Hello fellas, hoping someone can help me out here. Recently my battery started failing, requiring jump starts to get it going so I replaced it with a Motobatt model today. This is where my problems started.

The previous owner had put what looked like a few additional accessories on (trickle charger and what looks like either an LED relay or an alarm). I've unhooked them all from the old battery and immediately the alarm goes off at intervals for about 30 seconds then stops. Put the new battery in and re-attach all the wires and ... nothing. Completely dead. Not even fuel pump. No lights, no dash, nothing. Completely deaded.

Now I'm not the most technical kind of bloke but I can put a battery in (or so I thought). So my troubleshooting went like this:

1) Unhooked everything and tested the battery with circuit tester. Can see it's pumping out over 12v




2) Re-attach everything and check connections are tight. All look OK, but again, nothing when I turn the key.

3) Un-hook everything then re-attach the blue wires (which I presume is the main electrical wires.) and what I think is the frame ground only, Nothing.




4) Thinking it's a long shot, I re-attach the main blue wires and what is either the LED relay or the alarm/immobiliser (see below for identification). Again, nothing when I turn the key.




Any idea where I'm going wrong here? I'm thinking that either the immobiliser has done it's job and immobilised everything or a main fuse has blown somewhere else. Any help on this I would really appreciate as I've come to a dead end.

Just to be clear, there's no clicks, no lights flashing, no headlight, nothing. completely dead.

 

Your work involved moving wires, perhaps a poor connection somewhere became a no connection. Check the voltage between the B+ (battery positive) and ground. If that's good, your ground should be good. Then work your way along the wires from the B+ until you find a point where you don't have your 12V.

 

Thanks for the tip.

After much tracing, scratching head and getting voltage readouts, it turns out to be a loose terminal on the + side. Took everything off, re-tightened everything terminal-wise to the max and reconnected everything (this time with the ignition on so as I ain't deafened by the alarm) and bingo - the bike burst into life.

 

Glad I could help, Ciaran. Often it's just a systematic hunt, to find electrical gremlins.

 

Yep, you're not wrong. The terminals were unattached as there was a choice of two types. I was sure I'd tightened them down good with the Allen key provided. Obviously not and when I used a ratchet, there were a few turns more on the connector screws which obviously made the contact good. Lesson learned for future reference there.