Not charging enough. Battery slowly dying.

loudhvx wrote: First test is to check battery voltage while running, then jump green to brown while running. Check that the voltage goes up to 14.5v. Rev it lightly if necessary, and take note of the RPM where it gets to 14.5v. Make sure battery does not go above 15v.

Ok, i did this. Warmed up bike, let it idle and then checked voltage at battery which was around 12.2v, I then jumped green to brown and the result was no difference in voltage. Revving the engine resulted in the voltage running up by .2 to 12.4 maybe 12.5 at 4000rpm, which is the same reading as when green and brown are attached to the regulator.

Patton wrote: Some basics, and how I would proceed.

Remove battery.
Assure fluid levels are correct.
Add distilled water if needed.

Charge battery overnight on the bench with 1~2 amp trickle charger.
Have battery load tested.

If battery passes the load test, re-install it.

Assure cable terminal connecters are clean and snugly fastened to the battery posts.
[Don't reverse these -- Duh]

Assure integrity of the connection where the negative battery cable attaches to rear of engine.

yep did this.

As the rectifier must be properly grounded, would assure integrity of ground wire from the rectifier and its connection to ground.
Could use an ohmmeter to assure continuity through ground wire from rectifier to frame or engine.
I did this as well.

Now it's time to measure voltage across the battery posts at 4000 rpm, and look for 14~15 volts, which indicates that the charging system is indeed charging.
done, never goes past 12.9 at 4000rpm.

If loudhvx says anything different, go by what he says.

Good Fortune!

Thanks patton, I`ve checked both batteries I`m working with and they are tested good. ground is good.

bloglos wrote:

loudhvx wrote: First test is to check battery voltage while running, then jump green to brown while running. Check that the voltage goes up to 14.5v. Rev it lightly if necessary, and take note of the RPM where it gets to 14.5v. Make sure battery does not go above 15v.

Ok, i did this. Warmed up bike, let it idle and then checked voltage at battery which was around 12.2v, I then jumped green to brown and the result was no difference in voltage. Revving the engine resulted in the voltage running up by .2 to 12.4 maybe 12.5 at 4000rpm, which is the same reading as when green and brown are attached to the regulator.

Ok this means there is basically no output getting to the battery at all. (That .2v climb is due to the fact that the ignition uses a little less power at higher RPMs.)

Since you previously had good voltage at the output of the rectifier (though, not necessarily power), the next test would be to run a jumper from the output wire of the rectifier (white?) directly to the battery + and do the same test.

OK will do. I'll report back once I've done the test. Going to have to wait until tomorrow.

Thanks for all the help. Its very appreciated.

So when you get back to the bike, lets do a couple of tests.

1st do use a test lead to hook between the white output wire of the Rectifier, and the + Battery post. Leaving the Factory wiring hooked up also. Creating a Parallel circuit. While measuring across the battery with you Voltmeter, looking for an increase of voltage.

2nd do the same at the ground, that is the Black/ yellow wire coming out of the Rectifier, going with a test wire back to the - Battery post, and measuring at the Battery terminals still.
Any increase of voltage across the battery shows you that the wiring in that circuit is high in resistance.
3rd the Brown wire, where it goes from the bikes harness into the Voltage Regulator, what is this voltage. Measure between it and the Battery - post, and also to the frame ground. Compare this to what is measured across the battery. If lower, the Field coil in the Alternator won't be receiving full power. So then it can't energize properly and put out full power. This Brown wire runs many electrical Items on your bike, and is Known as a problem. Look through and you will find the
"Coil Mod" done around the Forum.
Do these 3 and see if we can't find where your problem arises from.

Motor Head wrote: So when you get back to the bike, lets do a couple of tests.

1st do use a test lead to hook between the white output wire of the Rectifier, and the + Battery post. Leaving the Factory wiring hooked up also. Creating a Parallel circuit. While measuring across the battery with you Voltmeter, looking for an increase of voltage.

2nd do the same at the ground, that is the Black/ yellow wire coming out of the Rectifier, going with a test wire back to the - Battery post, and measuring at the Battery terminals still.
Any increase of voltage across the battery shows you that the wiring in that circuit is high in resistance.
3rd the Brown wire, where it goes from the bikes harness into the Voltage Regulator, what is this voltage. Measure between it and the Battery - post, and also to the frame ground. Compare this to what is measured across the battery. If lower, the Field coil in the Alternator won't be receiving full power. So then it can't energize properly and put out full power. This Brown wire runs many electrical Items on your bike, and is Known as a problem. Look through and you will find the
"Coil Mod" done around the Forum.
Do these 3 and see if we can't find where your problem arises from.

