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Old February 21st, 2012, 01:26 AM   #1
NathanF
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DIY - Hot Grips Heated Grips Install

Well, after getting some POS $5 heated grip pads on eBay that were total junk, I decided to go to the other end of the spectrum and purchase some top notch, US made Hot Grips brand heated grips.

On Amazon I ordered the 475-875 kit, which comes with two grips, the hi/low switch, and some misc wire. Turns out that was the wrong kit, as our bike requires the ends to be drilled out. The proper kit is the 475-876, and here is the Amazon link for it. As of today, it's $98.26 shipped from Powersport Superstore.

I drilled mine out with my drill press and two appropriately sized forstner bits. This created factory perfect holes with some care, though I stressed about this for about 2 days before finally doing it. (Buy the right kit to avoid this!) Here they are right after drilling before being cleaned up a bit:



After getting those ready, I removed the bar end weights and existing grips. I used a small micro torch to heat the bar end weight bolt for about 30 seconds, and then they came right out with my impact driver. The grips came off quickly with the help of my compressed air wand.

The instructions call to epoxy both grips on to the handlebars. I decided I wanted to make them as removal as possible. This is easy for the clutch side. I drilled two small holes in the bottom of the handlebar, and inserted a bent piece of a coat hanger.



When fitted into the bottom of the handblar, this provides a perfect key to fit into the ribbed, notched grips. I put a small kink in it, then friction fit the clutch side grip on.



The throttle side is more tricky, since you can't drill into the plastic throttle tube. What I ended up doing was wrapping the tube so the grip fit on snugly. I then expoxied to that, with a small amount on the actual throttle tube. It should be enough to hold, but not enough to be totally permanent.



The low setting of these grips uses a big honking resistor to shed unnecessary heat. I mounted it to the metal center bar in front of the handlebars.



You can wire this straight to your battery, but that is not considered wise since you can leave them on by mistake. I wired up a relay into my tail light flasher (to avoid having to cut into any factory wires) at the rear of the bike. The relay is a $5 12v from Radioshack. As a result of this, turning the key off kills all power to the grips, whether they are on or not.

All connections were made with soldered crimp connectors and protected with heat shrink tubing.



To mount the switch, I cut a piece of aluminum flat bar, drilled two holes in it, and cut the corners off. One hole holds the switch, while the other is bolted to the preexisting, normally plugged threaded hole in the clutch lever assembly. A bit of textured black spray paint on the bolt and aluminum makes it blend in.



Here it is all finished!



A comparison of the old grip and new grip. The Hot Grips are much harder, larger, and feel more substantial. This means your hands are less cupped which lessens fatigue. I loved them the very first ride I took. However, if you were foolish enough to ride without gloves, the softer more rubbery stock grip might be missed slightly.



The verdict? Hot damn these grips a nice. Their larger size is much more comfortable than the dinky stock grips, and the heat they put out is unbelievable. I did 150 miles on 40-45 degrees a weekend or so ago, and they made a huge difference. In fact, I had to keep turning it back to low, since high was downright uncomfortably hot. It's amazing how much better off you are if at least your hands are warm.


PS: This mess took a while to clean up.


Last futzed with by NathanF; February 21st, 2012 at 06:03 PM.
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Old February 21st, 2012, 05:35 AM   #2
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Nice!

If you don't mind me asking though... what was wrong with the $5 kit? I thought it was getting descent reviews... I have one but I have yet to install.
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Old February 21st, 2012, 06:48 AM   #3
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Old February 21st, 2012, 12:31 PM   #4
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Nice!

If you don't mind me asking though... what was wrong with the $5 kit? I thought it was getting descent reviews... I have one but I have yet to install.
It is true some others have been OK with them. Here is my experience in another post:

http://www.ninjette.org/forums/showt...750#post425750
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Old February 21st, 2012, 12:35 PM   #5
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Thanks. Maybe I'll do some testing prior to the install.
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Old February 21st, 2012, 02:35 PM   #6
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You made a good choice with the HotGrips. I've been using them on my EX-250 for three winters now, couldn't be happier with the product.

