Here's the quick summary on my '99: did only step #3 and charging voltage at the battery went from shaky 13.1V (2500rpm) to solid 14.1V. I commoned the red-white wires coming out of the new style Honda rr using zam's recommended button hook method and also soldered it, then ran direct to the battery positive with a 30a fuse in the line.
The background is my batteries have started dying sooner and sooner over the last few years. I was always able to charge them back up and they'd run for awhile but the top off charge would need to be more and more frequent. This was regardless of new/old battery. My current battery is 8 weeks old and was just about dead Sunday morning, for the second time. The Electrex/ElectroSport flow chart showed everything within specs other than the voltage at the battery, which would not go over 13.1V and was about 12.8V at idle.
New values are 14.1V at 2500rpm, 13.8V at 5K rpm, a full 1V higher at all rpm's. I've never seen 14V at the battery before, ever. Running around yesterday with a lot of short trips, frequent starts and the battery seemed solid, no weakness. Battery is sitting at 12.8V volts now with the bike shut off. I'm cautiously optimistic this problem may be fixed! :thumbsup: (Although I'm going to hunt down a Yamaha rr just in case...)
The rr connectors were getting very hot when I was letting it idle Sunday, now the power/ground plug shows no sign of heat build at all. The stator plug is still getting very hot but it seems to be isolated to the connector itself, the wires a couple inches away on either side were not particularly hot. It would seem the connector has some major resistance? I'm thinking it needs to be rewired and the stator wires upgraded? I've cleaned the connectors and they seem about as good as they're going to get.
edit: I think swas answered my queston in the previous post. Time for new stator plug...