I have a Drag Specialties Battery Tender Junior, which I plug in whenever the bike sits at home. The battery is always fully charged when I begin a ride, but upon returning, when I plug in the tender, the red light comes on (less than 80%), after fifteen minutes or so, the light starts blinking green (80% charged) and it's fully charged within thirty minutes.

My question is this: does this indicate my charging system is less than optimal?

 

Mine does the same thing.

 

Test the voltage on the battery with a volt meter and load tester. That will rule out the battery going bad. Then with the bike running, take a voltage reading from idle to about 2-3k rpm. This will at least let you know for sure.

 

Check voltage when you get back.

 

Put a volt meter on the battery with engine runnin'... think it shud read over 14 vdc.

 

Mine does the same thing, sounds about normal.

 

My Battery Tender Jr. will go red for a couple (2-3) of minutes, then turn green.

 

All four of my battery tenders do that. If mine is green and fully charged and I turn on the bike radio, it will go to red while the radio is on, then stay red a short while after turning the radio off.

Your battery is probably fine.

 

my HD charger does the exact same thing