electrical problem - nothing works but the clock,and that ain't doing so well

I have a 2000 VFR with about 28K miles. About 2 months ago, I had 4 or 5 episodes where when I started the bike, it didn't immediately start, and the clock and the trip odometers were set back to 01:00 and 0, respectively.

I did some research in the archives and found that several people have experienced this problem. There were a number of theories on why this happens, including a bad cell in the battery or an R/R that was about to fail. I checked my battery and it had a good charge but not full power. I fully charged it and I had no problems for about 4 weeks, until about 2 weeks ago.

On that day, when I went to restart the bike after a 20-mile ride and then sitting for 10 minutes, nothing happened when I pushed the starter button. The clock and odometers were reset and there was no noise from the starter at all.

I was out of town for the last 2 weeks and while gone, I fully charged the battery even though the lights on the charger indicated that it didn't need a charge. When I then put the battery back in the bike and turned the key on, the indicator lights glowed dimly and then slowly faded. I heard a fading whining noise from the instrument cluster area, like something electrical was discharging. I heard one click from the mid-section of the bike (may have been the fuel pump?) and then everything was dead.

At this point the clock is working, but when I turn the key to the 'On' position, the clock disappears after a couple of seconds. It comes back on when the key is turned off, but it has been reset to 01:00. Pressing the starter button does nothing. All fuses are OK.

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Don

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Put a voltmeter on the battery, then turn the key on. What is the voltage
before and after?

doug

-----Original Message-----
From: vfr-bounces@xxxxxx [mailto:vfr-bounces@xxxxxx] On Behalf Of
don.vt@xxxxxx
Sent: August 12, 2008 12:01 PM
To: vfr@xxxxxx
Subject: electrical problem - nothing works but the clock, and that ain't
doing so well

I have a 2000 VFR with about 28K miles. About 2 months ago, I had 4 or 5
episodes where when I started the bike, it didn't immediately start, and the
clock and the trip odometers were set back to 01:00 and 0, respectively.

I did some research in the archives and found that several people have
experienced this problem. There were a number of theories on why this
happens, including a bad cell in the battery or an R/R that was about to
fail. I checked my battery and it had a good charge but not full power. I
fully charged it and I had no problems for about 4 weeks, until about 2
weeks ago.

On that day, when I went to restart the bike after a 20-mile ride and then
sitting for 10 minutes, nothing happened when I pushed the starter button.
The clock and odometers were reset and there was no noise from the starter
at all.

I was out of town for the last 2 weeks and while gone, I fully charged the
battery even though the lights on the charger indicated that it didn't need
a charge. When I then put the battery back in the bike and turned the key
on, the indicator lights glowed dimly and then slowly faded. I heard a
fading whining noise from the instrument cluster area, like something
electrical was discharging. I heard one click from the mid-section of the
bike (may have been the fuel pump?) and then everything was dead.

At this point the clock is working, but when I turn the key to the 'On'
position, the clock disappears after a couple of seconds. It comes back on
when the key is turned off, but it has been reset to 01:00. Pressing the
starter button does nothing. All fuses are OK.

Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Don

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vfr@xxxxxx
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Replace the battery. Even if it is not the root cause, it's clearly
contributing to the symptoms. It's a wear item and this one is worn out.

don.vt@xxxxxx wrote:
> I have a 2000 VFR with about 28K miles. About 2 months ago, I had 4 or 5 episodes where when I started the bike, it didn't immediately start, and the clock and the trip odometers were set back to 01:00 and 0, respectively.
>
> I did some research in the archives and found that several people have experienced this problem. There were a number of theories on why this happens, including a bad cell in the battery or an R/R that was about to fail. I checked my battery and it had a good charge but not full power. I fully charged it and I had no problems for about 4 weeks, until about 2 weeks ago.
>
> On that day, when I went to restart the bike after a 20-mile ride and then sitting for 10 minutes, nothing happened when I pushed the starter button. The clock and odometers were reset and there was no noise from the starter at all.
>
> I was out of town for the last 2 weeks and while gone, I fully charged the battery even though the lights on the charger indicated that it didn't need a charge. When I then put the battery back in the bike and turned the key on, the indicator lights glowed dimly and then slowly faded. I heard a fading whining noise from the instrument cluster area, like something electrical was discharging. I heard one click from the mid-section of the bike (may have been the fuel pump?) and then everything was dead.
>
> At this point the clock is working, but when I turn the key to the 'On' position, the clock disappears after a couple of seconds. It comes back on when the key is turned off, but it has been reset to 01:00. Pressing the starter button does nothing. All fuses are OK.
>
> Any suggestions?
>
> Thanks in advance for any help.
>
> Don

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My clock and trip odo does this about once every 2 months.* No battery issues at all, did it with the old battery and with my new one...
*
My RR is original far as I know...and I get around 13.5-13.6V charging with the rr at some???reasonable rpm...max I ever see is 13.8 briefly.

Matt



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