Hi folks, I've had my bike for two months now and since bringing it home have kept it on the battery conditioner as I've not been able to ride it as I was waiting to insure it at renewal time... Anyway..over the past 5 days I've been riding it, decent rides...30-50 miles a time, so not been plugging the charger in when getting home. Didn't ride it Monday, yesterday rode it to work...about 15mins ride parked it up with the Datatool S4 red alarm fully armed, finished work 12 hrs later to find the battery, not completely flat but not enough to crank the engine over fast enough to start. Bumped it off.... how embarrassing ....got home and put it on charge over night, all green lights this morning on the conditioner. Rode it to work, parked it up but put the alarm into winter mode, minimal power use, tonight it only just fired. The battery was replaced earlier this year by the previous owner, though he reckons he had no issues, just changed the battery due to its age, 5 years. I've checked the alternator output and it's putting 14.56 volts out, so is enough to charge the battery..theoretically. So..any ideas ?? I'm going to buy another battery anyway, but is there anything on the charging side to look out for....how many amps does the alternator put out...does it have an alternator or is it a regulator rectifier setup ?? My Suzuki has an alternator... Does anyone else use the Datatool S4 red and have there been any drainage issues ?? I'm a mechanic by trade with good electrical knowledge, but as you guys have had your blades longer than me experience is always priceless
15.5v at 5000rpm ignition off should be 2mA leakage, anything after 2mA will be the alarm so give it a test and see what the drain is.
15.5v ??..thats quite a fair chunk...I got the 14.5 at tickover, 1200rpm, I'll check it at 5k rpm tomorrow.
Also might be worth checking the previous owner fitted correct size battery for the bike mate. As said tho I would advise carrying out a leak test and see what drain the battery has. Hope you get to the bottom of the issue nothing worse than being at bottom of a hill n no juice to turn engine over!
The charging circuit on bikes normally operates from 13.5v - 15.5v @ 5000rpm. My bike can be a little lazy at first start to jump up to my runnin voltage of 14.1v but as soon as I rev her so jumps up to voltage and hovers giving on +-0.1v.
The thing was, the bike was betting drooled over by most of the staff....obviously not the reason I rode it to work ;-) Then to have to get a push to bump it off with half the night shift watching ....;-( I'm of the opinion that, ok the battery is recent, but thats no guarantee that it is OK. Just back to basics really, after all batteries are cheap enough, so change it and at the same time check for parasitic drain with alarm fuse pulled and charging voltage/amperage... Or..go back to using the 20 year old Suzuki that fires up rain or shine...but tops out at 140mph...on private roads of course ;-)
I blame these new gel batteries too. they die so easy, one good winter or a full discharge is enough to tip some of them over the edge so they never hold the charge as well.
I'm not sure that this isn't a gel battery, I just know its yellow coloured with a 2013 date written on. I'll pull it out and have a good look tomorrow, it would be nice if my spare Suzuki battery fitted as a temporary fix
think the stock is a yusa YTZ7S, was a thread on another forum about changing it to a shorai which hold the charge better and generally is a stonger cheaper battery.
If its a yellow battery it sounds like a Motobatt which are twice as good as the originals! Datatool alarms are notorious for having problems and draining batteries, I would get a decent vehicle electrician to have a look at the alarm. I had a meta alarm on my old Cbr600f and had no problems at all with it and that was even with my old job and being away for 6 weeks at a time, so might be an avenue worth looking into
Just a thought but how old is your battery conditioner? I had a trickle charger that went faulty so was just over cooking the battery and killed it! It got to the point where the bike would start once after taking off charge then needed another few hours charge before it would start again.
My battery conditioner is about three years old and is working ok as its keeping the Suzuki battery topped up nicely. I went out and bought a new battery, so is currently getting a full initial charge. the battery thats on is a Motobatt and was put in in January this year. Of course the monsoon thats descended means the bike isn't coming out so any further findings will have to wait
My original battery lasted for 60k miles, never used an optimate, only ran out of power a couple of times towards end when it had not been used for ages. You do have to watch it if you leave hazards on while Spanish police deal with a written off bike...
Well I changed the battery last week and had a couple of rides out on the bike, used it for the short work commute on Thursday and parked the bike up in my garage. 5 days later, bike not been on trickle charger as thats on my other bike, dragged the Blade out, pressed that starter and away she went loads of cranking speed, three times in a row... So it would seem that the Motobatt battery was faulty or at least not holding a charge. I wonder if when they get completely or very near completely discharged they cannot recover like the lead acid battery... It could be a possibility I suppose...
since there is a date on the motobatt it should be under warranty, try getting it changed for another one, and use it as a reserve, or just flog it off on fleabay
