Electrical prob - Honda Blackbird.

[dave_s13]

I thought these here Honda things were supposed to be reliable anyway......I've posted this on a 'bird specific forum too but know there's plenty of knowledgabe chaps on here too so no harm in asking.

Bike is a carb'd 1998 blackbird, 23k miles. Pink.

Basically my bike seems to be frying reg/recs; things panned out as follows:-

1. Laid bike up over winter and it wasn't really touched - battery went flat when trying to start it up so had to be jumped of car battery - all then seemed fine for a few months.

2. Rode out to squires cafe (about 10m from me) and wouldn't start after a coffee and poncing about looking at other peoples bikes etc. Bumped it ok and got home in one peice.

3. Bike now won't start - charge battery and off she goes again but not h9olding charge.

4. Charge batt again and test - steady 12v ish on tick over with no rise in V with revs. Output from the 3 stator wires around 40v. I assume reg/rec is goosed but did wonder if stator output a little high - shouldn't it be mid twenties?

5. Make the mistake of buying a cheap pattern reg/rec. Fit and test. V now rises with engine speed indicating it's doing something.

6. Set off for a ride to hartside. Get 30miles from home, clocks go dead then engine dies shortly after accompanied by and electrical burny smell. Get recovered back to garage that sold me the reg/rec (startright in Leeds) who were very good and grafted me one on from a large capacity norton.

7. All seems well and do a 250m ride the following week but notice a little heat under my left thigh that wasn't there before but shrug it off as one of those things.

8. Set off yesterday for brid. Stop to adjust my tackle and bike won't start manage to bump it and get home, just. Had to turn lights off and not use indicators.

9. Batt now sat at 10.5v with a slight drop in V when rev engine.

10. Bike now tucked away feeling sorry for itself.

I've bought a genuine honda reg/reg and that should be here soon but I don't want to fry that one too.
I just wondered what people thought about my stator output, could that be frying the reg/recs at 40v (ish)???

Thanks for listening.....any ideas??

[Dontlift]

Check the big plug, located near the bottom of the fairing at the front, this connects various bits and pieces together and is well know to corrode over time

[black-k1]

Many (many) years ago I had a similar problem with a Honda 250 while I was still young enough to think that dealers knew what they were talking about and electrics were too complicated for me to understand. The battery on the bike kept going flat so the dealer said I needed a new battery. New battery kept going flat so the dealer said I needed a new regulator/rectifier. Battery still kept going flat so dealer said old regulator/rectifier must have stuffed the new batter so need another new battery. New new battery started going flat so I thought ‘dealer doesn’t know what he’s talking about’ and I started looking myself. I found the neutral light wire that had chafed and was shorting out to the engine casing, causing the battery to discharge! The neutral light bulb had never worked on the bike so I had I hadn’t thought to ‘connect the two’, but nor had the dealer! It took about an hour with a bulb and a couple of bits of wire (I didn’t have a multi-meter) to find it but I started with the fact that there was current discharging from the battery when everything was switched off.

Is there any current drain from the battery when the bike is switched off? If so, track that down first.

[Dr Doofenshmirtz]

40v (3-phase AC) at idle is normal, in fact it should go up to 60-70 volts if you rev it (it may even give you a bit on an electric shock if you touch the wires, so be careful).
If you Google the problem you will find the achilles heel of Honda's is the voltage regulator/rectifier.
A common fix is to mount the unit on a big heat sink and stick a 12v PC fan over it to keep it cool.
It's not uncommon for aftermarket units to fail like you describe - see if you can get a replacement.

[RizzoTheRat]

This may be worth a look
http://www.electrosport.com/technical-resources/li...

Reg/rec used be a major weak point of the VFR, dunno about the Blackbird though. A company called Electrex make heavy duty pattern ones that several peple I know have fitted after the originals (Yam in this case) died and not had trouble with them.

[dave_s13]

Thanks for the link to that flow chart thingy, just been through it all.....

I got my new reg/rec delivered and the bolt centres don't match the bike so just left the existing one on as I thought it may well be fine and just the battery that's knackered.

I stuck the good battery on anyway. And it sits at 12.65V with no load/ignition off.

- 12.8-12.9 at idle.

- 14.5V at 5k RPM with the lights on.

- 14.8V at 5k rpm with lights off.

- 40-50V AC between each stator wire at 5k rpm - same number between each of the three wires.

That's feckin normal isn't it??

Only issue is the battery came off an old Fireblade Ithanks Dave) so it's not as tall as the 'bird battery. It works though so I'll send this R/R back as it appears to be the wrong one and just keep an eye on the battery voltage.

I'm not really sure what the consequences will be of using a slightly shorter battery, anyone care to offer a prediction? Obvious issue is it doesn't fill the battery housing as it should but I've propped it up with some bits of bathroom floor tile - given they won't set on fire

[Mr2Mike]

As long as the battery has similar CCA rating and ideally not much lower capacity (Ah) than the correct one it should be fine.

[Rick448]

Mine was a shagged solenoid which was taking the power from the system.



Guide courtesy of Jaws.

http://www.bikersoracle.com/jaws/regrec.htm

[dave_s13]

Cheers.

Battery that came off is GTX12-BS (rated at 10ah)

Battery that went on is a YTX9-BS (rated at 8ah)

I'm assuming that if it works, then it works. But it may just not have a particularly long life?

It's probably worth shelling out for a new battery then?

[dave_s13]

Rick448 said:

Mine was a shagged solenoid which was taking the power from the system.



Guide courtesy of Jaws.

http://www.bikersoracle.com/jaws/regrec.htm

Thanks.

Just been out to double check and at 2k RPM the stator ouput is 28V across each wire.

Which is good! Stator is fine.

[CPC]

Im having/had a similar fault with my 954 Fireblade, but appears to have fixed its self lately ( fingers crossed)

[dave_s13]

CPC said:

Im having/had a similar fault with my 954 Fireblade, but appears to have fixed its self lately ( fingers crossed)

lol, you say that now, you won't be saying that when it breaks down 200miles from home

Have you done the charging system tests?

One question.....how do you know (for sure) that a battery is fooked??

[dave144]

Only way to tell is to go on a long ride and stop half way for a pish!

[Rick448]

On mine when it wasn't charging properly the speedo needle would flicker down to zero and back up again, particularly with lights on.

[Hooli]

dave_s13 said:

Cheers.

Battery that came off is GTX12-BS (rated at 10ah)

Battery that went on is a YTX9-BS (rated at 8ah)

I'm assuming that if it works, then it works. But it may just not have a particularly long life?

It's probably worth shelling out for a new battery then?

It'll probably work fine in the summer & struggle or fail to start in the winter.

[dave_s13]

Rick448 said:

On mine when it wasn't charging properly the speedo needle would flicker down to zero and back up again, particularly with lights on.

Aye, 1st sign your about to be walking home is the clocks flicking on/off then completely dying.

If you switch the lights off and don't use the indicators you can get about 15ish miles from that point...on mine anyway. If you leave the lights on and use the indicators you come to halt after about a mile.