History: 2007 FLHTC - coming up on 70k miles. Radio has quite working a couple years ago - slowly faded display screen until finally nothing. Replaced stater at 57k when I killed a battery trying to figure out those issues.

This years flavor is volt gauge normally sits on 14. It went down to 11 and the battery light came on with the engine light. A couple miles later crept back up to 14. By the time I got to work it was pegged past 16. After work, I rode home at 14 volts like normal. I did some looking and found the negative post was not tight so I fixed that all up and put the battery tender on. Next day the bike cruised at 12 volts but no warning lights. Today, cruising at 12 volts and the warning lights came on again. Two times, for about a miles the gauge showed 14 with no warning lights but then went back to 12 volts with the warning lights. Back home again, I see that my rear brake does not cause the rear brake light to work but my front brake does. Also, left blinker works but the light does not stay in like the right one. The lights and radio may have nothing to do with anything but just thought I'd mention as much as I can.

I'm planning to replace rear bulb and left blinker bulb regardless. Also planning to replace headlamp bulb since I think I last did it at 17k miles.

Is there any sort of quick test I can do to gain an understanding as to where I should begin looking first?

 

Oh, and I just read another thread where a guy said his bike wouldn't start good after gas stops - that he would wait a few minutes for it to cool down before it would fire up without issues. Mine does that too. Makes me think my starter is bad.

 

Clean and tighten battery cables before anything further.

 

After riding 2,800 miles through the Smokey's on a round trip from Miami my engine light and battery light started playing the same song and dance. Sometimes it would charge just fine and other times it would only get just less than 13 volts, then back to normal. Finally it stopped charging but never went below 12 volts. I do keep a tender on it every time I get off of it. To make a long story short, I tested the charging system as per the Electrical Diagnostic Manual and everything checked out to specks.
Bad regulator. I already had the meters to check the system, AC volts, Ohms, and DC volts. Between the manual and the internet the information needed to trouble shoot the system was more than enough. Checkers is spot on, check the Battery and cables first!


Investing in the meters will enable you to check your car, house/apartment, appliances, boats, and just about anything that uses electricity. The meters are extremely valuable, but not that expensive to purchase. I know it is easy for me to say, and it might be much harder to lay out the money, but the truth is that the meters and learning to operate them is a wise investment of money and time. You can be in your 90's and you'll still be needing them one way or another.


My bike has an oil cooler sitting just in front and a bit lower than the regulator, I'm curious, does yours have an oil cooler too?

 

No oil cooler. The battery and cables are clean and tight. Today no lights and the gauge was just below 14, a tiny bit below normal but good enough for me. I'm not electrically smart. I do most of my own work and want to learn more so I think I'll get a tester like you said. Any recommendations on those. What should a good one cost without looking like I'm signing up to be an electrician. Ha

 

Today's flavor:

Everything looking fine until I get into town, I notice I've got no speedometer and the mileage isn't tracking. That lasts about 6 miles. I pull my clutch in to coast down a hill to a stop sign. Bike dies (happens now and then). I shut everything down for a minute and fire back up. All gauges working, bike responding to throttle well. All is good until about 15 miles later right about to my workplace. Volt gauge is suddenly on 12. Still running good, just low in volts.

I think she's mad at me for admiring the new Indian chieftan last night. Hahaha

 

If interested, it was the voltage regulator. Bad battery to but it was original.