Bike won't start

[flynrider]

Agreed. AGM battery death is a lot harder to troubleshoot without a load tester. Unlike the old flooded cell batteries, they seem to have a habit of dying and coming back to life randomly near the end of their life, which complicates the troubleshooting procedure.

Mine started up fine one day, then after a 5 mile ride and short break, refused to start the bike. After bump starting I rode it 5 miles home and it started the bike easily in my garage. Several hours later I went back out to the garage and it wouldn't start again. By contrast, my CB750 has used flooded cell batteries for the last 20 years and they have always died a slow and predictable death,

 

[AKB_imp]

Thanks for the feedback.... I have finally accepted the fact that this is indeed the battery. Hard to believe these Yuasa batteries can have a 5 month life on bike I've put 1400 miles on, and kept a battery tender on when not riding.

 

[the Ferret]

That is not the standard for a Yuasa battery. Many of us get many years out of them I got 5 years each on the one in my ST, and have 3 years plus on the one in my CB. Not sure why yours went dead but that is NOT the norm.

 

[Django]

Thanks for the feedback.... I have finally accepted the fact that this is indeed the battery. Hard to believe these Yuasa batteries can have a 5 month life on bike I've put 1400 miles on, and kept a battery tender on when not riding.

Could it be by any chance, the battery tender was defect and killed the battery?

 

[Lord Popgun]

Django, A guy at work was having battery problems on his bike. Had the green light on the tender and all. Turns out, the green light was on, but the tender was not putting out! A new one fixed his problem.

 

[LongRanger_imp]

I just had the same issue with my trusty 22-year old Battery Tender. The green light was on but it was no longer maintaining the battery.

 

[the Ferret]

How would one go about testing a Battery Tender Jr. I use a fleet of them

 

[LongRanger_imp]

As do I (5 of them). I imagine there's a way to do it with a digital multimeter, but beats me. As long as I see the light go from red to flashing green, and then to green, I have faith it's working.

 

[the Ferret]

POPGUN? Get off the brakes thread on the ST forum and tell us how to do it!

 

[emptysea]

Here's how to test them: 1.) Plug it into your bike and leave it plugged in for a couple of days or weeks 2.) If/when it lights green, assume it is working. 3.) Try to start your bike. If it starts, tender is working (probably). If the battery is dead, then it is not working and proceed to step #4. 4.) Buy new tender or (better option) plug bike into your extra tender and repeat steps 1-3.

LOL

 

[Lord Popgun]

I wonder if that's a common failure mode. I have 2. Better keep an eye on them I guess.

 

[LongRanger_imp]

4.) Buy new tender or (better option) buy new bike.

 

[Lord Popgun]

I just noticed Ferret is spying on me on the ST board

Should be easy to test with a multimeter. I'll take some readings after work and post them up.

When charging I would guess it will be 13.7 or 13.8 or so. Or maybe 14-14.5. Don't know the value when in maintenance mode. May be just battery voltage unless it is topping the battery off, so to speak. But it is easy to check.

 

[LongRanger_imp]

Wouldn't it be more relevant to see amperage +/- ?

 

[the Ferret]

I just noticed Ferret is spying on me on the ST board

Should be easy to test with a multimeter. I'll take some readings after work and post them up.

When charging I would guess it will be 13.7 or 13.8 or so. Or maybe 14-14.5. Don't know the value when in maintenance mode. May be just battery voltage unless it is topping the battery off, so to speak. But it is easy to check.

A good shepherd keeps track of his flock

 

[Lord Popgun]

Wouldn't it be more relevant to see amperage +/- ?

Ok I'll check that too. I have a DC clamp on meter that should make that easy enough. But the charging voltage has to be higher than the battery voltage to flow the charging current through the battery. The current flow will also vary with the battery charge. You can see that easily on most car battery chargers.

NOTE, I am not a battery expert, but most of this is pretty basic.

 

[ClassicVW_imp]

I use a couple of BatteryDocs. What I dislike about them is just having it plugged into AC outlet, you get a green light. The same green light that tells you your battery is fine. So, if it's really not charging or maintaining over the winter, I'd never know because I'd see the single green light. Other lights are yellow and red. They really should have designed it with two green lights, one for "Power On" and the other for "Fully Charged" indications.

A quick and admittedly unscientific way I see if my charger is working is I have it hooked up and showing the green light, then while still hooked up, turn key to ON and, of course, the lights come on. After a short time, the charger's indication should change to yellow or red as the battery drains. Then turn bike OFF and wait to see that the indication goes to Green. If it does, it's charging.

 

[Lord Popgun]

That sounds like a pretty good check Classic.

 

[curlyjoe]

My batteryMINDer 1510 has 3 led lights that can flash or display different colors so to actually figure out what the heck was going on I had to initially refer to the owners manual a few times, lol. When you hook up the charger to an AC source without plugging it into the battery tender lead, the power light come on for a bit and after a few seconds, it starts to blink. This means no battery was detected so it went into sleep mode (flashing light). The other led lights refer to desulfation and charging mode.

This particular unit does not have an output voltage unless it's connected to a battery so they recommend attaching the volt meter to the battery to monitor increase in voltage with time.

If you are interested in this unit, the owner's manual is here. A table with all the various led combinations is on page 8.

 

[Lord Popgun]

Curly, Thanks for posting that manual. The voltages listed are about what I figured they would be, and are close to what I measured on mine a little while ago. I'll post up my voltage reading and the current draw I measured later.