Help, please electrical. Been through hell

[pipewelder]

Ok I need serious help. I'm having battery frying issues now ive done all the electrical charging tests which brought me to bad volt reg ,, producing 14.9 volts at battery, so replaced it, now new battery tests good, bike fires runs good, 2 days goes by ride all weekend no prob, sunday afternoon stop for gas bike won't start dead battery, check ALL conectons wires all looks good. Been threw a few baterries and hundreds of dollars and rewiring and um so lost I'm ready to go Japanese with a warranty,,, s&s 100in, shorty e carbon, dyna 2000i ignition crane cam coil 3ohm, please help I'm so frustrated and lost its been going on for months, also key switches jab shortest replaced 3 switches 3 batteries, 1 coil 1 ignition WTF ,, by the way I'm a new member but have used this site for years to work threw my many different bikes and jab apreciated u all silently for years

[jsdiamond]

Something is draining power or shorting.
Check your grounds; make sure they are bare metal, --don't ground to painted or powder-coated surfaces. Make sure your battery (-) is grounded to the frame tight. Make sure the rectifier is grounded to the frame. Make sure the rectifier plug is secure in the stator plug recepticle.

Check your key-switch; is it allowing (+) to anything when the bike is turned off?

Check the fuse between your rectifier and the batttery, make sure it isn't blown or you will be running off battery power with no recharging going on.

Look over each wire. You'll have to check for nicks or cuts, checking for shorts along the rectifier wires. If there is a short, it will interrupt the charging which will lead to a dead battery.

[pipewelder]

Thankyou for if response I recognise if name and jab read many of if posts. The batterys r winding up with dead cells I hav inspect all wires, only thing I'm seeing is batery is grounded to trans case near the rear wear starter bolts to,,, today fired up fine, road down arrest, starting popping & cut out, test battery, has another dead cell, only could ignition be frying it or is that battery ground attatched to trans case no good, again wires r clean and new and felt along every inch, again I apreciate if knowledge immensley. And hav used if words for years to solve many problems

[jsdiamond]

I place a pad under my battery to reduce vibration; also I run a gel cell because wet cell batteries (the ones you add electrolyte to) occasionally get a bad cell due to vibration. Batteries don't like vibration.

Attaching to trans case is okay, but much better to attach (-) direct to bare metal place on frame; because if there is any extra resistance between your charging system and your battery, your battery will drain power faster than your rectifier can restore it.

[Tortolabob2]

I was having similar issues a few years back. I traced to bad ground too. I now use two heavy ground wires. One to a bare spot on frame and a second directly to a starter mounting bolt. I also switched from batteries purchased from Battery Warehouse, as three in a row failed, to a V rod gel battery from HD. Now perfectly reliable.

[Ricky-D]

For a battery to go bad in such a quick way as you describe there would necessarily be some indication like smoke or burning insulation. Something would definitely give it away.

That's why it most likely is another bad battery. They can mess up internally with no outward indication.

The charging rate around 14.9 volts is high but not unreasonably high and is an indication of a bad battery as opposed to a bad voltage regular. A well charged good condition battery would and should indicate a lower charging rate when installed in the bike.

All things point to a bad battery.

***

[chopperfugger]

Is the voltage regulator Grounded?

[Barefoot Choppa]

Originally Posted by Tortolabob2

I was having similar issues a few years back. I traced to bad ground too. I now use two heavy ground wires. One to a bare spot on frame and a second directly to a starter mounting bolt. .

Bingo!!! We have a winner....so many guys do not understand the importance of having a good ground.....and, why not run 2 grounds? I always do and exactly like this. Current (like anything else) likes to take the path of least resistance. So, your heaviest current draw is from the starter....hence the ground right to the mounting bolt. Now go ahead and run that extra ground to the frame...for the hell of it....

[pokergolf420]

It sounds like a grounding issue, or a short somewhere. But most likely ground.

[chopperfugger]

Right on Rick -
A distinction to add to your statement -

The current flows from the GND to the Power. The Power connection
needs to be adequate with enough extra to prevent temperature rise
and voltage drop.
The GND should be much larger than needed to provide a good return path without
voltage drop - solid reference for Voltage potential.

[LonDart]

Originally Posted by chopperfugger

Is the voltage regulator Grounded?

This sounds like the problem to me, very similar issues happend to me all because my voltage regulator wasn't grounded properly!