TOPIC:

Hello all. Just discovered my tail lamp inop & B+ & ground wires coming out of R/R are hot to the touch.

The discovery was made late afternoon & I did not have my meter with me, so was only able to make a few quick checks.

I'm not certain that the two are related, but was curious if anyone has any thoughts on this. I'll be able to bring my meter home from work & get into it tonight.
From what I understand these R/Rs are notorious for overcharging. As far as the tail lamp is concerned, I did have a test light. All fuses good. No power going to the diode.
As stated earlier, I don't think these issues are necessarily related, but part of thinks I should address the tail lamp issue first. Maybe I'll find the harness melted somewhere.
Just putting this out there for now. I'll post my findings as they come about.
Thanks in advance for any input.

Uh Oh!!! I forgot to mention it's an 82 Kz1100 A2 shaft.

Sorry all.

How old is the battery?
Steve

Put your volt meter across the battery posts and rev the engine to 5000 rpm. If the voltage exceeds 15 volts you have an issue. Poor R/R grounds can cause this issue so you might want to check that first. If the ground is good you need a new R/R.

The best R/R on the market these days is the SH-775. This is a Series style R/R, instead of the common Shunt style R/R. A Shunt R/R sends all excess current created by the charging system (power that is not needed by the bike) back into the stator itself, which can fry it. A Series R/R does not return the current, instead it dumps it to ground (or something like this). At any rate, Series R/R's are state of the art these days and you can get an SH-775 for less than most chinese made generic shunting R/R's. A no brain choice once you educate yourself some.

Ness, have a link for one?
Steve

Series reg/rec limits the voltage by being a "series" resistance.
Shunt reg/rec limits the voltage by "shunting" the excess current to ground.

In either case, whatever current is flowing is flowing through the stator, so in either case, the reg/rec is allowing the current to flow back to the stator. The shunt is just allowing more to flow when it is limiting the output voltage.

I have some good info posted on my build with links.
www.kzrider.com/forum/11-projects/592092...ix-fighter?start=280

I have copied and pasted the pertinent information instead of making you look for it.

Check out the Roadstercycle home page.
Frequently asked questions
What is a balanced charging system?

A balanced charging system is when the manufacturer designs lets say 25 amp charging system and the bike uses 20 to 22 amps of it to run the bike and charge the battery. The R/R only needs to get rid of 3 or so amps, so it is happy. Now if you take that same bike and run led taillights and marker lights and maybe some led headlights now your making the R/R get rid of lets say 10 amps, now its working hard and getting hot. Although it seems like your doing your bike a favor by thinking it's going to charge your battery better your actually slowly killing your R/R. Not to mention if you unplug your headlights for track days.

Although the Mosfet is still a shunting type regulator which means (in layman terms) it takes all the extra juice that is not used by your motorcycle electronics and gets rid of it by grounding it to the frame or negative side of the battery. The great thing about the Mosfet R/R is that it has up to date technology. It uses Mosfet style transistors. The old diode types found on most motorcycles today are 60s technology. The up to date technology lets the regulator perform substantially better and run cooler. I have close to 2000 upgrade kits out there running the Mosfet regulators and had literally no issues with them. I started out with the FH012AA, then the FH015AA and now the latest and greatest FH020AA. All have performed above expectations (actually I'm amazed how bullet proof these have been). As far as I am concerned there is no other choice for a stock motorcycle upgrade conversion. The great thing about this regulator is its ability to work with a 2 wire (single phase) or 3 wire (3 phase) stator just by hooking up either 2 or 3 wires to the gray terminal. The Mosfet technology is the best thing going until someone comes up with an affordable series R/R using Mosfet technology. So if you have been wondering about whether to upgrade to a Mosfet or stay with your stock R/R, stop wondering. Whether you purchase it from me or one of my competitors it's the most reliable and best alternative I know of. If you decide to upgrade and you have an charging issue I'll help you out, it does not matter to me where you bought it. Jack"

You won't use your stock Regulator any more this one has it built in. I have replace all of my lights with LED and the old units are not designed to get rid of that much additional voltage. I also want to use a lithium battery and they are supposed to work better with an up to date R/R. Jack States in the paper work that if you fry one due to an incorrect hook up he will replace it @ cost. I think that is more than fair.

loudhvx wrote: Series reg/rec limits the voltage by being a "series" resistance.
Shunt reg/rec limits the voltage by "shunting" the excess current to ground.

In either case, whatever current is flowing is flowing through the stator, so in either case, the reg/rec is allowing the current to flow back to the stator. The shunt is just allowing more to flow when it is limiting the output voltage.

I apologize for not understanding electricity very well. It's my understanding though that a Series R/R has a significant effect by eliminating excess current being returned to the stator(and the heat that goes with that current).

You guys can read more about the SH-775 here, including part numbers and pricing...www.thegsresources.com/_forum/showthread...-4012941)&highlight=

Thanks for all your prompt replies.
Battery is new (from April)
Last winter I went through the harness, updated the fuse block, cleaned/added new grounds where I thought fit. Removed old crappy looking connectors & installed new bullet style. There's the possibility that something went wrong there, but I've confidence in the work I did. Nevertheless it is a possibility.
First thing is to verify I do have an overcharge concern. I'll find out tonight. I very much appreciate the responses. It can be hard to stay on track at times.
I'd like to get things squared away before the weekend. I like old bikes, but I like riding more than fixing.

Check your crimps.
Steve

FNGCOC wrote: Uh Oh!!! I forgot to mention it's an 82 Kz1100 A2 shaft.

Sorry all.

Same bike as mine!
Since changing to a Ricks unit, I'm running 13.7V. while cruising. The Ricks regulator rectifier doesn't have the brown wire, and (for some reason) corrected my overcharging problem. It was recommended by the fine folks at Z1 Enterprises...call and discuss the problem you have with them.

Well, as far as the tail lamp is concerned, that ended up being just a tired factory splice where the red w/ blue wire meets the red wire before the diode.

AS far as the R/R, I'm still not convinced. I have 13.8V at idle & 14.5V at 5K. It seems a tad high from an automotive perspective, but not condemnable. I pulled the module down to give it a good visual & found nothing obvious. By the way it's an SH-532 if that means anything to anyone. The yellow wires were kind of warm, the ground was hot, & the module itself & the B+ were HOT. Couldn't even touch them.
And the B+ wire is hot only at/near the module end itself. At the battery end it's ambient temp.

Tomorrow I'll pull the clutch housing off & take a look at the connections there, otherwise I can try & run a new B+ from the batt. to the module. I'm not opposed to spending the money on an R/R, as it would be peace of mind, I just don't want it to be a priority if that's not going to solve the problem.

If anyone thinks I'm wasting my time & I should just put an R/R speak up.

Once again, thanks to all.