This post has been edited. Originally I hooked up the heaters withOUT a relay. I finally got my relay and did it RIGHT this weekend.
I have read a lot of talk on the dual stars and the symtec. I was getting ready to order a set, and my local "cycle gear" had the Kimpex set, so I thought I would give them a try. I also grabbed a set of the Pro Grip Gel 719 grips. Rivcyco... the 714's felt so comfy, but kinda ugly. The Kimpex kit comes with everything you need for basic installation, except some female insulated 1/4" connectors for the switch, you can get at autozone or just about anywhere.
The first thing I did was pull off the stock rubber grips. I was able to get them off just by tugging. Then, I wrapped one layer of electrical tape on the clutch side metal handlebar, to insulate it so the steel doesn't soak up all the heat. I've been told in a post below that the electrical tape will get hot and break down. He's probably right, so you may want to consider another option instead of electrical tape.
The Kimpex have a peel off backing / adhesive. Peel the back off and wrap it around the handlebar, keeping the wires on the bottom side. I put on a couple wraps of electrical tape.
At first I used just a tiny bit of dishsoap and water, wet the inside of the Progrip and slid it on easily. It slid around easily, even after it sat for a few days. I ended up taking off the grips, cleaning off all the soap and just going with a tad bit of water. This worked great. I did not use any grip glue, even though I bought some.
Do the same on the other side, but make sure the wires will be ok when you open the throttle.
Nice looking grips, eh? They feel good too.
Use electrical tape and tape one wire from each element together, and run them neatly to the left hand side of the frame, where you see the brake line bolted to the frame. Take one lead from each element, cut them down, twist together, and ground it to that bolt. Twist the other two leads together, put on a female connector, and go the the center pole on the switch. Use the included wire to go to each side of the switch, and the other end to the battery area. You will have to take the two bolts out that hold the gas tank down in the front. Be careful NOT to drop the washer/bushing thing in the bike like I did :-) Use small cable ties to run the wires to the battery. Make sure you mount the resistor where it doesn't touch anything. It gets HOT. I wired mine on the inside of the frame.
I cable tied my on off switch instead of drilling a hole to mount it. Drilling a hole in my new bike just seems so... FINAL. Yeah yeah, I will eventually mount it correctly, but for now I'm not sure what I want to do. I might want to mount a under light kit switch and maybe a 12v cig outlet / GPS, so I just don't want to go drilling yet.
Now, if you connect the power lead directly to the battery and forget to turn off your grip heaters, your battery will die. I bought a $5 auto relay #275-226 at radio shack which I wired into the license plate power.
The relay is wired so my grip heaters will not come on, unless the bike is turned on. They way a relay works, is when it gets power, it turns on a switch inside. So, when the bike is turned on, the license plate light power causes the relay to flip on it's switch. You can even hear it "click" on and off. The grip heaters are NOT getting their power from the license plate light. See my wiring diagram below. Also, when the switch is on LOW, the grips are not quite warm enough. The kimpex set up includes a 2ohm resistor. I took a 10ohm resistor and wired in in parallel to the 2ohm, knocking down the total resistance to 1.6ohms. That SHOULD drop more voltage on the heaters than on the resistor, and should make the LOW setting just right... but I have yet to take a ride yet, so I'll have to let you know.
The grips heat up very toasty in about 5 minutes on high. But as we have seen with other heaters, they get a little TOO hot. The low setting with the adjusted resistor should do the trick.