I put my switch on the fairing (right above the voltmeter in the picture).

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Old February 21st, 2012, 05:21 PM   #7
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What is the total power consumption of this thing? 36 watts? And about how much thicker are they than the stock grips? Do you notice one side being warmer than the other side?
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Old February 21st, 2012, 05:45 PM   #8
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What is the total power consumption of this thing? 36 watts?
I don't know precisely what the draw is, but I do know that while sitting at a stoplight (brake lights on) at idle (with all my Fuel Injection system electrical draws operating: fuel pump, ECU, sensors) and the HotGrips on "high" my voltmeter sits at 13.1 or 13.2

Once the RPMs come up the voltmeter sits at 13.8 or 13.9

Quote:
And about how much thicker are they than the stock grips?
I'm an average sized guy with average sized hands and the HotGrips feel better in my hand than the OEM grips did.

Quote:
Do you notice one side being warmer than the other side?
Yeah, there is an imbalance. That's just part of the deal with the left side being mounted to metal while the right side is on the throttle sleeve. It's not a bad thing, but you do notice it.
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Old February 21st, 2012, 05:51 PM   #9
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What is the total power consumption of this thing? 36 watts? And about how much thicker are they than the stock grips? Do you notice one side being warmer than the other side?
I'll echo what Greg said above, but I think the heating difference tends to even out. It is noticeable at first, but once the metal bar gets up to temp, it stops being too noticeable.

The inside of both grips are ribbed/slotted plastic, which I'm sure makes them perform much better than the "wrap the heating element around the bar" variety. The end result is much more heat going into your hands.
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Old February 21st, 2012, 06:01 PM   #10
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What is the total power consumption of this thing? 36 watts? And about how much thicker are they than the stock grips? Do you notice one side being warmer than the other side?
Just took a picture of the two grips side by side, and added it to the original post towards the end.
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Old February 21st, 2012, 06:30 PM   #11
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I'll echo what Greg said above, but I think the heating difference tends to even out. It is noticeable at first, but once the metal bar gets up to temp, it stops being too noticeable.

The inside of both grips are ribbed/slotted plastic, which I'm sure makes them perform much better than the "wrap the heating element around the bar" variety. The end result is much more heat going into your hands.
Yea this setup probably puts more heat into your hands however, the symtec stick on set that I have is often too hot for me when its on high unless I'm on the freeway at night, then it's just perfect lol. I think @setasai would like these since he likes larger grips
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Old February 25th, 2013, 06:02 AM   #12
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a year later... and thanks for the diy...

it was nice to see a few of the things illustrated. I did mine with epoxy though, that simplified everything a lot. I figured I'll never actually take them off, I'd just buy a new set for a new bike if the time came.

btw, what did you use for ground for the grips? I haven't gotten to taking the side fairings off yet.

And I'm also looking at using one of these switches... with the extra "kill" button, I'll scrape the "kill" off and wire it up to a garage door opener.

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Old February 25th, 2013, 02:57 PM   #13
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a year later... and thanks for the diy...

it was nice to see a few of the things illustrated. I did mine with epoxy though, that simplified everything a lot. I figured I'll never actually take them off, I'd just buy a new set for a new bike if the time came.

btw, what did you use for ground for the grips? I haven't gotten to taking the side fairings off yet.

And I'm also looking at using one of these switches... with the extra "kill" button, I'll scrape the "kill" off and wire it up to a garage door opener.

