The issue is figuring a way to connect up the terminals without removing the thing.  Being so tight in the battery case there is no obvious, reliable way to hook it up without causing a short.  If anyone has figured out a way to do that let us all know.

Since I use mine as a daily commuter (=short rides 1-3mi) repeated starts, not enough running time to fully recharge the battery, I've had battery issues too.  I'd like to know if there's a more powerful alternator to recharge the unit faster.  Just a dream.

  You can charge it without taking it out,put the red clamp on positive the black on a motor fin,if it doesn't charge up you might need water then you have to take it out,Distilled water

Or - you can do what I did. I installed a 12 volt socket on the frame under the left side of the seat. It's connected to the battery all the time, would be very hard to short out and can be used to keep your cell phone charged (with a small inverter) when you're trippin'.

Then I took some battery clips from an old battery charger, a male 12 volt socket and about six feet of 12 gauge or so speaker wire and made a "jumper" cable. Now I can jump start the bike (not needed since the new battery), run a low draw inverter and have a cable I can leave plugged into the bike and clip the leads of my battery charger to give the battery a hit once in a while during the winter months up here in southern MN.

Jack

If the battery has had no obvious "Ooops" discharged accidently & its just low, Might be a good idea to chack the water level, IMO. You know how old it is & all the details about it. Maybe its okay, just a thiught

justin_o_guy2 wrote on 10/30/08 at 01:48:22:


I didn't ride it for 4 days which it doesn't like. The morning I went to ride it to work the temperature had dropped from the 60s to the 30s overnight. I think it's just being balky since the Honda did the same thing. I will get the battery checked this weekend though.

A mod I've done to all my bikes is to fit what we call a "pig tail" to the battery positive terminal.  It'll take about an hour to fit and will only cost you a short length of heavier gauge wire..say 6mm..and a 4 inch length of fuel hose.

You need to run the wire out of the battery case and tie wrap it to the bikes frame..say the frame on the right between the seat and the fuel tank.

Bare back about an inch of the wires sleeving to expose the conductor.  Slip a length of about 4 inch fuel hose over it ..to prevent it shorting against the frame. The hose should be a snug fit over the cable to ensure that it does not slide off on its own.

Finally connect the other end of the wire to the battery positive terminal..or join it to the battery positive line where its convenient.

Now if you want to charge up your battery simply remove the fuel hose and clip the battery chargers positive lead to the bared wire then clip the chargers negative clip to a suitable earth...say for example a starter motor mounting bolt.

Likewise if you suffer from a flat battery connect the jump leads as you would the battery charger leads....hence the reason for fitting a heavier cable since if using jump leads the cable will have to carry starter motor current.

If doing this mod run the cable first and bare its end and slide on the fuel hose then finally connect it to the battery positive terminal..you don't want sparks flying whilst running the cable.

A flat battery always happens at the wrong time...it takes just a minute to expose the bare wire and clip on a set of jump leads.  Access to the Savages battery is a bit of a pain and fiddly at the best of times.  If you store the bike for long its no hassle to just clip on those charger leads every few weeks.

I've found this to be a very simple/cheap and easy to use mod...hope you find it so...

Cheers...Connor.

Jack_650 wrote on 10/30/08 at 09:20:23:


I knew you meant left side. It was just t hat old dyslexia setting in - happens to me all the time.

The bike started up fine this morning with the battery tender. I'll see how it does tomorrow morning. We did warm up again here and it's going to be in the 70s tomorrow. Go figure.

I great suggestion though for the winter since I didn't get Sadie until March I don't know how she will do in the real winter. Although it's usually pretty mild here. Maybe a week of bad weather but not much else. Our garages are kind of cold though so it might prove difficult to start anyway.

Sat I will have the battery checked to see if it is good. My assumption is that they put in a mew one when they put in the new engine prior to selling it to me. I of course should not assume anything.

Thanks again everyone.