dead battery

[Enigma]

So me being a dumbass about electrical.....

how come my new battery in my 40 is dead? I fire it up a couple of times a month, run it for 20 minutes or so (amp gauge is over to the 15 mark and ever so slowly zeros by the time I shut it off.
But this weekend I go to fire her up and ..rrrRrr.rrrrr.Rrrr..hhhhhh.

Theres no stereo in it..so what could be draining it..just father time?

And no I havent actually checked the charging system..no meter to test it.

 

[REDREEFER]

Hey Jeff, has this been a consistant problem since i had it?

Try charging up the battery with a charger, connect the neg terminal then lightly touch the Pos. cable to the terminal and see if ther are and small sparks, if there are then it would indicate a small draw on the system.
If there is not then i would say that the battery is getting to the point where it will not hold a charge over time.
My 2 cents,
rob.

 

[Scalp]

You may have some electrical leakage when its not running. You can hook up a meter and see if its draining power even when shut off. I use one of those battery disconnect switches that hook to one of the battery terminals, and just turn this little green wheel and it disconnects the battery. Its also handy if you have some emergency like a starter that keeps running and you have to disconnect in a hurry. Its also a poor man's theft deterrent, not expensive, and easy to hook up. On the other hand, you could have a defective battery and/or charging system. See a professional, ha ha!
~Bill

 

[Enigma]

Hey Jeff, has this been a consistant problem since i had it?

Try charging up the battery with a charger, connect the neg terminal then lightly touch the Pos. cable to the terminal and see if ther are and small sparks, if there are then it would indicate a small draw on the system.
If there is not then i would say that the battery is getting to the point where it will not hold a charge over time.
My 2 cents,
rob.

No it hasnt been a consistent problem, the other day was the first time it happened. The battery is new, well a year old now I guess, bought it just before I took it in to you. I'll go pick up a meter one of these days soon and check it out.
I think I have one of those disconnect switches somewhere, I'll put that on it as well.

 

[Fantom]

Hi, I had issues with my 60 and the charging system. I thought that it was draining when I was gone on 2 week - month trips out of town. Turns out that there were several issues, the batteries were drained too many times and even after a proper trickle charge on a machine they never went back to original condition. The other issue was the charging system - mostly old grounds. So I got fed up and upgraded to 4ga positive for the main battery stuff and 2/0ga welding cable for all my grounds. Granted a bit over kill but I am a firm believer in "a little more then required" is not a bad thing. All the grounds have connectors that are soldered on and heat shrunk. I have not had a problem since, also I am now running Optima yellows in it.
Electrical is the biggest pain to troubleshoot.

 

[brownbear]

If you don't get to very often you could get those top up chargers or a solar charger for the window. They work not too bad.

 

[Enigma]

I think it just might be my battery connection. I had disconnected it while doing something, and even tho its sparkling clean it just might not be hooking up the way the electrical gods like to be zapped. For example, while driving around on Sunday, it would usually flash right up, but every now and then I'd get the slow RRrrRRrrr Vroom! And even once after it went RrrRRRRrrRrrr,and I sat for a sec cursing and looking around for a possible helpful type, I tried it again and it flashed right up.

so, did I mention I hate electrical crap?

I guess another possible scenario is the starter getting hot as well? Them AA headers throw off some pretty good heat.

 

[Enigma]

So I finally hooked a volt meter up, and after sitting for a week the battery read 12.7 (which from what I remember from mechanics in high school is perfectly normal).
Started it with meter still hooked up, dropped to around 10 and then peaked out at 14.6V while it was warming up (about 2200 rpm).
Blip the throttle when it reaches about 180 deg and the rpm drops to about 800, and the volts went down to 14.4.
I turned it off and the battery now reads 13.6.

I did notice that while its running, if I operate the signals you can see the amp gauge 'ticking' with the signals slightly.

I'm going to pick up a heat shield for the starter as well, seems like they are cheap enough anyways. It starts up great when its cold.