My pleasure. To answer your question, I believe I slightly unscrewed a bolt that goes into the frame somewhere then put a crimp on connector underneath and re-tightened. I don't recall where though at this point, and have since sold my Ninja. I wouldn't worry about it too much.
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Old January 17th, 2014, 01:25 PM   #14
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Old thread revival...Wanted to try and install these, but wasn't sure about the wiring. I replaced the flasher relay when I got an LED brake light and turn signal; was this wired to that flasher relay? What exactly does the wiring look like? What are other options/ideas to wire this thing short of directly to the battery?
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Old January 17th, 2014, 02:13 PM   #15
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I m not an electrician, but i have hooked up accessories without blowing up my bike.

Based on the pictures, this is not hooked to the flasher relay. Leave that one alone. It only controls the turn signals.

You buy a new automotive relay at any electronic store. What it does is has four or five terminals you attached wires to. One wire comes from the battery straight to the relay. One goes from the relay to a grounding point. One is a switched wire that has been tapped into another wire only powered on when the key is turned (ie the tail light wire). The final one or two terminals provide power to what accessor(ies) you are hooking up.

This allows you to leave the accessory plugged in and power will only be supplied when the switched wire has power to it. That flips the relay to connect the power from the battery to the wire going to the accessory.
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Old January 17th, 2014, 03:12 PM   #16
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I m not an electrician, but i have hooked up accessories without blowing up my bike.

Based on the pictures, this is not hooked to the flasher relay. Leave that one alone. It only controls the turn signals.

You buy a new automotive relay at any electronic store. What it does is has four or five terminals you attached wires to. One wire comes from the battery straight to the relay. One goes from the relay to a grounding point. One is a switched wire that has been tapped into another wire only powered on when the key is turned (ie the tail light wire). The final one or two terminals provide power to what accessor(ies) you are hooking up.

This allows you to leave the accessory plugged in and power will only be supplied when the switched wire has power to it. That flips the relay to connect the power from the battery to the wire going to the accessory.
Thanks for the info. I'm having trouble understanding the 'switched wire'. What is meant by 'tapping into tail light wire'? It seems to me that the power wire for tail light gets connected to switch terminal, and power terminal goes to tail light and heat grips. Is that correct?
It might make more sense if I had the bike in front of me, but I wanted to get as much information beforehand as possible.
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Old January 17th, 2014, 03:34 PM   #17
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That may be possible, I honestly haven't tried.

What i did originally was bought a wire crimp (?) ... Um, this thing...


And just laid the tail light wire into it and then the line going to the relay from the tail light. Pinch it together and it breaks through the plastic cover and connects the two lines. However, i decided later I wanted a more permanent solution, so stripped the plastic cover off a small segment of the tail light wire, stripped a bit of plastic off the relay wire and wrapped it around the tail light wire, and soldered the two together, then covered the connection with heat shrink.

The only thing i could see going wrong if you power the tail lights through the relay is if the relay goes bad, you loose your tail lights.
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Old January 17th, 2014, 04:07 PM   #18
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You made a good choice with the HotGrips. I've been using them on my EX-250 for three winters now, couldn't be happier with the product.

I put my switch on the fairing (right above the voltmeter in the picture).

Do you have a thread on the voltmeter you installed?
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Old January 17th, 2014, 04:30 PM   #19
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That may be possible, I honestly haven't tried.

What i did originally was bought a wire crimp (?) ... Um, this thing...


And just laid the tail light wire into it and then the line going to the relay from the tail light. Pinch it together and it breaks through the plastic cover and connects the two lines. However, i decided later I wanted a more permanent solution, so stripped the plastic cover off a small segment of the tail light wire, stripped a bit of plastic off the relay wire and wrapped it around the tail light wire, and soldered the two together, then covered the connection with heat shrink.

The only thing i could see going wrong if you power the tail lights through the relay is if the relay goes bad, you loose your tail lights.
OK. So it's entirely possible to just forego the relay and splice the power wire for the heat grips to tail light wire?
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Old January 17th, 2014, 04:50 PM   #20
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OK. So it's entirely possible to just forego the relay and splice the power wire for the heat grips to tail light wire?
Errr, this is where my lack of electrical knowledge is going to show.

