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Message started by 1988savage on 05/02/09 at 18:32:47

Title: battery....
Post by 1988savage on 05/02/09 at 18:32:47

so, i left my ignition on this morning when i went into the house.. rookie mistake. i plugged my battery into a battery tender and it didnt do anything for the battery. so i jumped it wit a car while it wasnt running and it worked.... so i rode it around for about ten mins. then tried to restart it and there was no juice again. should i plug it up to the car battery again and let it sit like that for a little bit? or what? please HELP lol

Title: Re: battery....
Post by Yonuh Adisi on 05/02/09 at 18:40:29

Put it on a slow trickle charge over night (about 2 amp or less) after checking water level to be sure you didn't boil a bunch off while jumping it from the car.

Title: Re: battery....
Post by 1988savage on 05/02/09 at 19:11:20

ok, so i shouldnt keep it hooked up to a car battery to try and charge it?

Title: Re: battery....
Post by Yonuh Adisi on 05/02/09 at 19:47:43

Not a good idea, no.

Title: Re: battery....
Post by odvelasc on 05/02/09 at 19:50:49

Yep, Charge it at 2amps overnight. Its the safest way for the battery. And yes check your water level on the battery. It should be between the top two blue lines if you are running the original battery. If it is low,
get a turkey baster and some distilled water to fill it up to level.

Title: Re: battery....
Post by 1988savage on 05/02/09 at 19:50:52

ok, so i should be good by keepin it on the tender all night? the battery was brand new 20 miles ago

Title: Re: battery....
Post by Yonuh Adisi on 05/02/09 at 19:52:43

That would be the way I would go if I didn't have an actual charger. If I am correct, a tender is used mainly to just keep the battery topped off while not in use for a while. Anybody can correct me if I am wrong, for I have never used a battery tender.

Title: Re: battery....
Post by 1988savage on 05/02/09 at 19:54:24

yea i dont have a charger. that is what the tender is supposed to do

Title: Re: battery....
Post by Savage_Amusement on 05/02/09 at 19:56:54

The tender I have will very slowly charge the battery at 2 amps and then float after max charge is reached. I'm sure most of them will do the same.

Title: Re: battery....
Post by 1988savage on 05/02/09 at 19:58:37

ok thanks alot for the help. im sure ill be posting more questions soon lol

Title: Re: battery....
Post by PTRider on 05/03/09 at 07:14:02

Quote:

the battery was brand new 20 miles ago

It is entirely possible that the battery wasn't completely charged when you bought it.

The trickle charger ("Battery Tender" is one good brand) will recharge but very slowly. Either connect to a 2 amp charger for several hours to get the battery up to full charge, or just give the trickle charger several days. Sure, you can ride, and the bike's alternator will eventually fully charge the battery, also.

Title: Re: battery....
Post by Charon on 05/03/09 at 07:30:33

A completely dead battery sometimes will not accept a charge, at least at first. A "smart" battery charger will sometimes see a very dead battery as defective, and refuse to even try charging it. I have not used a brand-name Battery Tender, so I don't know its logic. Try connecting it, and if it doesn't show the battery as defective, it will eventually do the job.

Title: Re: battery....
Post by odvelasc on 05/03/09 at 08:27:10

151D1C1C574552454341240 wrote:

ok thanks alot for the help. im sure ill be posting more questions soon lol

Charging is the easiest maintenance on the bike lol. At least for me. I have a charger/booster. I set it to 2 amps. For a drained battery it should take over nigh to charge. Goodluck.

Title: Re: battery....
Post by marshall13 on 05/03/09 at 11:17:56

these bikes have alternators, not generators... a generator will charge a discharged battery, an alternator will not... you need the battery to provide a minimum of 12 volts, while the bike is running, for the charging circuit to work... so, trickle or tender charge until a volt meter reads at least 13 volts on the batt terminals... that's with the charger turned off(or disconnected).... at that point, you could jump it, and have it charge... much better to fully charge the battery, then go riding.... most of the chain auto parts stores will charge a battery for you, way cheap, as well as most mechanics shops (cages or bikes)... sears, walmart, kmart, and all auto parts stores sell small 10 amp max chargers.... cheap, and most handy... tenders "float charge" and most wont charge a completely discharged battery....

Title: Re: battery....
Post by false_illusion on 05/03/09 at 11:37:55

747F6D7E777A68781B0 wrote:

Another tool useful for this app is a medical "Bulb Syringe".

This works great for transferring the distilled water from its container to each battery cell.

Cheap, too...

And if you have little ones runnin' around the house like I do...there's a very good chance you already have one!

