Airhead LED Conversion

Apologies to Edward Bulwer-Lytton - it wasn't a stormy night but it was very dark and I was afraid I might run off a poorly marked road.

Way back in 2015 I rode Otus to The Top 'O The Rockies Rally in Paonia, CO and then on to the BMW MOA Rally in Billings, MT. Along the way my group rode through Yellowstone Park to see Old Faithful. We had a bit of a wait getting into the park and got stopped a couple of times - once due to traffic and another time due to a Bison wandering the road (that was an impressively big animal!) so we got to Old Faithful late in the day. After Old Faithful did its thing we decided we wanted to find a hotel for the night rather than pitch camp. The park had a room available, but it was about an hour ride from Old Faithful. The time and distance wasn't a problem but we'd be riding after dark. Again, not normally a problem but there are a couple of things to keep in mind when riding through a park like Yellowstone. First, there are no street lights - probably because of those animals wanting to be able to sleep. The other thing we found out as the sun was setting, there was no reflective paint strip on the shoulder of the road. Either the road had just been re-paved or they just don't paint that stripe. Either way, this one hour ride with an incandescent bulb made for a dark and scary ride. I knew that Otus' next modification was going to be an LED headlight.

After registering at the Billings Rally and setting up camp, I went straight to the vendor area and started looking for an LED headlight. As it turns out, the type of light bulb used in my beloved Airhead is the very common H4 bulb. There are several H4-replacement LED bulbs but the first vendor interested enough to talk to me got my business - Cyclops. Their headlight was a direct plug-and-play fit, and it lit up the night! I highly recommend this bulb! This light helps me see and be seen!

The little bulb in the headlight reflector had proven difficult to find. I searched all the websites claiming to carry all the LEDs I'd ever need, but I couldn't determine which LED bulb I needed to replace that little incandescent bulb. I parked that in the back of my brain hoping some day I'd figure it out. "Figuring it out" turned out to be asking the correct person the correct question. This year I was fortunate enough to attend the BMW MOA Rally in Lebanon, TN. It was a glorious ride there and back, and being there with my Airhead friends was a lot of fun. It was even more fun than anticipated because at Airhead Central I ran into Kat and Paul - the people behind KATDASH - and asked them if they could help me with an LED Parking Light bulb. They had the bulb I was looking for, and for only $4.00. That wasn't all I bought but this bulb is central to this part of the story, so now I'll show you the pictures!

I am NOT an electrician but I am a fairly stubborn researcher and question-asker. Those two skills allowed me to get the help I needed to make LED turn signals work. What I came to understand is that LED bulbs don't act like incandescent bulbs when it comes to relays. The stock turn signal relay in Otus did not work when I put LED light bulbs in the front and back turn signals. Nothing happened when I turned on the left or right turn signal. Through trial and error I learned that I could run LEDs in the front turn signals OR the back turn signals, but not in both. I figured out that I needed a relay that would work with LED turn signal bulbs fore and aft, but I wasn't able to find a relay that plugged into Otus' stock turn signal relay plug. I wandered around the Internets looking for an answer but couldn't find a definitive answer. Like the LED Parking Light bulb I pushed this to the back of my brain and let it cook.

This question also came up when I talked with Kat and Paul of KATDASH at Airhead Central in Lebanon, TN. Guess what? They have a solution! A relay, a set of instructions, and a four-pack of LED turn signal bulbs and Otus now features functioning LED turn signals. Oh, and after a couple of minutes of thinking I connected the relay without chopping up the stock turn signal wiring. The stock turn signal relay has four pins. The replacement relay has three pins. While I don't plan on going back to the stock relay and lights - Otus is a war horse, not a show pony, so there will be no concourse judging! - I hate cutting stock wiring. Rather than chopping and crimping the stock wiring I made a few mostly color-correct jumpers from the new relay to the stock relay fitting. These work great and keep all the stock wiring intact. I'm pretty happy with this solution. Check out the pictures for more details.

This is perhaps the neatest part of all the LED upgrades. Advertised as "Modern solid state LED lighting for for BMW R bike motorcycle gauges" the KATDASH system is just that. With this kit I no longer need to futz with tiny incandescent bulbs mounted in a flexible circuit board. Oh, and I can actually see what the gauges are telling me. If you own an Airhead this is a must-have upgrade. Even though Otus is a 1977 R100/7 I ended up needing to order the Slash 6 kit. The web site describes how to select the correct kit and the instructions were well done. The upgrade took minutes and the results are great!

Like the KATDASH instrument cluster solution, the tail light solution was simple and elegant. I chose the Motorrad Electrik Beacon 1 kit for Otus. This tail light kit is genuinely plug-and-play and makes me feel more confident when it comes to being seen - which is especially important when stopping! Check out the pictures to see how simple this is to install!