You have got to be kidding me!

I had about a volt and a half drop in my battery when I rode it the other day. Based on that, I assume now the issue is the wire that supplies juice to the battery. I cannot wait to get home and dive into my harness. I'm so ready to kill this issue and get to riding!
 
I had about a 1.5 volt drop at the battery after riding a bit the other day. No where near draining it down to nothing. I'm hoping I'm closing in on the issue that it could possibly be the red wire that's feeding the juice to the battery. I cannot wait to get home today to dive into the harness.
 
So I worked on her again tonight. My ground from the rectifier is bolted direct to the frame behind the battery. I'll double check that I'm getting a good ground there. My red wire seems to be in good condition throughout the entire system, no breaks in the insulation that could cause a short. I plan on testing the resistance in my rotor one more time with the yellow wire connected then disconnected to see if there is any change there. If there is, then my safety relay is shot. The only other test I want to do is my key switch. I recall having a drop in voltage between the battery and the positive brush. Once I'm past these two tests tomorrow, I plan on going through Curly's guide to a "T" again.
 
A couple of quick questions before diving into my wiring this evening.

1. I will be testing my key switch by probing behind the connector to see if there is any change in voltage from the battery through the switch. If the switch is giving me a lower voltage reading, simply jumping the brown and red wires together will give me a bypass connection? From there I will test my voltage at the positive brush to see if it is closer to my battery voltage. I will not leave it connected for an extended period of time so I do not fry my coils.

2. Is there a way to test continuity through the safety relay? This is one more thing I want to look at since both my rotor and stator pass the resistance tests and I have a brand new regulator and rectifier.

3. Stupid question and I"m sure I'll figure it out. What's the proper way to test continuity with a multimeter? Is it by using the ohm scale?

4. I will be double checking all my ground connections one more time while I'm at it.

Thanks!
 
To check operation of the safety relay:

Leave the "Lights" switch off. With engine off, the headlight must be off. Start the engine, and now the headlight must be on..................thats all there is to it.

If you want to do continuity on the SR. Unplug the relay, and use the ohmmeter on the lowest scale (200 ohm). There is a 3 terminal connector, and then 2 single connectors.

You should measure 0 ohms from the red/white on the 3 term conn to the single red/white conn. Now operate the relay with your finger and you should measure 0 ohms from the red/white on the 3 term conn to the blue/black single conn.
 
The SR test will come after the key switch test. Headlight does not turn on when the bike is started but that could be that my stator isn't putting out enough juice to operate the relay. That's why I want to test the key switch wiring first.

The battery is on the charger as we speak so I plan on diving into it in a little while.
 
I charged the battery to 12.7 volts, took a reading with key on, 1.4 volts. Unplugged the key switch connection and bypassed it directly, the second test read the same at 1.4 volts. There must be a break in the wiring somewhere!
 
I recently replaced my fuse box with blade fuses. I checked all of my fuse connections and they test fine. I traced the green (positive) brush wire all the way through to the regulator. It tested 1.5v all the way through all the connectors including out of the regulator. Is it possible that my new regulator has shorted or is defective? Anyone else hear of this issue? My brown wire through the harness, through the key switch, both sides of the regulator connector all test the same as the battery.
 
At 5 o'clock you were only getting 1.4 volts on the brown wire downstream of the key. Then at 8 o'clock you are getting battery voltage on the brown wire...................so, what did you do to go from 1.4 to 12 volts?

Your new regulator; do you have it grounded properly? Does the black wire go to the common black wires in the harness or to frame bare metal. ( I hope its not connected to the battery box)

Do you have your old regulator? If it was in working condition, you could try using it. Its possible the new reg is defective. Where did you buy the VR-115.........was it new or used?
 
RG, I meant the green wire at the brush. My apologies if I wasn't too clear in that post. My regulator is a brand new VR-115. I have it grounded through the harness. In my test, I did connect a separate ground to it connecting it to the frame. There was no change.

The thing is, it was charging fine when I installed it. Something must have happened to it during my test ride. Are these regulators that sensitive and are prone to shorting? Then again, I may have just happened to get a weak one. Regardless, it is warrantied so I plan on exchanging it tomorrow.
 
I replaced my regulator with another new one since it's under warranty at the local parts store. I wired it up and tested the output through the green wire. My battery is at 12.3V. My output through the regulator was at 10.9V. What the hell? Is there another alternative regulator that I can get for this?
 
I took my regulator back to the parts store for a warranty exchange. I wired up the replacement and now I'm getting 12.2V in through the brown wire and 10.9V out to the green wire to the brush. I wired green to green, black to black, and yellow/orange to brown. The regulator is bolted direct to the frame. I should be getting full foltage out of the green wire, correct? Now I tested this with the bike not running so maybe I'm fine. It just seems to me that even with the bike off I should get full voltage out. I want to get your thoughts before I run out this afternoon and purchase yet another regulator.
 
I will. I've had so much bad luck with this recently that I guess I'm assuming the worst each time I do something.
 
cmyoch;

Stop exchanging regulators. Its normal for the voltage to be slightly less on the reg output.

Start up the bike and you will likely be getting 14.2 to 14.5 volts at 3000 rpm. That's the proof that all is well in the charging circuit. Allow a few minutes for the battery to recover after using the starter motor, before measuring voltage.

If you want to see regulator operation. Wait a few minutes after starting and then measure voltage across the 2 brushes. At idle will be 10 to 13 volts, and at 2500 to 3000 rpm will decrease to 5.5 to 7 volts.
 
I'll start her up and test it this evening. I had to exchange this last regulator because I was getting 1.5 volts regardless if I was running or not. Hopefully that was just a defective part and all will be well now. Say a prayer!
 
My test was unsuccessful but I wonder if this could be the problem. I noticed while kicking it over that it was difficult to kick and it sounded like the rotor was rubbing directly against the stator. I managed to start it anyway just to test the voltage on the battery. When I shut it down, a little smoke and the smell of metal on metal was coming from the side case. Could I have torqued the rotor down too much or not enough? I would have thought that the rotor and stator would have lined up properly from the get go.
 
That's just great! I got this rotor and stator from a fellow XS'er on this forum. I had to pull my original rotor with a gear puller because apparenly the threads are boogered up too much that I cannot get the rotor puller threaded onto it. It popped right off so maybe it isn't damaged that I can put it back on. I may solicit another rotor on this forum. Do you think my stator is damaged?
 

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