The entire question in one line Is there a battery, or battery + modification such that we can make a clean (no external chargers and solar panels etc), zero-maintenance upgrade to a durable lithium battery? Why I'm asking I've seen posts about lithium batteries scattered around the forum. The biggest benefit is a lead battery is about 2kg and a Lithium battery is about 0.5kg. Some members swear by lithium batteries. Others have tried lithium and gone back to lead. Some members have done custom solar charging setups. I don't park outdoors, nor would I want to. Some members have used remote-control hobby style bulky 220V AC chargers, which I would definitely not do. Then you can't ever go on a long trip, or recharge the battery when you're not home if it dies for whatever possible reason. I'm asking this question because there will come a time when my lead-acid battery dies and it will need replacement. When replacement time comes, I'd love to get that 1.5kg weight saving. Right now, functionality wise, my lead-acid battery works amazingly well, I can let it stand for 3-6 weeks and it starts immediately. It's maintenance free. I never manually charge it etc. It's amazing to me, because my previous bike was 20 years old and I had a lot of hassles, especially before I overhauled the charging circuitry and connectors, but even after that, I walked on broken eggshells, maybe just because I was scarred. So I won't accept a lithium battery if it's going to mean it needs manual charging or it's going to need replacement quickly, or gives any hassles whatsoever. Doing a modification such that the bike's charging voltage is more suited to Lithium is perfectly acceptable to me. Or perhaps adding some lightweight BMS is also acceptable to me. I would probably add a voltmeter to keep an eye on it in the beginning, just because it's a new, custom thing. List of requirements * The battery and charger must fit neatly inside the CBR1000RR (2004 in my particular case) * The battery must be maintenance and hassle free (no manually flicking switches or plugging in a balance charger, etc) * The service life must meet or exceed that of a lead battery If the mod is done right, this should happen. The design life of a lead-acid battery is 300-500 charge cycles and an old lithium cell technology is 800+ charge cycles. When I refer to Lithium batteries here I'm referring to Li-Ion and Li-Po. Electrically they're the same, same chemistry, same voltage, in different packages, like 18650 package or flat sandwich format like mobile phone batteries, etc. Although the flat ones have massive peak current, useful for cranking an engine) LiFePo are safer but have less capacity per gram. Safety shmafety. Let's have some capacity. New Lithium batteries made by Tesla and Samsung (and probably others these days) incorporate graphene and/or silicon, and (don't quote me) achieve like 1500-3000 charge cycles and better peak current etc. And the raw material cost (not considering paying for the R&D) of these improvements is very low. So new lithium batteries make the economics of choosing lithium even better.
Hi, Mine has the lithium bat on, But I also have an alarm system on and only use the bike 5 months a year, so I use a solar charger, If there is no drain a lithium will last longer than lead acid, lithiums and lead acids both need looking after if not used but in different ways, It all depends on your use
