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4th gen battery DOA?


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My 4th gen is always on a Battery Tender when I'm not riding it. But the batter has been dragging lately and will no longer start the bike. Checked it with a meter today and it's showing 12.6V-12.8V when off the Tender. I've done the R/R swap from a Yamaha a while ago. Isn't 12.6V enough to turn it over? Next things to check? How do I check the R/R? It cranks but won't run, and dies after 2-3 seconds of cranking.

 

Thanks guys.

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How old is the battery? It can show a 'surface' charge of over 12 volts (which is enough to start the bike) BUT if its just a surface charge the 2/3 seconds of cranking will be enough to flatten it. Charge it up as far as it will go then take it to an AUTOZONE or some place that can test it. They can tell you if its still good. ...or not. 

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Check all heavy cables to & from batt., both ends of each. Maybe connecting enough to transmit volts but insufficient current when “working” to turn starter.

 

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Definitely a bad battery. Good voltage means all the cells are working, voltage down by two volts means a single cell is bad. Voltage dropping when a load is put on a battery means it has gotten weak.

 

Battery Tenders are great, but don't prevent a battery from failing prematurely. Some batteries will just die before others.

 

Also, make sure your BT supports the type of battery you have.

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Autozone supposedly load tested it already...  Well, that should mean the battery is fine.  Which would mean there's a bad connection somewhere in the starter circuit, or in the starter itself.  This should have nothing to do with the charging circuit that you already fixed.

 

Do you have any way to try a different battery?  I know the battery "should" be fine, but a battery swap would be an easy confirmation...

 

Ciao,

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All battery tenders, but some battery tenders are more equal than other, as George used to say.

I would never put a battery "under load" all off the time, no matter how intelligent the CPU thinks it is....  :goofy:

 

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I would first try a known good battery and see what happens.

 

In all due respect, I have as much faith in the intelligence and know-how of folks working at chain parts stores like Autozone as I do in the current President of the United States. My apologies to Autozone employees.

 

I would have the battery load tested by somebody who knows what he or she is doing. Go to a local automotive starter, alternator, and battery shop to have your battery tested, for example. Heck, most NAPAs I have been in have employees with far better mechanical aptitude than do Autozones, Western Autos, Advance Autos, etc. 

 

The battery I just replaced in my car (rated at 850 cold cranking amps) would NOT start my car when it got below freezing. It tested at 13.1 volts sitting there but load tested at 485 cranking amps. 

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On 1/19/2018 at 5:59 PM, WGREGT said:

When cranking it drops to....8V?

Old school battery test was to check voltage while cranking if it dropped below 9 volts battery is bad. I would try new battery. Do you have a jump box? If it cranks on that you know you have a bad battery. 

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Sounds like AutoZone only checked for voltage. I've been given the, "We don't load test batteries anymore" by a few different places before.

 

Based on the voltage readings from sitting, key on, and cranking the battery is bad. Sitting for a lead acid battery should be 13-14 volts. Just turning the key on shouldn't drop it to 11.2 volts, maybe 12.5 volts. Cranking shouldn't drop to 8 volts, that is a 33% drop which is significant. Cranking an engine and monitoring voltage is the best at home load test you can do.

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Yep. Swapped it with another battery, and it started on the first inkling of hitting the starter button. In fact, slo-mo garage cam footage may even show that I was just *thinking* about starting it, and it turned over. In hindsight, I thought the battery might be the problem, but the normal readings on the multimeter thru me off. I even took it to my local honda dealer who put it under load and said "battery's good." I even asked him for a price of a new one, and he said "What for?" So I guess since it cranked & ran with another known-good battery I need to follow up with him.

 

Thanks for the nudge, guys.

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