Hopefully the pic comes through...http://thm-a02.yimg.com/image/0df1bfd227faf70e

Title: Re: battery....
Post by Charon on 05/03/09 at 13:30:33

True, these bikes have alternators. But they have alternators with permanent magnets, not field coil excitation. So, as soon as the magnets (mounted on the flywheel) start turning, they generate voltage into the stationary stator coils. Those coils supply three-phase AC to the voltage regulator, which in turn supplies (about) 14.4 volts DC to the entire remainder of the electrical system, including the battery. If the battery is very dead, it may not accept a charge, so it will appear the system is faulty and did not charge it. A "smart" charger will see this 14.4 volts and no charge acceptance current as a fully-charged (not dead) battery and will switch to trickle or float charge. Given time the trickle charge (or voltage regulator) voltage will begin to charge the dead battery. Once the battery starts to accept charge current its terminal voltage will drop. The regulator will respond by "dumping" less excess charge current; or the "smart" charger will respond by entering bulk charge mode. At this stage the battery charge system will proceed to a normal charge.

Title: Re: battery....
Post by marshall13 on 05/03/09 at 15:55:19

a transistor in the regulator/rectifier wont allow making the charge circuit without 12 volts from the battery, thus the 2 ignition leads into the reg/rec unit. one's the make circuit, the other the charge.... no batt voltage, no charge...

Title: Re: battery....
Post by prechermike on 05/03/09 at 16:32:46

644F46554849270 wrote:

Yeah, what he said! :-?

Title: Re: battery....
Post by PTRider on 05/03/09 at 16:36:53

3E3221203B323F3F6260530 wrote:

these bikes have alternators, not generators

An alternator IS a generator, specifically an alternating current generator. You might be thinking of a direct current generator. And, you might be right, I don't know, that the control circuit of these alternators needs to see some voltage in the battery before it'll start putting out.

Quote:

most of the chain auto parts stores will charge a battery for you, way cheap, as well as most mechanics shops (cages or bikes)

Be very careful. Most cannot charge at a low enough level to recharge a small battery at a rate that won't shorten its eventual life, about 2 amp max charging rate. Figure the max safe battery charging rate to ensure a long life of the battery is about 20% of the amp-hour rate. Our batteries are rated at 14 amp-hours (thus the "14" in the battery designation), so 3 amps initial charging rate might be OK.

Quote:

...sears, walmart, kmart, and all auto parts stores sell small 10 amp max chargers.... cheap, and most handy... tenders "float charge" and most wont charge a completely discharged battery....

Again, 2 amp max for these small batteries. By "tender" I assume you mean a battery maintainer. The Battery Tender Jr. (http://batterytender.com/) is a 3/4-amp full charger plus maintainer, the Battery Tender Plus is a 1-1/4 amp full charger plus maintainer, the BatteryMINDER Plus (http://www.pacificbattery.com/batteryminder.html) is a full 1.3 amp charger plus desulfating maintainer. Any of these will fully charge one of our batteries if we're patient enough and give it time. As you say, depending on the control circuit in the charger, we might need to supply an initial voltage to get the charger going.

Title: Re: battery....
Post by Charon on 05/03/09 at 16:44:18

However, the nominal 12 volts must be present, or the CDI won't be making any sparks and the engine won't be running. The whole system is a parallel circuit, and it isn't very likely the 12 volts can be present in only part of it. Given that the bike has been jump-started, the 12 volts was supplied by the external battery. When the engine starts, the voltage regulator tries to supply the 14.4 volts to charge the external battery, and the bike battery in parallel. In the process it supplies the voltage to the rest of the bike. The external battery is removed when the jumper cables are disconnected. The voltage regulator sees this as a fully-charged battery (the dead one on the bike), and "dumps" excess charge. A push-start is explained similarly, in that the bike battery is rarely so dead as not to be able to supply at least a little voltage, which will probably turn on the low-current control circuitry and CDI in the absence of the heavy starter current.

Edited to add: To be pedantic, a generator is an alternator with built-in mechanical switching - the commutator. Both generators and alternators can be made with either permanent-magnet or electromagnetic fields, or even both. A permanent magnet field does not require excitation, but is harder to control Its charge cannot be reduced, so the excess has to be shunted (dumped) somewhere. The output of an electromagnetic field alternator or generator can be controlled by controlling the field current.

Title: Re: battery....
Post by marshall13 on 05/03/09 at 16:55:11

ok, maybe i should clarify... by a 10 amp max charger, i meant one of the little guys, selectable 10-5-2 amp charge... cant remember who made mine, and as it's currently charging a friends trolling motor battery, not much chance of my finding out...lol just wanted to distinguish between it, and one of the 200 amp jobs the service shops use... if you go the chain store route to seek a full charge(or service station, for that matter) you have to make sure they will properly charge it... usually, of course, that will require dealing with someone old enough to know how little he knows.... teen countermen and pump jockeys wouldnt be my first choice....