what can come from a bad battery?

[Duran]

so alittle after i bought my bike (84 gs1150, with a 83 1100 motor in it) the rectufier went out on it so i bought a used one that was just like new, anyways that one went out too only after a week of being on, so i have like drained my brand new battery like 3-4 times from trouble shooting and just trying to get it home off the battery, now i have another rectufier on it seems to be working for now, so i went to go have me battery charged yesterday and so i pick it up today, and had it tested and turns out the battery is shot, what im am wondering is that with having run the battery down so many times that i have hurt the battery is having running off that bad battery frying up my rectufiers, just courious if the battery is bad will it cause problems with other things that are connected to it? so now i have to wait till tommorow to get my other new battery to ride, and before anyone thinks its has to deal with the stator it was tested too, turning out 80 volts around 5000 rpms and also tested it for shorts turned out good.

thanks for any replys :-D

[bwringer]

The battery, wiring, stator, and rectifier/regulator are all part of an interrelated system. A failure in any one area can easily destroy any or all of the others.

If your stator is testing OK, you are lucky. But don't just plug in a new regulator/rectifier without checking the wiring thoroughly for corroded and overheated connections. The stator connectors and the back side of the fuse box are especially problematic, but just about anything is possible on a vintage bike. Take nothing for granted.

There are also certain wiring modifications that are considered mandatory, such as running a better ground wire and bypassing the headlight loop on one leg of the stator wiring.

[Duran]

what do you mean by bypassing the headlight loop on one leg of the stator wiring, what does it do and how do i do that?

[Steve]

On many (but maybe not ALL) of our bikes, the wires coming from the stator don't all go directly to the regulator. One of the wires disappears into the harness, to show up near the left hand grip, where you used to be able to turn off the headlight. From there, the wire would go back down the harness, to emerge near the regulator and get plugged into it.

What bwringer meant was to bypass that detour to the left hand grip and connect all three stator wires directly to the regulator.


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[jwlawrence]

when the R/R goes out the voltage from the stator still flows, on into the battery. The battery is DC volts untill a good R/R changes it the stator puts out AC voltage, The battery dies QUICKLY. Batterys don't like AC.