Headlight blinks on and off...?

silverbear

The Boy Who Never Grew Up
I rigged up headlights on both my 2 cycle bikes today, running them off the engine white wire. The Both work fine in terms of brightness, but both blink on and off. What's with that? It isn't a loose connection with either one, it is very regular...on for one second and off for one second, etc. Both lights ground to the bike for the second "wire"... is that what's wrong? In each case it is a six volt incandescent flashlight bulb. I had mostly wanted to make my self visible to others which this certainly does, but it also makes it pretty useless as a way for me to see. Any help is much appreciated.
Silverbear
 
My guess would be that you have an intermittent ground connection between your engine and the frame. You could try running a wire from the engine block to some point where you can make a solid connection to the frame and see if that fixes the problem. Paint can act as an insulator.
 
I guess it is also possible the lights are supposed to blink. Did they come with any instructions?
 
I've bought flashlight replacement bulbs without noticing that they were blinking lights. Who'd a thunk...why anyone would need a flashlight that blinks?
 
Well, I tired running a ground wire from engine to frame and still had a blinking headlight. I dug through the waste can to find the card the pair of bulbs came with and sure enough in small print is says, blinking bulbs. I guess these would be good for some kind of turn signals, but not a headlight, for sure. Thanks for the tips, both of you. I think a new set of bulbs will fix the problem.
Silverbear
 
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