MK3 battery connections

I am attempting to tidy up the wiring on my MK3. I am confused by the existence of a green/yellow wire which joins a red wire with ring connector terminal at the battery positive terminal.
Having read thru some earlier posts by Les, I understand that this secondary red wire is not a good thing for the MK3 and plan to disconnect it, but cannot get why the green/yellow wire is spliced in (appears to be factory or at least a good shop splice)
Green yellow is alternator output so it seems very wrong to connect it to the grounded side?

Up until very recently, the bike has always functioned fine.

worntorn said:

but cannot get why the green/yellow wire is spliced in (appears to be factory or at least a good shop splice)
Green yellow is alternator output so it seems very wrong to connect it to the grounded side?

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No, it doesn't look original, and a green/yellow to the positive terminal wouldn't be right, so where does that wire actually go?

I will do some tracing and report back.

Glen

The Green/yellow wire in question goes into the main harness. After cutting the harness open, I found that it terminates here, joining together with all of the harness red wires, one of which goes to the head steady. So it seems benign enough other than the confusing colour. It also has been warm enough at some point to partially melt the insulation. All of the other harness wires look OK.

Glen

worntorn said:

The Green/yellow wire in question goes into the main harness. After cutting the harness open, I found that it terminates here, joining together with all of the harness red wires, one of which goes to the head steady. So it seems benign enough other than the confusing colour. It also has been warm enough at some point to partially melt the insulation. All of the other harness wires look OK.

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Yes, I would hazard a guess that the original red wire burnt out because it was the secondary return wire, which technically, shouldn't have been connected to the battery in the first place-even though it was included in the harness and is shown on the wiring diagram.

That makes sense Les.
I guess the person who added the green/yellow ground wire wasn't worried about some future owner trying to decipher things.
Someone also changed out the black starter supply cable for a very heavy red cable. This also had me bewildered for a bit until I realized it was much heavier than stock, so likely someone used what was at hand even though the colour was wrong.
It is looking like my MK3 is not quite the untouched pristine example I thought it was, at least not the electrics.

Glen

worntorn said:

I guess the person who added the green/yellow ground wire wasn't worried about some future owner trying to decipher things.

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Most likely he would not even have been aware the wire was a potential hazard and may not have known the reason why it burnt out in the first place and only replaced it 'because it was there'?

Don't feel so bad about the P.O. touching your wiring worntorn, a friend of mine married a girl I dated in jr high school & he still thinks she was a virgin too, didn't have the heart to mess up his gig! Glenn T.S.

I found more evidence of past electrical affairs this morning, but I still love her.

Glen

IIRC the symptom shown of the melted thin red ground on a MKIII is when you try and start with the starter and have forgotten to hook up or fully tighten... the fat ground to the back stud of the engine. The bike would function normally UNTIL you push the e-start.
The little wire tries but can't carry all the current. Seen it happen in person, but not on my bike...