Harley Sportster Tach Installation

Date: Tue, 23 Apr 2002 07:11:43 -0400
From: John Kodis <kodis@jagunet.com>
Subject: Tach installation on my 2001 XLH 883

I recently installed a Harley-Davidson Sportster Tachometer Kit (part number 67182-95D) on my 2001 XLH-883 Sportster. Before starting this project, I asked for advice on the Sportster mailing list, and received two pearls of wisdom: 1) the instructions supplied with the tachometer kit are outright wrong in some places, confusing in most places, and make the job way more complicated than it needs to be; and that 2) I should ignore the supplied instructions, and refer instead to a post written by some guy who installed the tachometer kit on his bike a couple of years ago. These both turned out to be good bits of advice.

I found and read the post "Installing a tach on 2000 XL1200C" by Myron Tuttle from February 12, 2000 in the xl-list archives. I was relieved to find that there was no need to remove the gas tank and seat, to disconnect the battery, or to pull the wiring harness out of place in order to install my new tachometer. Unlike the instructions provided by Harley, Myron's approach didn't mention any steps which could result in severe injury or death. Most surprising was that Myron, who is presumably not a professional technical writer, was able to put in a half page email a set of directions which were clearer and more accurate than those provided in the six-page professionally written and illustrated instructions supplied by the motor company.

As good and as helpful as these instructions were, they were written for an XL-1200C, and so differed slightly from the procedure I used in installing the tachometer kit on my XLH-883. Because of this, I thought I'd write up the steps that I used to try to help spare anyone the confusion I felt when trying to reconcile the instructions supplied with the kit to the reality of my bike.

• Cover the front fender and tank with towels to prevent scratching.
• Unscrew the odometer reset button cover; remove the speedometer rear cover plate; unplug the cable connector from the speedometer. Pull out the bottom of the rubber ring that secures the speedometer, and extract the speedometer cable.
• Remove the two upper handlebar clamp bolts that hold the speedometer housing in place.
• Remove indicator light pod, being careful not to lose the thin plastic strip of indicator light icons. The speedometer housing will now be free, and the speedometer can be gently pushed out from the rear of the housing.
• Remove the headlight and eyebrow assembly by removing the two bolts through the eyebrow; uncouple the twelve-pin Deutsch connector that's buried between the eyebrow and the headlight housing.
• Fabricate a tachometer cable from the parts supplied with the tachometer kit:

          Amp Tach     Wire         Deutsch       Wiring         Signal 
          Connector    from Kit     Connector     Harness        or Level 
       
             1         orange       1 (splice)    orange/white   power 
             2         black       12 (splice)    black          ground 
             3         pink         7 (socket)    pink           tach 

• Notes:
  • The orange power and black ground wires for the tachometer have to be spliced into the power and ground wires on pins 1 and 12 of the Deutsch connector. Crimp-on butt connectors are supplied to make these splices, but I made soldered connections instead.
  • Pin 1 of the Amp tachometer connector is set off a bit from the other pins.
  • Inserting the socket on the pink wire into the Deutsch connector block requires that the connector block be disassembled by prying the orange face out of its housing.
  • There will be several similar appearing pink wires supplied with the tachometer kit. Pick the one with a socket that's similar in diameter to the other Deutsch connector sockets.
• After fabricating the tachometer cable and running the wires through the supplied plastic sleeve, reconnect the Deutsch connector, and stuff the connector and cabling under the eyebrow. Reinstall the headlight and eyebrow assembly as per instructions in the factory service manual.
• Install the speedometer on the left and the tachometer on the right in the new bracket; reinstall the indicator light pod, and bolt the bracket loosely in place.
• Route the speedometer and tachometer cables through the rubber seal rings, and connect them to the speedometer and tachometer. Test start the engine, and insure that both the tachometer and speedometer are getting power and are operating. Troubleshoot if not. Install the tachometer and speedometer rear cover plates.
• Tighten down the handlebar bolts that hold the tachometer and speedometer bracket in place as per the factory service manual. Insure that all connectors are tight, all bolts are torqued to factory specifications, and enjoy the ride.

That's all there is to it. I hope this helps.