Charging Issue, Can you spell R/R?

Well, guess its my turn!

Long story short.

New battery put in the 97 VFR last season.

Rode to a furniture store to meet wife and child and load table into 'family' vehicle. Jumped back on bike, battery was almost dead?!

Get a jump from a freindly person, bike fires right up! Roll on the throttle and the lights would "dim" not brighten up. During the ride home the opposite began were the lights now "brightened" instead of dimmed down.

Pull into the garage and shut bike off, turn back on and it fires right up no problem.

OK?! Pull the seat and look at the RR and it is unlike any RR I have seen. It's square with NO heat displacement fins and was cold to the touch (If that means anything).

Solution: Put the battery on the charger and it came to full charge in about 15 to 20 minutes. So I don't think the battery is gone.

Found the major grounds and cleaned them even though they were in great shape.

Ordered new RR from Electro Sports because I do not have electrical testing equipement and sure seems to be one of the very common RR issues.

So my only question is this: How can I tell if my battery is cooked because of the RR?

Thanks All!

BZ

 

Hi Bubba, bad luck about your r/r unit.

My suggestion would be to buy a multimeter, or some small voltmeter you can mount to the bike to keep an eye on your battery/charging system.

Some mount a small LCD display which shows how much charge the battery is while the bike is running. Or you could test the battery with multimeter at pos and neg terminals while the bike is running stationary and warmed up. You should be getting 14 - 14.8V charge.

Hope this helps, I have just ordered a new r/r unit for my 98 also.

 

Thanks!

I am going to the auto parts store this afternoon and going to pick up a multimeter!

BZ

 

Actually, I should have suggested you buy both. Multimeters are quite cheaper now days and if you find your battery is getting charged with the old RR you might want to keep an eye on it while you ride. RR's have a habit of dying when they get hotter.

Could it be that your ride to the furniture place was short, it was cold, and that the battery did not have enough time to recharge before you went to start again? However, on the way home, it might have charged enough to start again in the garage {note:warm engine = easier starting etc} Afterall, it did not die on you at any stage... just would not start.

If the battery is not being charged, then you need to test the RR and stator.

The only way I found to test the stator was to check the resistance with all three yellow wires {for 98}. 0.1 to 1 ohm at 68degrees F.

If the stator works out fine, then the RR is cactus.

So,
Check stator resistance {with bike off}
Check battery voltage
Check regulated voltage of battery while bike is running {For 98 - 5,000rpm with hi-beam on}

Another thing to check would be leakage. After connecting everything back up... remove the neg lead off the battery and test the mA between the neg lead and terminal {98 1.2mA max}.

Anyway, A bit indepth... good luck, start simple.

Here is a good writeup if you find the old RR unit is still ok. It goes into using heatsinks and PC fans. Some say its just a temp fix, others say it works well. There is data to say it runs cooler.

http://www.geocities.com/MotorCity/Speedway/6198/reg-rect.html

Be sure to consult the manual for 97 specs and read the instructions of the multimeter if your not familar to them.

"This is a threshold moment..."

 

...step thru Johnny!"

LOL

Thanks for your help man, I appreciate it!

BZ

 

Update!

Hello Everyone:

New Electro Sports R/R is on with the wiring mod's completed too! (Fused wire to positive and negative wire to negative terminal).

All charging readings appear normal and the stator checked out too!

My wife's step-dad is a electric's guru, so he helped...hell I put the R/R on and he did the wiring mod's LOL!

Have a good holiday! And 'thanks' to all you vets out their!

BZ

 

Just curious: Was the R/R issue ever fixed by Honda?
Should I worry about my R/R on my 2008 VFR?
Thanks, -t

 

Honda upgraded the part, but onlt time will tell.

The problem seems to effect the 1990 to 1997 models most.

BZ