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8.6 volts while cranking is a very weak battery. Now if I was still questioning that then I'd do an actual load test as follows: I would make sure the battery voltage measured 12.6 volts at rest which indicates a fully charged battery, if it measured 13.1 volts I would know that it just came off a charger or was just being charged by the alternator and I would remove that surface charge by applying a short momentary load to get it down to the 12.6 volts of a fully charged battery, then I'd apply a load equal to 1/2 the CCA rating of the battery for a total of 15 seconds while observing the battery voltage, if it falls below 9.6 volts it would fail the load test. Now it's possible that the instructors who taught me that test over 30 years ago when I was in tech school were wrong and that the hundreds of slow cranking / no crank / hard start complaints I've successfully diagnosed in my career were just pure dumb luck, or it's possible that the $12/hr Autozone employee that performed the load test on your battery was trained how to load test a battery by the other $12/hr Autozone employee who was trained by the store manager who 6 months prior was employed as a manager at Pizza Hut.
Sportsters hesitate on the starter. They always seem to start however. If they came here I think they could be replacing batteries unnecessarily.
My FXEF ( Stroker ) seems like it takes everything he battery has to roll it over ... Hit the start button and there is a brrrr then a boom and it's running :>)
Ok, after a night on the charger, I put it back in the bike, took off the surface charge by turning the ignition on for about a min till the battery was at 12.7 and did the crank test and it did much better. 10.1 is acceptable for me. This is a 1.5 year old battery, gonna ride it the rest of this season and hopefully get through some of next. But these yuhasa are awesome, expensive but a great battery.
thats the thing, I rarely put it on a tender. Maybe once a month. Never had to use a jump pack. Has always started under its own power.
With multiple bikes and bad weather, and hunting, my bikes sit for a month and start.
Last couple years I added pigtails to put a meter on. I am trying to put on charger if it's been 2-3 weeks now
I don't like to stress a battery. But I also don't think it needs to be on a charger. I also think it is good to see it start after sitting few days.
At work when we test old batteries,if weak it's down hill. You could argue good to know. Or could have gotten more time. So I am trying to be better about changing over night if been awhile.
That said, with out, I get 7 years. But I am in cold climate. Garage doesn't get over 75-80.
Id say thats confirmation youre okay then. Nice meter by the way 😉.
Originally Posted by nocoast
Ok, after a night on the charger, I put it back in the bike, took off the surface charge by turning the ignition on for about a min till the battery was at 12.7 and did the crank test and it did much better. 10.1 is acceptable for me. This is a 1.5 year old battery, gonna ride it the rest of this season and hopefully get through some of next. But these yuhasa are awesome, expensive but a great battery.
I just had a bad battery that was 3 weeks old. Sometimes stuff breaks. Mine did test bad. Charging it before running it is a false test. You have multiple batteries. Move them around and see what happens. Also 1.5 years vs mfr date makes a difference too.
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