Any harm in keeping the charger on?

[MikeG]

I've still got a charging issue but no money to diagnose or fix at the moment. I had to spend my budgeted money on new tires. For now I'm keeping the charger in the saddle bag and pluggin it in whenever I park by an outlet ( at work and at home).

Any problems with doing that for the next month? I figure it's just doing what the bad stator (I presume) is not doing right now. Will it harm the battery?

[BassCliff]

Cooking with electrons

Hi Mr. MikeG,

I did this to my bike for three weeks last year while I was waiting for parts and time to do the repairs. I also suspect my battery was old an on its last legs. I ended up replacing the stator and r/r first, and then the battery a week later (it had stopped holding sufficient charge). I don't know if trickle-charging it every night hastened its death. I wanted to start with all new components anyway.

Keep a close eye on your battery's fluid level, unless it's a sealed AGM unit. Does your charger automatically turn off once the battery is fully charged?

Thank you for your indulgence,

BassCliff

[MikeG]

Battery is one week old, I've got it on a Battery Tender Plus that goes into trickle mode when it is fully charged.

[Steve]

Even with a one-week-old battery, you should keep an eye on the fluid. A BT+ is a decent-enough unit that you should have no problems keeping it plugged in all the time.

When you got your new battery, did you initialize it properly? Probably not.

Here is what is written up on one of the BMW boards, but the principle is the same for any wet battery:

http://home.jps.net/~snowbum/newbattery.htm

.

[robertbarr]

Battery is one week old, I've got it on a Battery Tender Plus that goes into trickle mode when it is fully charged.

Under the circumstances, you're already taking the smartest route you have available. It won't work wonders treating any battery like a deep-cycle, but you already knew that since you own a Battery Tender.

The more completely you discharge it, the greater the impact on its longevity -- but you waited all winter like the rest of us, so don't feel guilty about using up some of its lifespan.

[MikeG]

I've had the bike for a month and a half and already put 1200 miles on it

Battery died Sun am, bought a new one, rode it home 2 miles and let it charge for 24 hours+. Three days ago on the way home from working late at the bar the battery got REALLY low, died coasting into my driveway and wouldn't even push start. no lights or anything. Let it charge another 24 hours and rode it today, it's on the charger when it's not moving.

[Steve]

Sounds like it's time to break out the multimeter and go through the Stator Papers. 8-[

.

[MikeG]

Yeah, got the papers printed out, got a nice Johnstone multimeter, now I just need 20 spare minutes, easier said than done! I've got a three day weekend coming up in two days, I'll be working on the bike on Friday.