Charging system not working

[Neil86]

Not sure if you rechecked the stator to ground test yet.

The other variable that is part of the system is the regulator plug....there have been cases of poor terminal contact. Is the

plastic around the female plug terminals in good condition or is there any evidence of overheating.

[rougeray]

Not sure if you rechecked the stator to ground test yet.

The other variable that is part of the system is the regulator plug....there have been cases of poor terminal contact. Is the

plastic around the female plug terminals in good condition or is there any evidence of overheating.

 

Pulled the battery today and took it down to Auto Zone. Battery checked out good with an 86% charge. I hope the guy knew what he was doing. Brought the battery back installed and started bike. While keeping the bike rev’ed up to get the fan started I kept the throttle open well above idle. I also had the meter hooked up. The voltage on the battery slowly kept coming up. It started at about 12.4 and slowly climbed to 13.1. Once the fan came on I shut it down and checked for windings to ground. Checked with the Blk lead of the meter attached to the battery negative terminal and the meter set to 20m ohms. All checked open. I wrapped up the wires that connect to the R/R and installed the R/R and lower right hand fairing. One of those bolts for the R/R is a bear to get started. Reinstalled all panels & left passenger floor board. Bike reassembled except for seat.

It was still early in the afternoon so I decided to look for the ground up front close to the triple tree. It was easy to find right next to where the right front bolt that holds the tank on (see pics). It was corroded so I cleaned it up. This appears to be a bonding strap that runs from somewhere behind the front fairing to the main frame. This was not a point where the ground wire from the R/R would ground. Reinstalled tank. I’m contemplating hooking up the meter so that I can monitor it tomorrow on a ride. I would like to see how much it does charge the battery going down the road. OBTW The plug going to the R/R looks good. Looks brand new, no burning as I have seen in other posts.

 

Soooo at this point I see 2 items that all this testing has shown as a problem.

 

1. A good ground and positive connection from the R/R to the battery. One of the test required that with R/R be hooked up bike running headlight on and measure the voltage from the R/R back to the battery. This was done by sticking pins in the blk wire and red wire and measure the voltage between those two points back to the battery at the appropriate battery terminal. The red measured .2 the blk measured .7. I was able to lower this too .06 red & .07 blk by running a jumper back to the battery. These jumpers were just temporary and are not installed at this time.

 

2. The A/C voltage measured at the R/R plug with R/R removed.

1-2 98 vac

2-3 92 vac

3-1 76 vac

 

These are the only two items during testing that did not check out. Would someone please comment on this?

[rougeray]

I have not pealed back the OEM insulation that is wrapped around the wiring harness looking for bad connections that was suggested. Number one is that just cutting and pealing it back I’m afraid I would damage some of the wire underneath. I already did this to one of the wires going to the R/R plug when trying to peal it back. Number two is it would be very difficult to rewrap with electricians tape and get it to fit back properly and not cause a chafing problem. I would prefer to solder a jumper wire close to the R/R and run it back to the battery for the positive connection and for the ground solder a jumper and run it up to the grounding point for bonding strap seen in the pictures. Would someone please comment on this? Thanks

[rougeray]

Well, I finally got around to pulling the stator after replacing the R/R to no avail. Due to the holidays, other obligations and the weather the bike has been sitting since the middle of December. This job took about a day in a half that included chasing down new screws that held the stator in the side case. Plan on having a hand held impact when you go to remove the screws that hold the stator in place. They all came out but I buggered one up. The hardest part of the job was feeding the wires (starter power wire, wires for the stator, wires for the pickup coil and a pair I have no idea where they go) down so that I could get the side case away from the bike to work on it. All these wires feed into metal clamp that is squeezed around them and bolted to the engine. I was unable to pry this clamp apart due to its location so that I would only feed the stator wires out. The starter cable is the same gauge as the ground wire that comes off the battery there for it is ridged and is long, as it connects to the starter relay. When I reassembled I reused this clamp but in hind sight I should have used tie wraps to prevent chafing and hold the wires in place. I also completely removed the nuts that held the exhaust pipe to the front cylinder. The very front nut is difficult to get to and almost impossible to restart it. Of course while trying to get it started I dropped the nut which required removing part of the lower left front fairing so I could get a mirror in there to look for it. It is all back together now and the charging system puts out about 13.7 vdc while at idle. It does not go to 14 vdc with the engine revved up which is somewhat concerning considering this is a high output stator. Oh well…… Went for a ride yesterday and bike ran flawlessly.

As far as trouble shooting a charging problem in the future I would recommend checking the stator output using Flyinfool’s method called out in his procedure “TESTING FOR A BATTERY NOT CHARGING.” first. With the engine reved up check the AC output with a meter all three legs. No more than 5% difference between legs. That will tell you right up front if the stator is putting out. I had 98, 92 & 76 vac. BTW I’m using the original OEM R/R as the one I purchased from Caltric is smaller.

pic1 is the new stator

pic2 is the old stator

pic3 is the bike disassembled

pic4 is the two R/R. (right is OEM left is Celtric)