kaldek

Check your 30 amp fuse coming from the battery. Power must pass through this fuse for the ECU to power up.

I like the digital volt meters better. Here's why:

I believe you can tell sooner when your elect. system may be starting to have a problem. Lets say you have always been seeing a constant 14.4 at speed on the highway. Then you start seeing a constant 13.9 (all things being the same). Then a constant 13.7. Even these lower voltages are still within spec but something is changing and it would be wise to take a look at you elect. system. With an analog gage you might not even be able to see that slight change on the dial and the ones with the one LED (that changes color) would still probably be green.

I agree. I just had a sudden charging system failure which my Signal Dynamics Heads-Up LED system did not detect. I run a Lithium battery which holds a higher voltage even when the charging system is failing, but will then start to fail to crank the bike over in cold weather for the morning start. My charging system was peaking at 13.2 volts, which was not enough to keep my Lithium battery topped up to the point where it can perform cold cranking. This is because my battery is slightly under-sized for the bike (Shorai have since upped the recommended battery sizes for all motorcycles in their catalogue).

I asked Signal Dynamics about their meter, and their response was that the range of "12.9 volts to 15.1 volts" as being OK was because of people with heated jackets and grips who would have otherwise been concerned by the Amber/Red light when idling (i.e. people asking a lot of their charging system when it's not generating the most power).

I think it's time for me to switch to a gauge or readout.

I've done this job a bunch of times. Here's the skinny:

1. Drain the tank (cheapest solution is a shaker syphon)
   
2. Remove tank front bolts
   
3. Remove seat
   
4. Remove tank rear bolts
   
5. Place thick soft rag (like a large towel) where the seat used to be
   
6. Gently flip the tank and lay it upside-down on the towel
   
7. Get a rag handy and hold near the fuel return line that goes to the fuel pressure regulator
   
8. Remove the fuel return line from the tank and let the fuel in it drain out into a small cup or container
   
9. Remove the vacuum hose from the fuel pressure regulator
   
10. Remove the fuel return line from the Fuel Pressure Regulator
    
11. Using two separate spanners, brace the fuel rail with one spanner and use the other spanner to loosen the regulator
    
12. Remove the regulator and install the new one, reversing this procedure!
    

You need to fit that back up or you'll have a serious vacuum leak. You'll see the missing hose poking out from under the right-side of the throttle body.

The consensus from everyone is that it's bad for the battery.

Only for lead acid - Lithium batteries are fine and you can use them for total loss systems all the time with no battery damage (unless you run it DEAD flat). As always you would never run a total loss system with the headlights running as this is a full 10 amps (if you have two globes) and will flatten the battery real fast. The biggest amp draw on a total loss system will be the fuel pump.

Mine started to do this two weeks ago. My stator turned out to be stuffed but usually this issue is caused by the main 30 amp fuse holder overheating and causing the ECU to lose power momentarily. Check your 30 amp fuse holder and all wiring near it for corrosion. The wire between the fuse holder and the connector is a good test as well, because if this feels very stiff it means the insulation has been burnt and has hardened.

Also, where can you find OEM for under $200 online?

Honda Parts House. Look up your bike then go to the "Generator" page in the parts fiche. Part code is 31120-MCW-D03, price $205.87.

$800? You can get New VFR stators online in the U.S. for under $200, no reason to play with hit or miss aftermarket, for minimal savings, that on average are known to fail more often than OEM.

Honda Australia charge usually 2-3 times more than Honda America. It's a policy set by Japan which the local arm of Honda cannot change. Unfortunately, nobody in America does *easy* international shipping of Honda OEM parts.

Unless you know of anyone?

bookmarked for if I ever need a stator re-wired...

Hah now you're putting the pressure on. I've never rewired one myself but had a good look at some of the websites that explain how to do it.

Rick's motorsport stators are $155. So, either buy one of those or re-wire your own. Can't see why *anyone* would ever pay $800 for a re-wire, except due to how much Honda charge for OEM parts.

Any yellow wire to ground, should be totally infinite, 200,ohms, 500 ohms, 1000 ohms doesnt matter, that equals a shorted out stator.

Yup, tested my working stators on 2 megaohm scale and both say infinite.

Would you believe they charge $800 to re-wire a stator here? Fuggin stupid - you can do it yourself with enough patience.

OK she's fixed. Voltage at idle is 14.25 volts at the regulator, 13.8 at the battery. Seems about right given voltage drop (0.2 volts on each feed, total of 0.4 volts).

No obvious signs of deterioration on the busted stator, but must just have been the usual insulation breakdown.

I tell you, there is *nothing* like a garage of spare parts!

OK, found it.

The stator wires are NOT supposed to read 1.6 ohms to the frame. I checked the other two spare stators I have lying around and both of them had readings higher than 200 ohms (off the scale) between any stator wires and earth.

Ergo, my stator is totally farked. I guess I should have seen that coming since it came inside the wrecked bike, but 50,000KM seems low for a stator failure. Best as I can tell it must be the insulation on the wires having rubbed off inside the stator somewhere. I'm actually really curious what has happened.

An interesting factoid here is that when the stator is unplugged from the regulator, it still reads good AC voltage at rpm. I suppose that's because at that point it has no path to ground but as soon as you connect it to the regulator it completes the circuit.

Righto guys, you know I'm handy with the sparky stuff, but I'm stumped. The charging system in my 6th-gen has suddenly gone kaput again. It's lucky to put out 13.3 volts at revs and I'm darned if I know what it is.

First up, check out these results:

• Stator ground ohms - all legs 1.6 ohms (EDIT: ALERT!! THIS MEANS THE STATOR IS DEAD!
  
