How to fix common regulator/Stator failures

Jack at Roadstercycle knows his stuff. Would not hesitate to use his kit.

 

they make a nice kit, use it and the wiring harness

 

Yep..Pin this one. Good stuff. There have been fixes for 20 years some better than others but what is missing is Honda Inc knows fucking a well that they installed and sold POS R/Rs and never stepped up to the plate.

Now this:






Triumph recalls more than 10000 Street Triple, Daytona motorcycles
Dealer News
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Triumph Motorcycles America Ltd. is recalling certain model-year 2006-09 Street Triple, Street Triple R and Daytona 675 motorcycles to fix a problem with the regulator/rectifier, the National Highway Transportation Safety ...
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I hope to hell this hits the courts and sets precedent so maybe some of us who have had to shell out money to get back on the road because some fucking dude in Tokyo needs to save face by denying there is a problem. Maybe a class action suit might rectify this fifth century BS that went out with Hello Kitty.

 

Wow BB - its almost like someone hit a nerve with you. Almost.

And I caught it "...rectify this fifth century..." Smooth, BB, smooth.

 

A nerve and my wallet.. I can't recall the exact figure on the total cost of parts and lost time but heres one in short form. On my way back from Canada with a buddy. We had been to a thing called Sportbike West in BC. Aboot a quarter mile from the crossing the 91 mach 1 quits. It's Sunday. My buddy is an electrical contractor and has to be back in Seattle for his biz.. So off he goes. Like many dealerships the local Honda guy is closed on Mondays. Costs:

Tow the bike to a motel.
Motel charge and meals.
Wake up the Honda dealer and buy a new R/R and battery.
Missed a whole day of work.

I hope this thing snowballs and Honda has to pay.


First fix I saw goes back to another BB on VFR's and a guy from OZ (engineer type as best I recall) adding a muffin fan wired into the tail light circuit and a standoff using the stuff used to keep chips cool. Twenty fucking years ago. Honda knew about it then and still knows about it.

Do I feel the love. Fuck no!

 

My old R/R on my 91 Mach 5 lasted twenty years. I was in Germany celebrating the holidays, got home and decided to take it out for a ride, at night too.
So, I get off the expressway, sitting at a traffic light, and all of a suden it dies. No clocks, no engine switch, nothing! Luckily I was in the right lane and I duck walked the bike to side-walk which had one of the handicapped curbs and called my buddy who was five minutes away. He had his pick-up truck with a ramp. We loaded the bike and drove it 20 minutes to my house. I unloaded the bike, popped the seat and could smell the burnt up electronics, roasted r/r along with my starter relay.

I had a spare r/r on hand and a starter relay. I have gone through one other r/r, which was discovered while I was just noodling around with a multi-meter. Bike wasnt down more than a few hours. I have a Ricks r/r now which seems better than the few oem honda r/rs I have had. HOpe I dont jinx myself but then again I do walk under ladders on the street and have been known to open umbrellas in the house :rain:

CHeeRssssSS

 

I hope this doesn't cause anyone who collects old R/Rs to sell them before they become really valuable.

 

From BB:
First fix I saw goes back to another BB on VFR's and a guy from OZ (engineer type as best I recall) adding a muffin fan wired into the tail light circuit and a standoff using the stuff used to keep chips cool. Twenty fucking years ago. Honda knew about it then and still knows about it.

Do I feel the love. Fuck no![/QUOTE]

It irks me too. I'd GLADLY have payed the 20 bucks or so extra it would take to go up even ONE size on the wiring and a grade higher on the connectors. What are they worried about, weight? It was never intended to be a lightweight.

 

Not weight, COST

If you have the mis-fortune of having to do the prep work on new Hondas you would find your-self in a situation where you wished the engineers (and I use that term loosely) would have used an extra 1/4 of an inch of battery cable to connect to the battery instead of having to pull it and end up having to cut some plastic garbage on a brand new bike out of the way just in order to attatch a crappy battery cable (can you say, "cheap and idiotic?)

Does counting beans really come into manufacturing motorcycles? A lousy 1/4 inch of copper times 10,000 units yields Honda how much Yen/Dollars? Comes down to them (manufacuturers, not giving a shit about who works on their crap.) :sad: really,,, I am spent and have to mix a dark & stormy as I just bought Black Seal Rum FTW and F new Bikes :flip:

 

I hope nobody falls into the trap that all the parts for any Honda are made in one big Honda plant somewhere. It just ain't so. Many parts are shopped out. Nothing new about this. The practice is universal.

What is most irksome is that Honda continued to use and sell these POS items for years and not only did not attempt a fix but denied that the part was a POS and tacitly denied the issue.

