Finding Charging System Fault

MFolks wrote:

Do you have a good analog(needle pointer) to use as a comparison? I've heard some digital multimeters are sensitive to magnetic fields from bike's alternators.

I was having this same issue when measuring voltage across the posts of the battery, with the bike running. I now have both meters, cause it should take long for either meter to display a reading.

The meter is brand new.

cause it should take long for either meter to display a reading.

It should or shouldn't take long to display a reading?

Go use your meter on a/your car battery, should read almost instantly the battery voltage... I/we miss understood...

Meter may be good where you may have been measuring a slow ramping up to 14Vdc on the KZ...

have you had battery load tested?

Well I used an analog tester(not really a "good" one,but its all I have so...) to compare and it showed around 13Vdc at 4,000 rpms. I put the digital meter on the battery post an it immediately read 12.95 Vdc at 4,000 rpms and began to climb slowly again but I didn't have the patience this time to see how high it would go. Not sure what is going on anymore.

The battery has not been load tested but is a year old, sealed unit battery that is known to be good and was fully charged so...

I went back and didn't some current draw tests prescribed by Loudhvx:

Because the meter tops out at 10 amps we can't measure the whole bike at once. We will split it up into the lights and the rest.

Pull the 10Amp headlight fuse.
Make sure headlight does not come on (to verify the correct fuse is pulled).
Start the bike.
With the meter in DC-amps mode, clip the test leads to the headlight fuse holder/contacts.
You are now using the meter in place of the fuse and the light should come on.
Rev the bike to 4000 and read the current on the meter and notate it.

Turn the bike off.
Leave the headlight fuse pulled.
Also pull the main 20 amp fuse.
Now hook up the meter in place of the main fuse.
This will require alligator clips or whatever to make sure the meter doesn't become un-connected.
Start the bike (headlight should be dark).
Rev to 4000 and read the meter and notate it.


I get about 8.1 Amps checking just the headlight circuit.
3.1 Amps with the main and headlight fuse pulled.
Is the headlight circuit drawing too much amperage? The headlight is a stock 60/55 W unit.

I traced the Black/Yellow circuitry and found one real bad spot. Where the B/Y wire enters the ignitor unit the wire is bare(although it was wrapped it electrical tape) and about half the core appeared to be missing as well. What is the function of this wire, is it just a ground? I have a seperate ground for the ignitor unit running from the ignitor body. Could this bad wire be drawing some of the amperage, and can I remove it if it is just a ground?

Small Update:

On the headlight circuit the amperage goes from 7.6 Amps to .3 Amps just from unplugging the headlight when the bike is on, not running though. How much should a 60/55 W bulb draw?

The old electrical formula to figure current draw is W/E so if you have 55 Watts over 12 volts we get 4.583333 amps. At 60 Watts the figures are 5 amps.

THe reserve lighting unit can be bypassed. However, the pdf diagram in the KZR filebase for the 550 H1 is in error. The hi-lo switch is drawn wrong. Because of this, I can't be sure of how to correctly bypass the RLU. But, assuming it is the same as the 550 D1, here's what you do:

Unplug the RLU and remove it. On the harness connections, plug in a jumper from the blue wire to the blue/yellow wire. Leave the rest unconnected.
If the hi-lo switch works opposite of the way it should, then disconnect the blue/yellow wire, and run the jumper from the blue wire to the blue-orange (or is it blue/red ?) wire instead.

So bypassing the Reserve Lighting Unit was the Bingo!
Yep the jumper worked, only getting 4 Amps on Low beam now.

Got 14.1 Vdc at 4,000 rpms through my mediocre battery.

Now one last question:

I trickled charged my battery for 24 hours and tested it with a hydrometer, one cell showed fully charged and the rest showed 3/4 charged. Do you think the battery will be okay for another 1000 miles this season?

Also I have an electrosport stator on the way as I plan on doing a lot of around town riding(less than 5 miles between starts). Will adding this help rehab the battery?Or should I buy a new one?

Wow after 4 years of half-hearted trouble shooting, the charging system finally appears fixed(knock on wood).

Thanks everybody!