The tail light has a very tiny wire and I would presume a very low draw since it is only a small bulb.

My heated jacket has a thicker wire coming off the battery (I think) because it has a far greater draw.

A wild @$$ guess believes that if you try powering the heated grips through the tiny little tail light wire, you will end up blowing the fuse for the tail lights along with whatever else gets damaged when something draws too much power for what the wire was designed for.
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Old January 17th, 2014, 05:07 PM   #21
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You make a good point. I'll stick with the relay; pretty sure I got a good grasp on this now. Thanks for your help.
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Old January 17th, 2014, 05:11 PM   #22
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You are welcome.

Sorry i couldn't be more detailed or specific. But I am glad i could help some.
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Old January 22nd, 2014, 03:06 PM   #23
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A relay uses a small amount of power to control a bigger amount of power. The taillight wire is used to trigger the relay, since it switches on and off with the key. OP tapped into it at the flasher to avoid cutting any factory wiring. The relay then feeds power directly from the battery to the heated gear. The accessory gets power through thick wire that's essentially hooked right to the battery, but the power feed is switched on and off with the key (thanks to the taillight wire and relay).

Here's a diagram of a relay.


You would hook up the switched trigger wire and the ground on the left side to the coil. The battery would be connected to the upper right point, and the accessory would be connected to the middle bottom point, which is a normally-open (not connected) circuit. When you power up the coil circuit (taillight in this case), it acts as an electromagnet and pulls (represented by the dotted line) the relay switch over, connecting the input (the battery) to the middle bottom output (the accessory). The switch moving over to the other contact is the clicking you hear when a relay activates.

Standard automotive relays may or may not have the bottom right point, which is normally-closed. This contact is connected to the battery when the coil circuit is not powered, and disconnects when the coil gets power (since the switch is pulled over to the other contact). In this particular scenario, there's not a whole lot of use for the NC contact, but it's handy for other things when you want to turn on A and have B turn off automatically.
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Old January 22nd, 2014, 03:46 PM   #24
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haven't been paying as much attention to this site since the weather went downhill around here.

As stated above, you definitely want a relay. These things pull a bunch of amperage, you'll definitely keep blowing fuses if you try to run in parallel with any other item on the bike. There is plenty of room to store a relay under the seat (in the battery area). You really only need an automotive SPST (single pole single throw) relay that lacks the extra terminal that is closed when the switch is not active. The image posted above is from a SPDT (single pole double throw) relay. Personally I try to use the right tool for the job. If you chose to use a SPDT, make sure you either clip off, or adequately cover the unused terminal or you could find that you're shorting things out, causing fires, etc.

Personally, I'd stay away from using the brake light as your switched wire. The last thing you need is something to short while you're riding and lose your tail light. Pick something else. Personally, I picked the license plate light.

Think about the routing of the wires. You'll want wire covers if you want it to look professional as they will be visible in some locations, and wire covers prevent the wire insulation from becoming worn and shorting out on metal parts.

Mounting of the switches seemed to be the biggest battle for me. I don't like the cheesy looking switches that come with the kit. I got one of these: http://www.motorcycle-superstore.com...WT.MC_ID=10010

That switch fit perfectly on the left handle bar (of a stock ninjette) and provides a clean install. Nothing looks "tacked on", like it would with those simple toggle switches. Plus, it provided an additional momentary switch (advertised as a kill switch), that I wired up to a garage door opener... now I can pull straight into my garage when I get home without fumbling in my jacket pocket.
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Old January 23rd, 2014, 08:59 AM   #25
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haven't been paying as much attention to this site since the weather went downhill around here.

As stated above, you definitely want a relay. These things pull a bunch of amperage, you'll definitely keep blowing fuses if you try to run in parallel with any other item on the bike. There is plenty of room to store a relay under the seat (in the battery area). You really only need an automotive SPST (single pole single throw) relay that lacks the extra terminal that is closed when the switch is not active. The image posted above is from a SPDT (single pole double throw) relay. Personally I try to use the right tool for the job. If you chose to use a SPDT, make sure you either clip off, or adequately cover the unused terminal or you could find that you're shorting things out, causing fires, etc.

