flite. Even wired up brake light front and rear.
Went as far as test wiring up directionals and hazards with switches. Horn i could never get to work, prob needs a relay. Good luck on your quest, unfortunately i can't help you with your question.
Click to expand...
Just curious, what kind of tires did you find? Make, model , size? Cool that you found some. Maybe I’ll get crazy enough to upgrade from off highway registration to on way use, or atleast do it just to say I could.
 
sparkwizard

sparkwizard

#11
#11
akfonzy said:
How much current do I think it puts out? I’m not sure. Probably only a few amps, MAYBE 10 amps? I have check with the DMV and I’m good to go for “off highway use” so technically, because it already has a headlight, I could get away with just the high beam mod and a tail/brake light. Horn not required and hand signals are acceptable.
I’m a bit confused about the last part: you think the ground was left on the engin? The negative terminal on the rectifier is not grounded to the engine or anything ,
Click to expand...
What I meant was the ground was not connected to the frame because it is a utility engine, and is meant for easy installation on multiple different types of equipment. It is a simple 2 wire plug, correct?
 
A

akfonzy

New Member
#12
#12
sparkwizard said:
What I meant was the ground was not connected to the frame because it is a utility engine, and is meant for easy installation on multiple different types of equipment. It is a simple 2 wire plug, correct?
Click to expand...
There is a simple two wire plug coming out of the engines stator, which is the A/C output. The rectifier’s plug has 4 wires: 2 wires for A/C input (from the engine’s stator) and 2 wires DC out (Negative / Positive) wired directly to the headlight.
 
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