Electrosport Flow Chart question

[JVince]

Re: the '84 Vt700:

So we have the new AGM battery in and I made my way through the flow chart to test the system. At various RPMs the battery volts look good but when we got to step "B": Connect the red meter lead to the (+) battery and the black lead to the switched 12v input wire coming off the Regulator (black wire right?) I was getting almost a full volt. The flow chart says anything over .2v is a bad connection between the Regulator, ignition switch and back via the switched 12v input wire. Wonderful... If I recall correctly that thing runs the length of the bike up to the controls and back through the headlight and gauge cluster en route to the battery (+). Whew.

My immediate question is: If my wife rides the bike in this condition will it eat another battery or harm the stator/RR in any way? From my limited electrical experience it looks like the battery is just getting a little more charge than it normally would because of some kind of fault or impedance in the circuit I mentioned earlier.

Thoughts? Thanks!

[John Hopkins]

Originally Posted by JVince

Re: the '84 Vt700:

So we have the new AGM battery in and I made my way through the flow chart to test the system. At various RPMs the battery volts look good but when we got to step "B": Connect the red meter lead to the (+) battery and the black lead to the switched 12v input wire coming off the Regulator (black wire right?) I was getting almost a full volt. The flow chart says anything over .2v is a bad connection between the Regulator, ignition switch and back via the switched 12v input wire. Wonderful... If I recall correctly that thing runs the length of the bike up to the controls and back through the headlight and gauge cluster en route to the battery (+). Whew.

My immediate question is: If my wife rides the bike in this condition will it eat another battery or harm the stator/RR in any way? From my limited electrical experience it looks like the battery is just getting a little more charge than it normally would because of some kind of fault or impedance in the circuit I mentioned earlier.

Thoughts? Thanks!

It doesn't matter where the actual wire goes you can ambush it..there are only two things it can be stopped at..the 30a fuse and the ignition switch...

get a yard of wire with a crock clip on each end, measure the resistance of the wire to make sure the clips are good..it's no good working with faulty tools..

The black lead from the rec is the switched wire, it joins to the red/white wire via the fuse and ignition switch..

locate the 30a fuse and look at the two wires that attach to the fuse holder, link them one at a time to the battery + measure the resistance if the fault is corrected remake the fuseholder connections clean and retension the fuseholder, measure across the fuse and if good clean the contacts and refit it, if bad replace it..

If that is all good you have to follow the instructions on page 21-5 of the Honda manual shop manual to check the ignition switch..

John.

[tubes_rock]

The black wire was used on older bikes 9eliminated on newer bikes) to act as a voltage reference for the regulator. Corrosion, etc has caused this wire on your bike to drop some extra voltage, so your regulator is seeing lower battery voltage than it should. It's compensating for this bu increasing the charge voltage.

All in all, your battery may not have as long a service life as it normally would, but no real harm should come to the bike.

--Justin

[JVince]

Thanks a ton guys! John I really like your troubleshooting step. I'm a big fan of cutting to the chase Is the 30a fuse in the fuse block or somewhere in line (fuseable link, etc). Also, is the gator clip wire used to bypass the black wire in the harness or should I be checking the continuity of the one in the harness? I was thinking of doing both. If I jump the gator clip directly from the 30a fuse wires to the (+) battery I guess that will tell me if the fuse wires are bad. In that case all I would need to do is run a new 12v switch wire to the fuse. I'm hoping it's not the ignition, but I'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

I'll be digging into this tonight so I wanted to setup my plan of attack, thanks again guys!

EDIT: It looks like the 30a fuse should be right by the battery. I sure as heck don't remember seeing one there. I wonder if it's been bypassed in the 28yrs of wiring "fixes"... If I can't find it at least that takes one step of out the troubleshooting

[jnpalumbo]

Originally Posted by tubes_rock

The black wire was used on older bikes 9eliminated on newer bikes) to act as a voltage reference for the regulator. Corrosion, etc has caused this wire on your bike to drop some extra voltage, so your regulator is seeing lower battery voltage than it should. It's compensating for this bu increasing the charge voltage.

All in all, your battery may not have as long a service life as it normally would, but no real harm should come to the bike.

--Justin

Interesting, but as I just dropped a pretty penny on the new agm glass gel battery I don't want to overcharge & kill it!
The tests begin tonight!

& Thanks Everyone!!!

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[JVince]

Originally Posted by jnpalumbo

Interesting, but as I just dropped a pretty penny on the new agm glass gel battery I don't want to overcharge & kill it!
The beer drinking and fiddling begin tonight!

& Thanks Everyone!!!

Sent from my DROIDX using Motorcycle.com Free App

There, fixed it for ya

[John Hopkins]

I'm not certain where the 30a fuse is on the VT700..I haven't worked on mine for a month or two, and won't be working on it for at least another week, but the VT1100 I'm currently doing up has the fuse just above the battery.

John.

[JVince]

I think it might be a fuseable link (or should be). We're going to follow that black wire from the RR all the way to the ignition tonight. I'm almost certain there's a fault in it. Here's why. About an hour ago I fired up the bike and check the volts at idle. 12.5-13.5. I ramped up the RPMs and I couldn't get the volts passed 14.8, which according to the chart is where the RR should start dumping to ground. I then checked the black wire and the voltage had dropped to .7 and lower. 30 minutes later I did the same tests with my wife watching and the charging volts went over 15v at high rmp and the black wire was up over 1 volt again. That tells me there's some kind of fault in that line. Unless the RR/VR can fail in a funky manner and cause that but if I'm reading the wiring diagram correctly the black is carrying current TO the RR/VR not away.

Anyway we're draining the fuel out so we can remove the tank and chase that wire

[JVince]

Update:
We unwrapped the harness and followed the black wire all the way to the ignition switch and light cluster. Good continuity from the VR all the way to ignition. We're about to clean up all the plug connectors and electrogrease them up before we reconnect everything. I'll test the ignition switch continuity then. I'm guessing that's the last place it could be faulty.
On the upside of things we found 4 frayed and badly spliced wires that came off the tach. They were shot so I'm thinking the RPM and temp gauges might work now that I soldered them up.

Quick dinner break then we'll be back at it. The black wire splits off and heads into the rats nest of a headlight so we'll dive into that later. Fun, fun, fun

[jnpalumbo]

Originally Posted by JVince

I think it might be a fuseable link (or should be). We're going to follow that black wire from the RR all the way to the ignition tonight. I'm almost certain there's a fault in it. Here's why. About an hour ago I fired up the bike and check the volts at idle. 12.5-13.5. I ramped up the RPMs and I couldn't get the volts passed 14.8, which according to the chart is where the RR should start dumping to ground. I then checked the black wire and the voltage had dropped to .7 and lower. 30 minutes later I did the same tests with my wife watching and the charging volts went over 15v at high rmp and the black wire was up over 1 volt again. That tells me there's some kind of fault in that line. Unless the RR/VR can fail in a funky manner and cause that but if I'm reading the wiring diagram correctly the black is carrying current TO the RR/VR not away.

Anyway we're draining the fuel out so we can remove the tank and chase that wire

Maybe I just need to tone down my shockra vibes? ( I was standing close to it! Ha)

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