My new-to-me '03 VFR and I are off to a rocky start.
Yesterday when I tried to start the bike, the battery was nearly dead. It had enough power to slowly crank the engine, but not enough to start it. I put the battery on a Battery Tender and took the other bike.
When I got home the Tender showed a full charge, so I removed the leads. The engine started right up.
Today the battery was in the same condition as yesterday. I charged it again and few hours later it showed fully charged.
This afternoon I asked my Honda mechanic about this. He suspected the r/r, and said I should check the draw on the battery. I tested it and got a weird reading. I disconnected the ground cable from the battery and bridged the gap between it and negative terminal with a voltmeter. The needle shot right to 20 milliamps, then after a few seconds suddenly dropped to 2. Battery voltage was normal for a freshly charged battery.
I'm aware VFRs have all manner of electrical gremlins. Am I looking at any one in particular here?
Are you sure your battery is good? Load testaybe? Another thing is check all grounds--clean and one drop of dielectric oil? That's where I would start.
Good luck!
C
[image: View Post]Polarbear, on 29 September 2011 - 08:32 PM, said:
Are you sure your battery is good? Load testaybe? Another thing is check all grounds--clean and one drop of dielectric oil? That's where I would start.
Good luck!
C
I'm having it load-tested tomorrow. For now it's in the bike, fully charged, but not hooked up. If it's still fully charged tomorrow, I look someplace else, right?
How many grounds? Good question my friend. Never had to do it on my '03--got the vfrness--but I think there's two? People with more info will hopefully chime in soon. Needless to say, don't take my word for it and check the wiring diagram--free download on this site.
C
[image: View Post]SEBSPEED, on 29 September 2011 - 09:07 PM, said:
Need more info - any electrical accessories on the bike? If not, sounds like you might have the original battery that's taken its last charge?
Google up the electrosport charging system diagnostic flow chart - with that and a voltmeter you should be able to find the problem.
No added electrical gizmos. The battery isn't the original--it's a WPS unit with no date stamp on it, and I have no idea how old it is, since I'm the third or fourth owner.
Find the electrosport flow chart and a meter, that will be your best bet unless you want to pay a dealer. Report your findings and we can help from there.
Yeah, given that you don't know how old the battery it, I would suspect this is where your problem is... But please get some numbers so we can go from there.
C
[image: View Post]Polarbear, on 29 September 2011 - 08:32 PM, said:
Are you sure your battery is good? Load testaybe? Another thing is check all grounds--clean and one drop of dielectric oil? That's where I would start.
Good luck!
C
The battery was on the charger all last night and this morning. This afternoon the bike started up and ran normally. I rode it to the shop where the battery passed the load test. The factory VFR manual there says 1.2 milliamps is the max allowable draw on the battery with the ignition off, which I think is the clock's draw. Mine draws about 2. Two milliamps is hardly enough to drain a healthy battery in a few days, but I'm thinking of finding and pulling the clock fuse anyway. Meanwhile I'll keep an eye on it to see if the discharge recurs.
Many thanks to all for the advice so far. With luck I won't need any more.
My 2002 VFR800 Service Manual says that the max allowable battery draw is 2.5mA. I have the same issue with my 2003. I have about an 18mA draw on the battery with the ignition off. I have been able to trace it to the clock circuit since when I remove the 10A clock fuse (right side fuse box) the draw goes to zero. Looking at the wiring schematic in the service manual this wiring circuit only goes out from the fuse box to the dashboard display unit and the battery through main fuse A. I have not had a chance to chase it any further since I am busy with several mods on my bike and I have removed the battery. I am hoping that it is just a dirty connector or something at the display or fuse. If it is not, and it's something internal to the display unit I will probably just pull the 10A battery fuse and velcro a $10 sport watch to the stearing head cap or something like that. I hope there is nothing else of importance on the clock circuit internal to the display unit. The service manual doesn't give any detail as to the internal wiring/circuitry.
I suggest pulling the 10A clock fuse and seeing if the draw goes to zero. I am curious if we have the same problem.
[image: View Post]VFRBulldawg, on 04 October 2011 - 10:33 AM, said:
My 2002 VFR800 Service Manual says that the max allowable battery draw is 2.5mA. I have the same issue with my 2003. I have about an 18mA draw on the battery with the ignition off. I have been able to trace it to the clock circuit since when I remove the 10A clock fuse (right side fuse box) the draw goes to zero. Looking at the wiring schematic in the service manual this wiring circuit only goes out from the fuse box to the dashboard display unit and the battery through main fuse A. I have not had a chance to chase it any further since I am busy with several mods on my bike and I have removed the battery. I am hoping that it is just a dirty connector or something at the display or fuse. If it is not, and it's something internal to the display unit I will probably just pull the 10A battery fuse and velcro a $10 sport watch to the stearing head cap or something like that. I hope there is nothing else of importance on the clock circuit internal to the display unit. The service manual doesn't give any detail as to the internal wiring/circuitry.
I suggest pulling the 10A clock fuse and seeing if the draw goes to zero. I am curious if we have the same problem.
doin' a little math here... an 18mA draw should not be enough to drain a healthy battery overnight - that's 0.018 amperes and it's a 12 amp/hour capacity.
FWIW, I leave my bikes on the tender when they're parked, and I plug them in as soon as they are parked. It can alert me to potential problems before they become ride-stoppers. One example: I came home from a ride and plugged in the tender. Initial indication was 'charging', which is normal; but that indication didn't go away for nearly twelve hours - which isn't normal (usually catches up and indicates a full charge within a few minutes or less). This battery was nearly six years old. Turns out that sediment on the bottom was causing leakage in one cell and would soon be affecting others. IOW - the battery would have failed shortly just from normal 'aging'.
It's been six days since I last rode the bike. It fired right up today. Voltage readings are normal. For now I'm going to assume the original battery problem was a fluke, but continue to keep an eye on it. The bike's for sale now, and I won't sell a bike I don't trust myself.
Update on my battery issue. Those of you who guessed "battery", congrats, you win.
The first time I load-tested the battery I rode to the shop and had it done with the battery in the bike. Subsequently I was told the right way to do this is to charge the battery fully, wait at least two hours, and then load-test it. I took the battery out yesterday, charged it overnight, and drove it to the shop this afternoon. It failed the load test. Failed it miserably, in fact. I'm surprised there's so much difference in the results based on the procedure, but there is.
[image: View Post]JBSmith, on 16 November 2011 - 09:19 PM, said:
Update on my battery issue. Those of you who guessed "battery", congrats, you win.
The first time I load-tested the battery I rode to the shop and had it done with the battery in the bike. Subsequently I was told the right way to do this is to charge the battery fully, wait at least two hours, and then load-test it. I took the battery out yesterday, charged it overnight, and drove it to the shop this afternoon. It failed the load test. Failed it miserably, in fact. I'm surprised there's so much difference in the results based on the procedure, but there is.
Good to know, I wasn't aware of that procedure either.
[image: View Post]SEBSPEED, on 29 September 2011 - 09:07 PM, said:
Need more info - any electrical accessories on the bike? If not, sounds like you might have the original battery that's taken its last charge? Google up the electrosport charging system diagnostic flow chart - with that and a voltmeter you should be able to find the problem.
Here's the link to that flow chart. http://www.electrosp...ing-diagram.pdf
Thanks for mentioning it!
End of thread · 16 posts recoveredWayback Machine snapshot 23 Dec 2011