Bike Shut Off... Twice in two days

I'm really not sure if this was user error or not but this is the scenario.

My bike was plenty warm, riding in stop and go traffic. Both times I was braking to stop, geared down to first but hadn't yet released my clutch to engage first and the bike died.. Just shut off. The first time I was almost stopped so no big deal. Thought maybe I released the clutch with no throttle and caused it to stall. The second time I was much more mindful of what was occurring. I was also going quite a bit quicker and was able to hit the starter and the bike fired up again right away.

I'm still not exactly sure what happened. User error? What mechanical issue could cause this if it wasn't me? Simply stalled. Kinda unnerving.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

It sounds like it is electrical rather than fuel because it fires up right away. It could be a number of things. I would start with the most obvious. Make sure your battery connections are tight. It could be a faulty kickstand safety switch or the clutch safety switch. Check the connections to these switches and make sure they are tight.

I sure others will be along and have more ideas.

This might be a long shot here, I once had an FJ 1200 that had the exact problem that you have described here. It turned out to be the fuse's in the fuse box, they were all fured up, I took some wet and dry paper to them cleaned them up put some Vaseline on them, popped them back in and the problem never came back again. I truly hope that your cure will be as simple as mine was

Friend of mine had exactly the same symptoms.After much investigation it turned out to be the cheap and nasty multi-pin connector in the line between the throttle position sensor(that's the black plastic thing on the right carb.)and the main harness.
Worth a look.

Thanks everyone for your replies. Rode 40 miles today without an issue (except my foot peg snapped off but that's another thread)but I'm going to check all that electrical stuff out tomorrow. I'm not very knowledgable about wiring but I can see if everything's connected.

Well, I checked all the above mentioned connections and everything is nice and tight and the fuse box is super clean. I still need to check the resistance on the clutch lever and the kickstand shutoff. I've never used an ohm meter so I'll have my husband help me with that later today.

i don't know why, but my gut tells me that my idle just dumped low for some reason (could be user error) and then I stalled out. It was bizarre though.

Hey guys my 77 Bonnie has this same issue, i will get it started and ride it for 20-30 minutes no problem then all the sudden it will die while idling. Also occasionally after stopping the bike I will come back, kick-start it and it will die in a few strokes. any ideas?

How's the battery?

-- Posted with TapaTalk

It's fine, also the problem will come and go. i will ride for 20 minutes and it idles fine, then it will die if i don't keep it revved while stopped and then after some more riding the problem will go away.

I'd repost this in the Classics section for more brainstorming.

-- Posted with TapaTalk

Sounds like the idol is set to low

I've seen this exact problem come up a dozen or more times in the last dozen years. My bike did it too. My problem was a pinched breather hose for the gas tank.

With no breather hose a partial vacuum would build up in the gas tank until it reached the point where the gas would not flow even though the gas cap did not seal the tank perfectly. Engine dies from gas starvation, bike stops and in that short period of time, the partial vacuum eases off such that the bike will restart immediately. If the gas cap does seal especially well, taking the gas cap off to make sure you haven't run out of gas will insure that if will then start right back up.

On one 80 mile ride where I had a tight time deadline for arrival, my engine died twice (about every 20 miles) from this "vapor lock"; then as my gas level fell, I loosened the gas cap slightly and I made the rest of the ride without any problem.

In the last 50 years of working on internal combustion engines I have found that most of the time when an engine simply quits, its a gas flow problem; but one time it was blocked exhaust problem. I never had a engine quit for any electrical problem other than the spark plug wire falling completely off of a single cylinder bike.

I recently had issue with my Tiger just cutting out----could be running 65 down the motorway, dead....pull clutch hit starter, fire up keep going......never missed a lick but damn scary (hey I rode Harleys I am used to "improvising" to get where I am going) however it turned out (after much poking and prodding and prognosticating) to be a bad battery. Bad cell I guess it would drop out at intermittent times causing the fuel injection etc. to also blip off....fun in a 90 degree turn healed over and the engine cuts out on you.....lifes an adventure......
New battery, all is well.