Personally, I'd stay away from using the brake light as your switched wire. The last thing you need is something to short while you're riding and lose your tail light. Pick something else. Personally, I picked the license plate light.

Think about the routing of the wires. You'll want wire covers if you want it to look professional as they will be visible in some locations, and wire covers prevent the wire insulation from becoming worn and shorting out on metal parts.

Mounting of the switches seemed to be the biggest battle for me. I don't like the cheesy looking switches that come with the kit. I got one of these: http://www.motorcycle-superstore.com...WT.MC_ID=10010

That switch fit perfectly on the left handle bar (of a stock ninjette) and provides a clean install. Nothing looks "tacked on", like it would with those simple toggle switches. Plus, it provided an additional momentary switch (advertised as a kill switch), that I wired up to a garage door opener... now I can pull straight into my garage when I get home without fumbling in my jacket pocket.
You make a good point about using the tail light as the switch wire; I was thinking about that exact scenario after I did the splicing. This was my first time attacking a wire install like this. My wire routing is dismal at best. Will definitely redo the wires at some point which is when I'll think about using the license plate light instead.
I ended up cutting the power wire for the tail light and connecting it to the relay, then two wires out of the relay to the tail light and grips. I was a little confused on where the fuse should be...I put it between the relay and grips. Is that not right?
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Old January 23rd, 2014, 12:34 PM   #26
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Quote:
Originally Posted by dfox View Post
Personally, I'd stay away from using the brake light as your switched wire. The last thing you need is something to short while you're riding and lose your tail light. Pick something else. Personally, I picked the license plate light.
You make a good point about using the tail light as the switch wire; I was thinking about that exact scenario after I did the splicing. This was my first time attacking a wire install like this. My wire routing is dismal at best. Will definitely redo the wires at some point which is when I'll think about using the license plate light instead.
FYI, pretty much all the lights on the bike are powered off the taillight fuse (wiring diagram). Obviously messing with the actual wire going to the taillight increases the odds of problems with the taillight itself. However, the taillight, brakelight, plate light, and dash lights are all tied into the same "Taillight" circuit. If any of those short out and blow the fuse, you'll end up losing all those lights. Screwing up the plate light wire isn't that much better than screwing up the taillight wire in that sense.


Quote:
Originally Posted by broilmebk View Post
I was a little confused on where the fuse should be...I put it between the relay and grips. Is that not right?
Generally speaking, as close to the battery as possible. A fuse acts as a weak link that breaks before anything else gets damaged. If the fuse is a foot from the battery and blows, you still have 12" of hot wire that could short out. If it's only an inch from the battery, then you only have 1" of hot wire that could give you more problems.
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Old January 23rd, 2014, 03:37 PM   #27
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Quote:
Originally Posted by InvisiBill View Post
FYI, pretty much all the lights on the bike are powered off the taillight fuse (wiring diagram). Obviously messing with the actual wire going to the taillight increases the odds of problems with the taillight itself. However, the taillight, brakelight, plate light, and dash lights are all tied into the same "Taillight" circuit. If any of those short out and blow the fuse, you'll end up losing all those lights. Screwing up the plate light wire isn't that much better than screwing up the taillight wire in that sense.




Generally speaking, as close to the battery as possible. A fuse acts as a weak link that breaks before anything else gets damaged. If the fuse is a foot from the battery and blows, you still have 12" of hot wire that could short out. If it's only an inch from the battery, then you only have 1" of hot wire that could give you more problems.
Thanks for the info Bill. I guess I can leave the switch wire the way it is. I'll move the fuse between battery and relay when I go about re-wiring the setup.

BTW, everything everybody says about these grips is true. It's a total godsend and by far the best mod I've done to my bike.
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