If my bike is in the garage, it's plugged in. The battery is always ready to go no matter how often I ride or how long it sits.

 

If the wheels ain't turnin', the tender's burnin'!

 

Does anybody know if the Schumaker's will plug into the factory installed pigtails on the 2014's? HD didn't do something silly an install a proprietary plug did they?

 

Plus, it's not like we have a kickstarter anymore...if the battery is weak or dead, so is the bike. The tender is cheap insurance. I doubt that it really NEEDS to be plugged in all the time during riding season, but it is so quick and easy I have it connected nearly always.

 

If you have it, use it

 

+1 on Battery Tender. Has the same effect for bike and car batteries - longer life and peace of mind. Like many said, no real down side. Once fully charged, the only draw is the led on the tender itself.

 

If my bike is going to sit for over a week without riding it I might. So far, have never needed to.

 

My internet bravado, and this is all it is.......since I am a rider, not a mechanic or battery specialist.

It takes about two weeks for the micro amp draw to lower the battery to where it takes 5 minutes to turn solid green.

If I let it go 4 weeks, it takes hours, sometimes over night.

Therefore, my rule and having very carefully NOT READ THE MANUAL, is that if I am gone for more than two weeks, plug it in. If I am riding daily or weekly, well just top of the gas and go for a ride to charge it up.

I try not to over think it, yet I want everything, a bike instantly ready to go and a battery that will last 15 years or more.

I do not always get what I want, so here is the disclaimer that everything said above is for me, not for you.

 

Is there a difference to brands? Battery Tender $50 or so, Wally World brand $20. And a battery tender is different than a trickle charger correct? I've fried batteries on trickle chargers.

 

I'm thinking you've already over thunk it.

Just plug it in all the time.

There is ONLY an upside. Batteries like to be floated at full charge. They don't like to be constantly deeply discharged and re-charged. The battery will last longer, you will never come out to a dead bike that you "thought" wasn't going to sit for three weeks unridden, but somehow life got in the way and it did. It's 2 seconds added to the already multi minute process of parking your bike in the garage.

It took this moron (me) thirty years to figure this out after killing a battery every two years and frequently charging a battery instead of going for that first ride of the season.