Ok, it's dead, and I wondered if there were long life gel filled batteries that could withstand several months of disuse and the start the bike readily in the spring?
Or is it boring old lead/acid, again??
Cheers

If you're not using a bike for months on end, your best friend is a battery optimiser. I'm not entirely sure, but I don't think any type of battery is exactly overjoyed at being left for very long periods without a top-up charge.

You can get a bog-standard lead-acid battery for £20/30 or so. I think I paid £31 for the Yuasa one I got recently. You can pay anything up to a ton for all these wonderful batteries of various types that claim to be one thing or another. Do they make a difference? And if they do, is it worth the extra money? I reckon probably not, others might disagree.

Just to slightly contradict speedy here, I have a lithium ion battery and it works a treat.

Cranks much harder, can leave it for ages and it hardly discharges, and when the bike refuses to start and I've been frantically prodding the starter for ages because I'm late for work, it shows no signs of draining.

Downsides are it's expensive and you have to let the battery "warm itself up" on cold days before it'll start the bike properly.

Good quality YTX9bs or 7bs for the win..... I've got a lithium ion battery as well though came up too cheap to pass up lol

Normal lead acid battery and disconnect the -ve lead when it's laid up. Or put an isolator inline with the -ve lead.

Well it seems to be £29 for lead acid from dss, or £76 fit li ion from m and p.
think ill wait and save up for li ion. Nc35 not going anywhere for a couple of months.....
Thanks guys

racingt wrote:Well it seems to be £29 for lead acid from dss, or £76 fit li ion from m and p.
think ill wait and save up for li ion. Nc35 not going anywhere for a couple of months.....
Thanks guys

I have a couple of 10/11 yr old Honda's that are still on their original factory fit Yuasa batteries (gel)
Superb
Trouble with lead acid is they can spew acid on the paint. Sealed everytime for me.

bikemonkey wrote:Just to slightly contradict speedy here, I have a lithium ion battery and it works a treat.

Cranks much harder, can leave it for ages and it hardly discharges, and when the bike refuses to start and I've been frantically prodding the starter for ages because I'm late for work, it shows no signs of draining.

Downsides are it's expensive and you have to let the battery "warm itself up" on cold days before it'll start the bike properly.

I never said Lion batteries didn't work, merely that I had no experience and wondered if they were worth the extra money, which seems to be about a threefold increase in price. Also, with all due respect, how does 'works a treat' marry up with 'you have to let the battery "warm itself up" on cold days'..? On a cold day, I hit start and my bike with a lead acid battery cranks first time every time. The only exception there has ever been is when the charging circuit has been playing up. I ride in all weathers, so performance in literally freezing conditions is important to me. Out of interest, what exactly do you mean by the warm up bit?

As with all things, beauty is in the eye of the beer holder. Personally, I'd take a £30 battery that needs replacing about every 4-5 years and £50 optimiser that I can use pretty much forever over a Lion battery that costs almost a ton, although I'm not sure how often the latter is recommended o be replaced?

Warming it up means prodding the starter for 2 seconds to let the current flow in the battery and hence warming its cells or whatever up. Leave it for 2 minutes after that and then it'll crank like feck.

I chose to have one mainly because of my alarm I have fitted, I didn't want to piss about with an optimiser constantly. Plus it weighs fuck all, and because that's a bit of a gimmick, young male me had to have one :D

No idea on recommended replacement time, not even sure if you should compare it to the lithium batterys in phones and laptops etc, but for me it's great.

Shorai makes a nice light battery that fits the RVF perfectly