Electrical problems, this bike is killin me!

I swear this bike is like a money hungry wife. I replaced everything bringing it back from the dead, finally got my idle squared away. Now, I have it up and running and the battery starts boiling and spewing water out, I have NEVER EVER had that happen before.

I replaced the voltage regulator previously as the last one was cracked and extremely hot and leaking ooz out of it upon first acquiring the bike. Now my new regulator is hot, the battery is getting almost 17 dc volts at 5000 rpm, thats too high im sure.

Stator checks show: No short to ground (surprising, everytime I've had a bad stator on another bike, its shorted to ground), .8 ohms accross all coils, 36 ac volts at idle, 78 ac volts at 5000 RPM consistently accross all coils.

Conclusions anyone with the correct specs?

 

your R/R is once more JUNK!

 

The regulator rectifier is new I have only ridden the bike just 5 miles since installing it.

 

Bad R/R

The symptoms are definitely bad R/R. Your new one was bad from the get-go, or it fried already. It isn't regulating at all.

What year is your VFR? Does it have one of the 3-wire and 5-wire plugs to the R/R? If it has a 5-wire connector, it's just barely possible that there is a wiring fault somewhere in the 5th "sensor" wire that goes off into the guts of the wiring harness. Best advice, get a MOSFET R/R which will run cooler and regulate better.

 

Go to roadstercycle.com, and get your self a SERIES R/R (about same price). All other R/R's are shunt type units that will dump unused power to ground, thus the R/R's get hot. Sounds like your stator is functioning correctly. With a series R/R, you can run it with very little load ( they used them on race bikes without lights). 17vdc is too high, charging voltage max 15.5 vdc at 5000 rpm. Fully charged battery should be 13-13.2 vdc.

 

Believe me, as you have described the stator measurements all is in order, it has to be the R/R, nothing else could boil the battery like this. I had my share of such problems over the past five years. Despite all, try to be positive. One day your bike is going to be problem free and will reward your efforts. Good luck.

 

I got my regulator/rectifier from CALTRIC off of Ebay. I have bought a few parts from them in the past. Everything similar to a voltage regulator or the like. I read a few stories on line where Caltric does so much business, they will just send you a replacement no questions asked. I emailed them, I will see if they send me another to try. I was first thinking regardless of the stator output, the regulator should handle it. But then, my first regulator was burnt up also. I guess I will spin the wheel of electrical parts and see what I land on first LOL.


UPDATE: All you guys are probably right, I worked as a refrigeration tech in the past, and went to school for refrigeration engineering and beyond, I know a little about testing components. I checked the stator earlier with my Craftsman meter in my shop, when it read .8 ohms, that was a little over the .5 that the Honda manual says. I went outside just now and got my Fluke meter out of my truck (I was thinking I should of earlier but was being lazy), the Fluke says .5 ohms, which is right on the money. So its gotta be my regulator/rectifier again. Should of never went by the Craftsman, its good for somethings that dont require accuracy I guess.

 

And when you do get it to charge correctly, cut the stator/rec/reg connector off and solder and heatshrink the wires, factory connectors are crap and will not last and are the cause of most of these charging failures

 

EXACTLY what ended my Stator/RR burnout issues in 2010.

 

Okay, so I wanted this bike up and running, I went to a local motorcycle salvage yard today and got this VF700 RR and a another stator, stator checks identical to mine. I installed the new used RR and at idle it has 15.8, when I rev it, it is somewhere around 15 volts. This one has a sensor wire I wired in to detect the voltage needed for regulation I believe. I wired it into the 12 volts for the fuel gauge since it was easy access. I guess it senses when the bike needs voltage off of any 12 volts source it is regulatiing to.

It still seems a little hot, but not as hot at the CALTRIC one. Is this normal these things get hot, I never noticed on the many bikes I owned in the past. I read online alot of Suzuki GS guys buy these VF700 sensor wire regulator off of old Hondas as they are more reliable than the non sensor wire type.

I had it idling for 20 minutes and no battery boiling.

 

Just FYI, my VF750C (3rd gen Magna) had a R/R failure like your VFR. Boiled battery, burnt out lightbulbs, etc. It had a 5-wire (sensor wire) regulator. Personally, I don't trust ANY Honda OEM regulator any more, having had failures on all six Hondas I've owned. AT the moment, I'm running an experiment with some cheap Chinese supposedly heavy duty 50 amp MOSFET units for Suzuki 'Busas. So far, so good, after about 8 months, but time will tell if they last. They run cool, but on both bikes I've relocated them away from the exhaust heat and into moving air.

For what it's worth, none of the dozen plus Suzukis, Yamahas, or Kawasakis I've owned have had electric problems, and they all used Shindengen R/Rs like Honda. I have to conclude that Honda just cheaps out and specs undersize parts.

 

Dincha know ?? Translated, Shindengen means:You walkin home, sucka !!