...and I don't give a shit what your friendly dealer tells you..

 

Up-Date- RICKS SUCKS, they sent my shite back and sed, "that it was acceptable charging under da "5000 load!"

Under heat-ed conditions it kind of gave up the ghost! I have a CBR unit on there now that has beefier wires for the POS/NEG connections. Still a five wire connection though, (MOSFET) unit though. After-market may suck after all! Have bought new OEM parts in the past and had to use teflon tape to seal the threads. Every-thing is shite today! NO RANT mind you :tongue:

 

I think RICKS might have hosed me. OEM may be better as I have a MOSFET reg on my MACH-5 now and its doing its shite right!

 

RideVFR - Can you elaborate (or do I need to go read from the beginning again?)? You're saying you put a Ricks unit on (when?), it failed (how long after?) and they won't work with you on any sort of a replacement (I think there's a 1 year warrantee?).

I'm just curious since I, like many others, have a ricks unit on there.

Did you have the VFRness?

 

Ok - here goes, I bought a ricks unit exactly a year ago. Installed it and it worked as advertised. As of recently (warranty is up this month) I used my meter to check its condition out. Just out of luck really, anywho0 - I checked its condtion and it was not doing its job once it heated up. I sent the unit back and they checked it out on various loads and determined its ok, and sent it back. The bottom line was that it was charging 13.35 at 5000 rpm with 115 load. The good book says that it should be at 13.5 to 16 volts at 5000 rpm. There low number went down to 12.20 once the unit heated up. No fried wires, soldered connections from stator etc. Everything is tip-top and sano...

While I was waiting for the BS, I ened up using a Mosfet r.r off of some other turd, soldered connections on the ends of it, and low and behold, I have a better unit than what I originally paid for. :frusty: huh???

Bike was used 2-3000 miles in that year (dont make fun of me please) has a good battery along with new low miles oem stator.

 

my take on this problem even though mine is a 4th generation its the same thing.
so I have a parts bike that I can cannibalize parts off and I did. Its all the same colors.
09 cbr 600 regulator rectifier next to the vfr oem unit

So what I did was cut off the plug from the original R/R

plug in all the wires respectively. I had to trim the 3 yellow wire spades but the power and ground fit perfectly.

another shot

I used this type of RTV because I have had it for about 5 years and it was free.

pack the plug with as much rtv as you possibly can

once you got it packed with RTV then you slide the old factory plug up and in place and let the RTV dry over night

I also made my own version of the VFRness but didnt take any pictures because well I just didnt think to do it.

 

I've just installed an electrosport rr and still not getting a charge. Soldered 3 yellow wires from stator. Do these three wires have to match where they plugged into rr or can they be any order? Pretty sure I paid attention but may have 1&3 crossed. Shit only have the bike a week. I'm going to pull the stator next. Holiday inn a week.

 

+1 on this. I know you have only just got the bike and are starting to get frustrated it has got electrical gremlins, but before throwing money at replacing components which may be OK, PLEASE do the drill as per the initial posts in this thread. Check the battery is healthy and holds its charge. Rather than just pull the cover off the stator, check it out first with a volt meter.

You need to be getting decent and reasonably similar volts AC across all three pairings of the yellow wires from the stator (checks should be done with the RR disconnected) at tick-over (ideally 20+ volts AC) and 5000 rpm (heading for 50-60 volts AC). If that tests OK then reassemble and repeat the test straight after taking the bike for a half hour ride - by then the windings will be good an hot and any heat related failure of the insulation on the stator windings should be visible. If any pairing is way low or nil then the stator is duff. NB When testing, take great care with the test probes - you do not want to ground any of the yellow wires or indeed allow the probe to accidentally cross connect them or you will be seeing expensive sparks!

If the stator tests out OK, do the checks on the RR as per above. As for electrosport RRs I have seen a few posts suggesting they are not brilliant. The OEM version is not much better, so if you want peace of mind, these folks sell what you really want and Honda should have fitted in the first place! Shindengen FH020AA Mosfet Regulator/Rectifier

Good luck



SkiMad

 

Im just gonna put this out there, I have done electrosport. it is absolute garbage.
I have done ricks... eh nothing great to report.
i have done compufire, it was great till about 10,000 rpms at which point it would spike voltage and over charge, 18v. the compufire rr lasted 1.5 years.

right now i am running, roadstercycle.com fh020aa rr and an oem stator and a vfrness. everything is soldered, no crimps and rr is straight to the battery with a circuit breaker inbetween, per roadstercycle.com

everything has been great for the past 6 months or so. voltage is rock solid at 14.1-13.9 volts.
I feel like this is the way to go.