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81 gl1100 battery issue

1204 Views 8 Replies 7 Participants Last post by  Ken Bergen
Hey everyone. hope you can help me. Im new to the forum and new to a gl1100. i have a issue with the battery ( i think ) the bike has been sitting for sometime and i just bought it. everything seem to be fine execpt for...i bought a new battery for it and i charged as per paper work. it started fine for a couple of days then i needed to jump it, it started again but when i take the jumpers off it runs real bad n cant give it throttle. but while on jumper it works fine....any help would be greatful
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Sounds like a weak battery. Do you have a load tester? Do you have a lot of electrical accessories added, ie driving lights or light bars? The stators on these old bikes do not produce that much watts able to run lot's of accessories. Install a volt gauge to be able to keep up with how the battery/stator is performing. The stator should be producing 14.5 volts at 2000 rpms. I have kuryakan led volt meter on my 1100. If I'm not showing a green light, I'll switch off some accessories to get a good charge. All my accessories are switched to be able to turn them off or on as needed.
Sounds like a weak battery.
It sounds to me more like a charging system issue.
More than likely you have a bad stator. This is probably why the bike was sitting in the first place. I do not wish to insult your intelligence but I'll continue anyway.

The stator is the bikes "alternator". Unfortunately, on this vintage bike, it is inside the engine case. If you are going to do the work yourself, prepare to research, test, and roll up your sleeves, and wrench-you have some work ahead of you. This site has many posts on replacing the stator. Get busy.
do you own a meter or have acces to one?
It sounds to me more like a charging system issue.
Yes, I did address that but the symptoms he is saying is a weak battery. What is causing the new battery to be weak needs to be investigated. Is he trying to run too many electrical acessories at one time or is the stator not producing the right voltage? Is something staying on slowly draining the battery? With a load tester all this can be determined or some more information would be helpful.
Charging circuit is more than likely the fault. A new battery that hasn't been charged will go flat quickly without a charging circuit operating.
It sounds to me more like a charging system issue.
+1

And it may be easily/cheaply repairable. Don't go nuts YET!:praying:
First, who is "he"? The PO (previous owner)? As Ansimp says, a battery will go dead quickly without proper charging, regardless of the use of electricity on the bike. Load check the battery to be sure it's good. Any good auto parts store will do this, preferably the one you bought it from, since they have the biggest incentive to keep you happy.

Clean and sound battery connections and cables, including GOOD GROUND.
Soldered and shrinktubed stator wires, the three yellow wires to the left of the battery on most of our bikes. If the plastic plug is still there, cut it out and solder the wires and shrinktube. Be sure to check the soundness of the soldered joints if it's already been done. If you have a multi-tester, check the AC ouput of the stator on each wire before you button it up. Also make sure your main fuse ("dogbone" or otherwise to the right of the battery) is clean, sound, and tight.

On my 1200 I had this same problem when I got it and did as above and it was still not cutting it. I peeled back the electrical tape about 5" higher and found ANOTHER set of soldered joints, one of which fell apart when I touched it. It runs like a top now, with current well within the service limits for the stator.
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Yes, I did address that but the symptoms he is saying is a weak battery.
For what it's worth the charging system will run the bike just fine even with a dead battery and I've been there done that.
As John's bike runs fine until he disconnects the jumping battery there can only be one conclusion.
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