Awesome. I'm going to do this as soon as I get off work. Going to have to charge the battery for a while before I try.

Ok, charged the battery, and tested voltage at the output (white) of the rectifier again and again it was 15v+ at idle jumps right up with throttle.

1) Then I jumped white directly to the positive at the battery and checked volatage at the battery.
Result: no difference. 12.6v at idle, throttle to 4000rpm and it jumped to 12.8. This is confusing to me since the white outputs 15v+ when connected directly to the multimeter.

2) Jumped the negative from the output of the rectifier to the negative of the battery and checked voltage at the battery. Again, no differnce in volts at idle or 4000rpm

3) Voltage at brown coming out of the harness was 11v at the battery neg and grounded to the engine.

I'm really getting confused.

Well being a 1 1/2 down on the Brown wire coming into the Regulator is not helping any at all. try jumping the Green wire, straight off of the battery +, and measure the Battery voltage again across the terminals. this will supply more power to the Alternator Field, and hopefully raise the output. After a measurement across battery, check the output wire at the Rectifier, White, for an improvement.

Motor Head wrote: Well being a 1 1/2 down on the Brown wire coming into the Regulator is not helping any at all. try jumping the Green wire, straight off of the battery +, and measure the Battery voltage again across the terminals. this will supply more power to the Alternator Field, and hopefully raise the output. After a measurement across battery, check the output wire at the Rectifier, White, for an improvement.

Ok so just to double check, the voltage from the brown should be 12.5 to be optimal, this supplies power to the altenator field and should hopefully raise the output to the 3 yellow wires? I'm going to do this tomorrow for sure, but didn't testing the yellow wire output initially read at optimal levels of 50+AC mean that is was functioning properly? Sorry I'm in way over my head so I really have a small grasp of what I'm doing, I'm very greatful for all your help.

Well the Ac volt test you did of the 3 yellow wires from the Stator/ Alternator was "Un-loaded". This means that the wires were disconnected from the system. Testing under load is much more reliable, as this is the state of the system in normal function.
I still am wondering, if as you have tested, there is 15-20 Volts DC coming out of the Rectifier on the white wire close to the rectifier unit. But only 12. something at the battery where is the current/ voltage going. You have done the Parallel circuit, jumping on both the output, white, and the ground, black/ yellow and it did not lift the voltage at the battery. I can only assume that the connections were made. So the one thing that stands out is the low voltage, under load, on the Brown wire. This Brown wire is switched at the Ignition key switch and makes contact back to the White wire from the battery and rectifier 3 way Y bullet connection. This goes through the "Main Fuse" in the fuse box. It is very common for high resistance/ voltage loss to occur here. So this is a area that more than likely needs attention. Bad fuse clips, heated brittle wires etc.
What does the battery voltage do when running and 4K RPM with the next biggest load taken out, the Head light. Un-plug the Head light, the voltage at the battery should go right up, running or not. But lets keep all tests with it running, and 4K RPM.

ok that makes sense. I've already addressed connector to and from the fuse box and everywhere I can get at. I have not however checked connectors to the ignition and I really don't know how to but I'll give it a go.

So tomorrow I'll disconnect the green from the regulator and jump it to the positive on the battery. Then I'll take a reading at the battery at 4000rpm and see if volts go up. If I've misinterpreted your insturctions let me know.

bloglos wrote: ok that makes sense. I've already addressed connector to and from the fuse box and everywhere I can get at. I have not however checked connectors to the ignition and I really don't know how to but I'll give it a go.

So tomorrow I'll disconnect the green from the regulator and jump it to the positive on the battery. Then I'll take a reading at the battery at 4000rpm and see if volts go up. If I've misinterpreted your insturctions let me know.

Yes that sounds good, lets try to get anything that looks low diagnosed.

When doing the cleaning of connectors, you need to check for voltage loss. This is using your meter to measure the voltage on each side of the connector. There is a direction of flow of the electricity, so the end closet to the battery will be the higher reading, not by much or not at all if the connection is good. Down by a few tenths of a volt or maybe .5 of a volt, means poor connection. Get a few places along the circuit like that and by the end it is down 1.6v like the Brown where it goes into your Regulator. So testing at the white where it goes from the battery, into the fuse block at the Main fuse, then the other side of the fuse. Look at the readings and see if/ how much it drops. Then follow that forward. There is the wiring diagram in "FileBase" and I also posted it back a couple pages in this thread.