The charging curse strikes .... again

[brownford]

Anyone has any recommendations for a brand of voltmeter. I found a nice little LCD one very cheap from China but obviously quality and longevity is an issue.

I bought a NOS Stewart Warner Marine voltmeter off Ebay and mounted it prominently on my fairing.

[OldVet66]

To tell the truth, I bought two with charging problems before I knew any better. If I had known what I know know, they may have never failed.

[tkent02]

So you have had no failures either, other than buying dead ones?

[OldVet66]

No, I have had the system on my '78 and '79 parts bike both fail. I don't know if they were already damaged beyond repair when I got them or if knowing the signs that I have learned and doing something about it in time would have avoided the failure. The day I got them I should have been replacing burnt connectors and doing the necessary harness maintenance but I was totally ignorant of the signs and had to deal with the results. That was an education. The repairs and upgrades have been well worth it and I doubt I will ever be plagued with those problems again. I have gotten over the overriding urge to ride and have the patience to do it right the first time now. FYI, the '79 parts bike was parked with 4,300 miles on it and it had the typical burnt stator leads. Goes to show how bad the design was from the beginning.

[JTGS850GL]

My original 79 GS1000 (Purchased new) fried the stator after a year of use. I was running around 190W of lighting back then so that may have been a contributor.

Last three bikes I've purchased (82 GS850GL, 80 GS1000G, 80 GS1000GL) all had either bad stators or bad R/Rs or both. That's how you get good deals on GSs today. Pull out the DVM and show them that the charging system is toast. They knew it was but now got caught so the price just dropped.

[OldVet66]

So you have had no failures either, other than buying dead ones?

No I haven't had any problems since doing the repairs other than the stator replacement a year after installing the Compu-Fire. I attribute that to ignoring good advice on the forum, that said the dark color of the old stator was not normal and would fail, even though it tested good at the time. I didn't have a Megger to test the insulation varnish and sure enough it failed. I used the Furukawa RFW single waterproof connectors on the stator leads.

[tom203]

My stator (likely the original) failed at 38k- the replacement (used off an 81) sorta failed at 42k. I was still messing with things electrical at this point. I put the SH-775 on with another 81 stator- so far so good, but I have backup stators still and then there's Steve's guy!
I feel Shindengen has torture tested this unit, but you guys in the hot climates will find out.

[Grimly]

A prod with the DVM reveals a winding short to ground. One of the connectors has also developed a heated look to it. Damn, blast and soddit; I had checked, cleaned and repaired this less than a year ago. Ho-hum...
Another prod revealed the stator on the parts engine has a winding short to ground, too.
Means I'm down to two spare stators and they're both old.
I'll get an SH-775 as a first measure and see how one of the old stators holds up, but will acquire a new stator to fit sometime soon.

[Grimly]

Just bought this little beauty...

http://www.ebay.com/itm/191162444000

I was grudgingly accepting the postage cost, but when I put in my address, it knocked nearly ten dollars off That helps the cost of the wiring harness from Triumph.

http://www.worldoftriumph.co/product.php?xProd=42581

[posplayr]

I have bought a few with charging problems, just haven't ever had one fail on me. I prefer those to the ones killed by lack of valve adjustment, it's easier to fix.
I get the impression some people are loosing two or three stators a year or something.

Who has had a lot of failures? More than one or two? Dozens?

Sounds like you might have missed these.....

http://www.thegsresources.com/_forum/showthread.php?t=167978&highlight=fried+stator+poll

[OldVet66]

Means I'm down to two spare stators and they're both old.
I'll get an SH-775 as a first measure and see how one of the old stators holds up, but will acquire a new stator to fit sometime soon.

More cores for Steve.

[850 Combat]

I've never had a stator on a GS go out on me, nor an R/R. Interestingly, whenever I tested the voltage at the battery, I never tested one that had the voltage that it was supposed to. 100% of the cases were not charging correctly. In every case but one, I was able to make it charge correctly by cleaaning / eliminating connectors, adding grounds, and usually putting a used GL500 or GL1000 R/R. All the systems I checked, about 10 or 12, had marginal charging, like 13.3 or so volts. There were no symptoms in the way the bikes operated. More often than not, there were visibly overheated connectors on the wiring loom, generally the three stator wire connectors and the big red R/R output wire. If you check your charging system for the first time, I bet that you will be surprised.

[posplayr]

I've never had a stator on a GS go out on me, nor an R/R. Interestingly, whenever I tested the voltage at the battery, I never tested one that had the voltage that it was supposed to. 100% of the cases were not charging correctly. In every case but one, I was able to make it charge correctly by cleaaning / eliminating connectors, adding grounds, and usually putting a used GL500 or GL1000 R/R. All the systems I checked, about 10 or 12, had marginal charging, like 13.3 or so volts. There were no symptoms in the way the bikes operated. More often than not, there were visibly overheated connectors on the wiring loom, generally the three stator wire connectors and the big red R/R output wire. If you check your charging system for the first time, I bet that you will be surprised.

It can very well be the case. My first bike was an 1981 GS750E, that I had just purchased and ran fine except the PO said, "the bike probably needs a new battery".

After reading the electrical section here, I went to inspect the bike. The battery was over charged and boiled dry and the ground wires cooked (see picture below). After cleaning connections and adding grounds full operation was restored. Those wires to the ring lugs are bare copper with every bit of insulation burned off. I opened up the wrap on the harness to find the B/W common pint in the harness. It was obvious from the heating pattern that there was mucho current flowing between the two ground ring lungs and not running through the harness.