Battery Charging

Probably a daft question I know, but one I can’t get my head around at the moment and afraid of maybe doing some damage. I wish to connect a smart charger (Optimate 4) to my MK3 using the permanent fitted battery leads that come with the charger so as I can just plug in and top up when not using the bike for awhile and save removing the battery each time for charging. There's nothing in the instructions about connecting positive earths.
The question is good people, being a positive earth bike; do I connect the red lead to the earth or the black lead as normal? :?
Apologizes if this as been mentioned before.

The positive lead from the charger needs to go to the positive terminal of the battery, irrespective of whether the vehicle is positive or negative earth,

Dave.

Wasn't sure, thanks for the quick response. :wink:

I tried to use my "smart charger" with tose leads still hooked up in the bike & it would not charge.. I haven't tried itt since changing over to solid state regulator, and I don't know why but it charges fine with the batt out of the bike.

I had an interesting experience when I hooked up my "Battery Fighter" charger direct to the battery. The charger came with a cord that had a connector to two interchangable battery connectors; one with dual clamps; the other with ring connectors that I screwed direct onto the battery and left on the bike permanently. That worked really well - until..

The modern battery charger is designed for negative earth batteries, and the connector to the two end cables had the positive connector covered; and the positive connector bare. Of course one morning when I was in a hurry I disconnected the cable, and didn't put the little cap on the exposed connector while I was putting the charger away. The connector touched the frame, and all of the smoke came out....

I have now made up a new cord with fuses on both positive and negative cables, and I thought that I would be really clever and instead of screwing that direct to the battery along with the connectors to the electrical circuit and rectifier; would join the battery connectors into the cables to and from the rectifier. I recall LAB commenting that he does not like multiple cables being connected to the battery. Good plan, but it seems that the current is just going through the rectifier rather than just charging the battery; so I plan to rever to the original mulitiple connectors into the battery arrangement.

No Chris the charger current won't be going into the rectifier as the diodes will be reverse-biased. If charger current could flow into the rectifier so could battery current when engine was not running so you'd have a flat battery after leaving the bike parked for a while!

Dave.

On some models is is best to remove the lead to the zener for optimal charging.
Than again, maybe not for the Mk3, which has the zeners on the AC side of the rectifier diodes, not sure.

I just replaced my old battery charger with a new-fangled one. The new ones are pretty sophisticated and not all that expensive. I can see where a smart charger might get confused if the zener diode was hooked up. The zener starts conducting somewhat at around 13.5V and that is below where the charger is trying to go.

I take my battery out during the winter and charge it 1-2 times maybe. I see a lot of Nortons with battery-tender charging pigtails sticking out behind the sidecover. The AGM batteries (like Big Crank) last 5-6 years plus and I just don't see any need for charging while in the bike during the riding season. It doesn't go down even if the bike sits for a few weeks.

Russ

Jiggering around with negative-ground devices to use them on a positive-ground bike always carries the risk that Chris described; when the device ground touches the frame, either the fuse pops or the wiring burns. I converted both my Mk3 and my TR3A to negative ground to avoid this risk. However my Victor is still positive ground, and I wanted to be able to use the same charger (I have 4 Battery Tender Juniors) on my vehicles. To avoid Chris' problem, I did the following:

Attach the battery cable supplied (two eyelet connections on one end, dual connector on the other) permanently to the battery so that the EXPOSED dual connector connects to the grounded (POSITIVE) battery terminal. Now create an intermediate cable from 2 unused charger cables (each Battery Tender Junior is shipped with two cables, so I had surplus cables) by cutting them and crossing over the connectors (the exposed connector now goes to an insulated connector at the other end of this intermediate cable). Wrap this cable with red tape to remind yourself that this is to be used to charge positive-ground systems only. Now simply connect one end of this cable to the cable coming from the charger, and the other to the cable just installed on the bike. While charging, the cable assembly is insulated. While riding, the bike cable cannot short to the frame, even if the plastic cap is missing.

which has the zeners on the AC side of the rectifier diodes, not sure
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No that can't be the case slim, they couldn't have the Zenners on the ac side of the rec!

Dave.

daveparry said:

which has the zeners on the AC side of the rectifier diodes, not sure
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No that can't be the case slim, they couldn't have the Zenners on the ac side of the rec!

Click to expand...

The 850 Mk3 charging system has two Zeners on the AC side.

http://www.nortonownersclub.org/support ... alternator

Thanks LAB, I knew the Mk3 had two zenners but had had never looked at the diagram before, it's a full wave rectifier circuit but it does seem a strange arrangement!

Dave.

I got a Yuasa Smart charger from cyclegear (no interest here, it's $20 for a good smart charger though), I disconnect the fuse and use the big clips, red one to the z plate and black one to the battery terminal with the disconnected fuse. It means you have to have access to the battery though, but I always remove the side panel and seat anyhow, so it's all there.

Dave
69S

daveparry said:

Thanks LAB, I knew the Mk3 had two zenners but had had never looked at the diagram before, it's a full wave rectifier circuit but it does seem a strange arrangement!

Click to expand...

Simple, but it works, and the Zeners do not need to be a matched pair as they would have to be if they were connected to the DC side.

Interesting LAB, i've spent all my life involved with electrical/electronics repair and servicing but this does seem a bit strange to me. Thinking about it I suppose being on the AC side it means that when one zenner is conducting the other one isn't as they're on different parts of the sine-wave, hence they don't need to be a matched pair, never finish learning do we!

Dave.

Battery charger red lead to pos(+) terminal . Black (-) lead to other batt. terminal . Never turn on ign. during a recharge hookup , I remove the keys from switch to prevent the possibility. Not all intelligent chargers are as smart as advertised. I run a Gel type battery for high vibration applications (Norton perhaps ?) and this requires ideally an intelligent gel-type charger with the proper cycles of charging. Lead -acids need less sophistication. Scary Halloweeny to all.

Gel cell is not good for vibration (security batteries), look up in Wiki. AGM are good, the Yausa bat and charger are good combinations and seem to last, at least for me, but not always the cheapest. I got my AGM from clubman for a decent price for a name brand battery. I know some don't like to deal with him, but he seems to have decent prices for the US.

Dave
69S

I had no problem with a 1.2 ah gel cell security alarm battery in Ms Peel rough riding or rough crashing or running it till dead a bunch of times just listening to the nice kettle drum idle, til fire went out. Push off and charged right up in no time. Best deal weight wise now is the Li batteries with chemistry a bike alternator can charge up and not burn up. I run a 4+ ah wet lead battery in Trixie with no problemo on slow hi beam travel and its been dumped sideways for weeks w/o me knowing it then still worked till dead on road due the terminals vibrating loose so just uprighted screwed terminals then a push down hill has worked fine 2 more months even with extra slow half blinded after dark rain returns. Nortons are over batteried except for London Police service and camp side electric shavers, which is stupid as rockers that'd ride Commandos wouldn't shave on a camp out and mods who always shaved wouldn't be riding a Commando.

The Osborne color changing LED that replaces the ass-imulator lamp is the cat's meow for monitoring your spin/charge budget.

Thanks Dave , seems my battery is the PC 680 by Odyssey and is not Gel but A.G.M. type ,the product sheet says to charge using a regular type charger so the Optimate will be it. It says to clip to the battery terminals first ,then plug into the wall. To disconnect after charging ,unplug from the wall then unclip from the battery. And it's made in U.S.A. too.

I have the same problem with my battery that its not properly charged and the electrical component don't work properly.I don't know what the problem with that and that's why my alarm system is also not working and i am worried about the security of my vehicle.