jumping into the vfr world head first, for the good and the bad

hey,

i'm new here and to the vfr.

i've been riding for almost a decade, mostly pre 1980 jap bikes. they were either straight cruisers or i turned them into cafes. about a year ago i decided to break tradition and get a modern bike. after much deliberation between my need for speed and handling vs. comfort, i decided to go for a sport touring bike. naturally the vfr is the first (and only) bike that came to mind. i wanted something fast and rock solid reliable (carrying a few "just in case" parts gets old.) i've always been a honda guy, ever since my first bike, a 1975 cb360t. i've had the pleasure/displeasure of rebuilding it 3 times. first, when i got it (not running and free!), and again when i slid it under a corolla (they fit neatly under the rear with minimal damage to the car) and thirdly when i decided it would make a great cafe.

my original plan was to go from cafe to streetfighter. i was looking on craigslist at a wrecked 91 vfr that was a perfect candidate for a rebuild. unfortunately the guy was asking a ridiculous amount of money for it. so i waited and waited as every week he kept dropping the price. along the way, i started looking at other years and expanded the range of my search. eventually this road led to a bike that looked awesome that was about an hour away, a 99 vfr. in my head i was still thinking about a streetfighter. i planned on stripping it down, selling all the fairings and making a truly unique streetfighter. then i got down there and saw it. as the guy rolled up his garage door, my first though was "holy $#!+ that's nice!" the streetfighter idea went straight out the window, it's much too nice of a bike to molest. i spent an hour with the guy going over the bike, i ended giving him a deposit so i could pick it up that weekend.

so as i'm riding home in the numbing mid january cold, not really able to feel my hands, i was grinning so hard my cheeks were hurting. this is everything i wanted in a bike! great power, great handling and comfort. i took the long way home and after an hour and a half my back wasn't even a bit sore. oh the joy and excitement of a new bike!

then the ugly started showing. there were a few days of nice weather that i was able to ride. twice while i was letting it warm up the main fuse blew. i thought to my self "hmmm i'll have to look into this, oh well let's ride." today, i started digging. upon my first visual inspection i saw that the connector to the rectifier was partially burn and had been bypassed. the wiring job looked like a pretty decent one so i kept going. previously i saw a led kit that wasn't working, so i looked into that. all that wiring was done well, it was simply a matter of someone had disconnected it from the battery. it worked, but that's obviously not the problem. i left it unplugged. at this point, just the seat was removed, the rear fairing was still on. and everything i could see looked pretty good. i dropped another fuse in it, started it and let it idle for a couple minutes. i go get my multimeter and that's when tragedy struck. as i'm picking up my meter from my toolbox, the bike shuts off. i walk back to the bike and suddenly one of the most horrifying things ever happens. a loud POP followed by the sound of liquid oozing and sizzling and smoke starts pouring out of the rear fairing and that horrible (yet familiar) smell of burning honda electronics fills the air. the shear volume of smoke put me into panic mode for fear my new bike may soon possibly be engulfed in flames. luckily there was no fire. it was by far the most dramatic death of a rectifier i've ever seen. (working on old jap bikes, i've seen a few)


pretty isn't it

now that the fairing is off i can see a lot "custom" wiring leading up to the rectifier. so, i'll be working on this trying to figure out what's supposed to be there and what's not. and after reading a little more into these forums i'm unsure if i want to go into replacing it with an r1 r/r or get a complete FH020AA kit.

so, here i am and that's my story, any advice is appreciated.

 

Welcome to the forum. That is a good read . Some of the VFR's had electrical issues. Wiring harness and reg/rectifier issues... That would probably explain why the previous owner had to do 'custom' wiring..

 

Don't give up !! Once you've replaced your second r/r you're considered a VFR veteran !

 

hopefully i only have to do this once.

 

i knew they had r/r issues, i'm just hoping that it's not a case of faulty wiring that caused it to blow.

 

:welcome: to the 5th gen world :biggrin:
Hope you get things fix and get her back on the road. There are many thread relate to this issue.

 

If you need to see another bike's wiring person let me know. You can check mine out if it will help. I'm not that far.

 

Welcome to the forum. I was new to riding when I joined. I had a few problems with my bike too when I first got it but those problems seemed to just go away when I did not possess the keys.

 

After you get it fixed, you should still not rely on the bike to charge a weak battery that has been sitting around, too long. It's just too much draw for this charging system. It's quite possible that if you had used a charger to top up the battery first, you may not have had this problem, at all.

Welcome to the club.

 

WOW, that guy really sold it right in time, lucky you made it homes after your initial purchase ride---- I would of been horrified to hear and smell disaster happening--------Good luck and ride safe---ATGATT

 

I figure honda knew it had built such a great bike it had to build in some kind of flaw. +1on the good read i felt like i was there in the garage with you when it blew. Once you sort out the r/r problems you will be fine for a very long time. I bought mine from ricks motosports and soldered my connections together. Problem solved. Welcome to the forum.

 

i ended up getting a FH020AA kit from Shindengen FH020AA Mosfet Regulator/Rectifier it should be here friday. it'll be one of my weekend projects. i'll document it and post it up here, just in case it'll help someone in the future.

thanks! i found a schematic online that seems pretty solid, so that should work for me. if it doesn't i may have to take up up on that offer.

the battery is fully charged, i keep my bikes on tenders in the cold months, plus i start them up and let them get up to temp at least once every other weekend. but, thanks for the advice.