• Stator phase ohms - all phases 1.6 ohms between each other
  
• Stator voltage - all phases 20 volts idle, 60 volts at 4,800rrpm
  
• Idle volts - 12.8
  
• Volts at 5,000rpm - all over the place, sometimes up to 13.8 but never higher. Seems to hover about 13.2.
  
• Voltage drop on positive wire from reg to battery - 0.2 volts steady (idle and up to 5,000rpm)
  
• Voltage drop on negative wire from reg to battery - 0.2 ohms, climbing to 0.5 volts at 5,000rpm
  
• Regulator diode test - didn't do it yet (ran out of time, it's late and as it is I only got home at 8:45pm)
  

So, regulator - right? Well, I quickly swapped out the regulator for the one I had working well for 2 years previously and still didn't seem to get much out of it. I will admit that my stator AC wires were a temporary hack job during the test and maybe this threw my results off. The regulator on the bike now is stock OEM that came with the wreck I bought. The charging system was rock solid until now.

I'm thinking that maybe my Lithium battery has been masking the issues. These batteries don't suffer as much voltage sag as lead acid and I think that this has masked the fact that the charging system volts have been slowly dropping. The problem I've discovered with the Signal Dynamics voltage monitor is that "green" is anything from 13.1 volts up to 15.1. It's probably been dropping from 14 down to 13 over the last few weeks without me knowing.

So anyway, advice always appreciated. For now I'm just gonna have to ride around with a battery in my topbox to get me home if it goes completely.

I did this to my non-ABS bike. I don't seem to recall it being a big deal although I did remove the plastic adjuster knob so that the rest fit through the swingarm.

Be careful when doing this so that you don't lose the ball bearing inside the "clicker". It tends to go shooting across the garage and underneath the worst place possible.

Could be your fuel pump relay or wiring around that area is dodgy.

You can test if it's your relay easily by hard-wiring it on. See my video - if it doesn't play right at the correct spot, skip to 48 seconds in and watch how I jumpered the relay connector so the fuel pump comes on and stays on.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?list=UULPQanMaSMRas5gY1JCSaog&v=d38BNhfyMeo&feature=player_detailpage#t=46s

Note that the fuel pump relay is triggered by the ECU. You can tell if the ECU is booting up by turning the ignition on and watching the FI light. It must come on for about 2-3 seconds and then turn off. If it does not come on at all, the ECU is not getting power. A common cause of this fault is the engine stop switch being dirty, although I recall the bike won't even crank with the switch off. Since yours is cranking that's probably not the problem.

The wire which you need to be most concerned about is the black/white wire. This wire is the common 12 volt feed for all fuel injection components including the ECU, and also the fuel pump relay (technically it's called the Fuel Cut Relay). When you turn the ignition key, there is a relay on the front left of the bike which activates, and the black/white wire comes out of there and goes all over the bike to various places. Always start with THAT relay (make sure it clicks) and test for 12 volts between the black/white wire and ground. Then from there you can check the ECU is getting power as well as the fuel pump relay.

without the chain slapping the standard tensioner tended to do now & then with mine even when tensioners new the bike runs better all the time as timing doesn't change a degree or 2 now & then.

Does that really even happen? Like, folks have measured the valve timing change from varying tension?

Edit: Kaldek I believe is referring to me, and he has hasn't exactly been correct with his statement. It's not that the lock/jam nut came loose, it was 100% my fault as I didn't lock it down to begin with. And even this didn't "destroy" my engine, as it is still running just fine, but with just some new parts.

OK, so my memory wasn't spot on and "destroyed" is a relative term (based on the victim's willingness to pay for repairs). But still, the auto CCTs don't have the problem so I guess my point is that you're trading a noise for a potential expensive failure. Can you recall what the total repair cost was for your bike after the valves bent?

Don't forget that the one and only known example of a 6th-gen with bent valves was from a guy who fitted an APE tensioner. The lock nut loosened, and ka-boom.

So while the stock OEM CCTs can be noisy, they don't tend to destroy engines.

Sounds like it's running super-duper rich. Have you owned a VFR before so you can compare this bike to previous experience (with regards to its power delivery)?

When you did a "carb clean", what did that include?

Day job my ass, can be done in two hours (assuming you're used to tearing bikes apart).

My video doesn't show assembly, but essentially installation is the reversal of removal. To get the throttle body back onto the boots it's a good idea to use a rubber safe lubricant like WD-40 on the boots. Then you use a rubber mallet to thump the whole assembly down onto the front boots first, then the rear boots.

I actually bought a replacement on Ebay and it resolved all the issues. Here is a picture of the old computer layer.

I can't see the damage in that picture, but good to hear it was what we all thought!

+1 for me too. I've had two motors in my 6th-gen and they both get notchy when really hot. The 2002 motor was worse, but it had 130,000KM on it anyway.

found some burnt out wires

will the vfrness take care of that and where do i purchase

No the VFRness won't fix those wires there. They need fixing up, but it's such a low res image I can't tell what I'm looking at - the main fuel cut relay perhaps?

PCV is unlikely to be the cause. It gets its power from the injector 12 volt feed and has its own dedicated ground (which you probably hooked up to the battery).

The circuit that leads to your left hand indicator has shorted. It's probably shorted to ground and to the right hand indicator feed. I'd suggest it's fried up under the dashboard assembly, but the wiring there is a bit trickier than mine because the USA bikes have running lights (which requires a bunch of diodes).

Any start at the handlebar assembly first and work your way towards the indicator relay and output wires from there.

Good news...my stator is fried!! Just popped the cover and took a peak.

That is no evidence of a fried stator. I've got one that's black (previous owner blew up their engine) but it cranks out the juice.

However since you have a new stator now, your issue could be your regulator. You seriously need a voltmeter as it will warn you when the system is about to fail.