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lettuce discuss batteries


Gixxus Christ!

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Bought 2 new batteries last year, one for the honda from advance auto, and a yuasa for the bandit from pinwall cycles. Both are already shot. I half expected it from the advance auto one but I figured the yuasa would give me a few good years. Both were lead-acid wet cells.

So I'm looking for a gel cell or agm unit. Ebay has bike master gel cell batteries for the bandit for like $73, anyone have any experience with these? Or what brand have you had luck with?

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Sounds like it might be time to pick up a couple of battery tenders.  I had the same problem until I bought a battery tender.  I got almost 7 seasons on the original OEM battery on my last FZ1.  I plug it in after every ride.

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Battery Tender.  The bigger one, not the Junior.  Nothing wrong with the Junior, but its a "maintainer".  The bigger one is about $10 more, and will charge the battery as well as compensate for temperature differences.   

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http://www.yuasabatteries.com/faqs.php

http://www.yuasabatteries.com/pdfs/TechManual_2014.pdf

This battery issue seems to come up every year. My search skills suck and I can't find the previous thread. Take time to read that tech manual. You will learn a ton about batteries. No reason yours should have choked that soon. How you put a battery in service is the most important thing you can do to achieve long battery life. Lead acid and agm batteries require different care. The agm in my Super Hawk is 13 years old. I get 5 or 6 on the Wing with lead acid. Improper charging technique and or equipment will also kill a battery.

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AGM or Glass mat is the only way to go for power sport applications. One in my TL was 12 years old when i replaced it and the one i just took out of the C14 was 7 years old and still going(only replaced it due to it's age and terminal corossion) and they were all glass mats. I always plug mine into a tender in the winter months but never during the riding season. 

Edited by 2talltim
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My 06 V-Strom was still on its original battery, just replaced it "as a precaution" with a Chrome AGM battery from Amazon, only $44.90 delivered fully charged and ready to go. Had real good reviews, and for the coin I just had to give it a try.

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Not a believer in "must have a battery tender".

The Honda 599 battery lasted 8 years. No tender and spent half of those years in freezing temps while in storage. Charge it before you put store it.

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A new battery should be charged at 1.5 amp or less for 4 hours minimum! If you are not doing this your battery will fail prematurely.

If you leave a battery in the cold with low charge it will freeze and fail.

If the machine you are powering with the battery has a clock or ECU that draws constantly and you do not maintain with a battery maintainer the battery will fail. This is the reason most batteries freeze.

My FZ1 still has the OEM battery and it is 10 years old this spring. My last bike went 8 years on OEM battery and was still good when it was totaled. We have TTR dirt bikes which have electric start, all are on same battery 3 years now and these are known the fail frequently.

When a bike is started, it can take up to 4 hours of continuous riding to charge the battery back to full.

Moral of the story...properly charge battery when new, maintain the battery, and it will give you years of dependable service.

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Not a believer in "must have a battery tender".

The Honda 599 battery lasted 8 years. No tender and spent half of those years in freezing temps while in storage. Charge it before you put store it.

 

Extreme heat is worse than the cold, and I am a big believer in battery tenders. My garage rarely gets below freezing, and I keep my battery on the tender when it is the coldest months and I am unable to ride.

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Extreme heat is worse than the cold, and I am a big believer in battery tenders. My garage rarely gets below freezing, and I keep my battery on the tender when it is the coldest months and I am unable to ride.

The world made it thru ok before battery tenders existed. It's a lot of marketing hub bub. Although vehicles with battery drain is a concern. I normally put batteries in the basement for winter storage if it's super easy to remove such as a boat battery or something.

Edited by Gump
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Yuasa AGM or BikeMaster AGM. I've used both. The original Yuasa AGM in my 2002 still works, but I replaced it anyway. It's now a spare. That's 13 years old. Three batteries over the Winter, I just rotate the Battery Tender from one to another when I feel like it.

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I gave up on the Deltran brand charger/maintainer (i.e. Tender Jr.).  I picked up a couple 1510 BatterMINDer's which are a bit more expensive but not only do they charge and maintain they will also desuflate batteries and bring them back to good health.  Most batteries go bad because of sulfation and if they've not gotten too bad they can be revived and recover completely.  Another nice feature is that you can hook up multiple batteries to a single BatteryMINDer so you don't need to by a bunch of them if you have lots of batteries to maintain and store.

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