Strange Battery Issues
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- thunderace
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Re: Strange Battery Issues
I remember a similar intermittent charging issue on an RSV I worked on a few months ago. In the end I traced it back to the wiring for the reg/rec. The wiring loom had become crushed at some point and there were two wires shorting where insulation had melted.
Conventional wisdom says to know your limits. To know your limits you need to find them first. Finding your limits generally involves getting in over your head and hoping you live long enough to benefit from the experience. That's the fun part.
- speedy231278
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Re: Strange Battery Issues
That would be a nice easy fix, and cured by my plan to direct wire the alternator to the reg/rec as opposed to going across the engine, into the loom, back across the frame, and around the subframe rail!

- shep___
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Re: Strange Battery Issues
Hi Em,
The only electrical issue I ever had was when the reg/rec failed. I replaced it with one from ebay and it was fine after that.
I put the voltage meter to keep an eye on what the reg/rec was doing - the replacement unit wasn't OEM and I wanted to know in advance if it started to fail too.
I never had any problems with the battery so didn't change it. It is possibly getting long in the tooth.
The only electrical issue I ever had was when the reg/rec failed. I replaced it with one from ebay and it was fine after that.
I put the voltage meter to keep an eye on what the reg/rec was doing - the replacement unit wasn't OEM and I wanted to know in advance if it started to fail too.
I never had any problems with the battery so didn't change it. It is possibly getting long in the tooth.
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Re: Strange Battery Issues
if i'm not mistaken you have two identical bikes, so you could just swap bits over until you find the cause. I see a lot of problems at work caused by temperature. For instance in out 175degC tools we had an issue where they would fail between 100 and 120degC, but rarely above or below that. poor soldering was the cause, not helped by using a high temperature grade solder [not so easy to work with]. So it could well be temperature related. Swapping parts could be the quickest way to finding the root cause.
NC30 type 7, mods: Art can, Ohlins shock & RO fork kit
- em2evol
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- Bike owned: RVF400
- Location: Berkshire
Re: Strange Battery Issues
No worries Paul, it has only started doing it recently so maybe it is as simple as the battery...


Hey, why didn't I think of this?? Excellent plan - I think we'll have a look into this, cheersphilfingers wrote:if i'm not mistaken you have two identical bikes, so you could just swap bits over until you find the cause. I see a lot of problems at work caused by temperature. For instance in out 175degC tools we had an issue where they would fail between 100 and 120degC, but rarely above or below that. poor soldering was the cause, not helped by using a high temperature grade solder [not so easy to work with]. So it could well be temperature related. Swapping parts could be the quickest way to finding the root cause.


1996 RVF400