Hey Bigjimmy and welcome back, good to see you still have the old girl, when i hadn't see you around the site for so long assumed you'd got rid of it.
When the PMA conversion was first bantered around guys were making up there own with banshee parts, or what would work with the XS650,there were a couple of reasons for doing this. ........1; Getting or finding replacement parts was extreamly difficult........2; there wasn't any Mikes and if there were any Genuine Yamaha parts available the price was ridiculous. The output of these PMA's were in the same range and sometimes less than the original charging system. These PMA's had been factory designed and built so there was less excess, (if any), power being adsorbed by the Reg/Rect, the bike was using it.
For our crowd problems started to surface when the PMA sellers, XSCharge and any one selling their setups, increased the out put to 200 watts. I think the first ones they sold were around the 135Watt mark...............Joe Wiesguy, (who sells these), stated he preferred the 135 watt PMA's and would still sell them if they were available from the supplier............That increase with the amount of excess power had to have an effect on the other parts that were not intended to absorb so much excess. ..........I don't know what a recommended ratio would be for the PMA output in relation to a bikes consumption and allowance for some excess for some extras on a bike, like heated grips, ect, ect. But i'm betting it would not be any where near the 60 or about watts the XS650 has with the 200 watt system, that is slightly more than a third of the power output the regulator is dealing with at all times.........To be fair, those who did not know, or do any research for them selves to find out, were listening to the guys using an original charging system and replacing the rear bulb with an led bulb........the main reason for that was to save a strain on the battery when using in a stop start situation and siting with the rear brake light on..............When the PMA conversion guys did this they were creating more of a strain on components...........hence........some of the problems punters were getting.
Thanks Skull, No, sir! She was my first. You should always keep your first (if you can). Even though she's not running, I still have her. On the PMA's, I pieced mine together and use MrRiggs bracket, bought it from him when he was still selling them. If that tells you how long ago I did my PMA.
I'd reckon I have a 135 set up. Considering I planned my bike to have a head light, tail light and ignition, but I also run without a battery (when she is ran)... Since I'm not a wiring/electrical guy, I have no idea what is what when it comes to 135 or 200, but like Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor, I'd probably opt for a more powerful charging system if I were doing it now.
When I did my PMA, like you said and I stated previously, there was a lot of trash talk about the stock system because there were limited ways to find replacement parts and when you did, they were $$$$$$ or you could have your old system rewound and that was $$$$$$ so it was either $$$$$$ or $$$$$$. However, when people like MrRiggs and others started doing the PMA's that gave all of us an alternative to the cost. Now we could buy readily available parts and piece a charging system together. Voila! The widespread use of the PMA began. Then people started realizing that they could ditch the battery on their no frills chopper/bobber build (me included). Then, if they weren't sold on buying a PMA before, they were then. Like I said, I don't know anything about the 200W setup and there may very well be a problem there, I don't know, I don't claim to know, but for people to just outright slam the PMA is ridiculous. It was and still is a very viable solution to the finite number of stock systems out there still available to pillage and use.
I know you understand, but I think some people reading through here that might have considered the PMA before, may not if people are just saying it's all gobbledy gook. I know some of the purists on here just like to bash anything that isn't stock, but I just try to remind them. It. Is. Not. Your. Bike. Let them do whatever they hell they want to it. Hell, if anything, every time someone does a PMA swap, there's one more stock charging system for the purists.
Now, to address those who are outright bashing rephasing, I don't need LED light bulbs in my house, but I have them. I don't need them on my motorcycles, but they have them. I don't need paint on my car, but it has it. I don't need that extra piece of stock chrome for the contutor valve on my XS650, but I'm sure some of you have one, because it's stock.... Same thing. If for the pure reason it sounds better to someone else, then that is their choice on what they want to do with.... Wait for it... Their Bike... Not yours, not mine, but theirs. Does it harm you in ANY way? Not unless you're that cam that gets cut in half... I say everyone rephase, if you want to, if you don't want to, then don't! It's as simple as that. I know I haven't been around long recently, but to my limited knowledge of the goings on here for the past 5 years, there hasn't been any reported drawbacks of the rephase. Have there? There have been some recorded improvement from the rephase though, at least last I was here lurking the pages.
I do see one thing that hasn't changed around here though. The stock purists are still the stock purists. Which hey, that's cool and awesome at the same time, but when they start telling others not to build a custom bike or that "it's a shame that you're cutting that up" or that the stock charging system has been somehow vindicated because there have been some issues with some parts... I mean come on. Shit happens. Chalk it up to learning. Now, I have dealt with Hugh and have only had 1 issue with anything that I have received from him. He not only replaced that part, he also sent me out some extra to make up for it.
Skull, have you ever purchased anything from Hugh? Did it fail? Did he go out of his way to make it right? That's the Hugh I have dealt with. To question a man's honesty, is pretty scathing. Could even be considered libel, which is in fact, very serious. Unless you can prove that he was knowingly passing off false information or he openly admits that he was knowingly passing off false information, what you wrote can absolutely be considered libel and defamation of character. Key word - knowingly. If he wasn't passing that false information knowingly, then there is no lacking in integrity. Just someone making a mistake. It happens, you yourself even said that he came out and said he was wrong. So which is it? Is he lacking integrity or did he do what almost no one does anymore; admit he was wrong?
