ditching the assimilator

Hi fellow tinkerers!,what do I need to do to get rid of the assimilator and possibly wire in a volt. / amp. meter? bike is a 1974, 850. Thanks. Ride safely. James.

No responses from the peanut gallery? Well here's one from me.

PO ditched the assimilator on my bike some time before I bought it. I guess the things had a high failure rate. There's two wires going to it, an ac and a dc. Grounding the dc lead turns the warning light into an "ignition on" light, which is what he did. I've left it like that, it's kind of a nice feature. When my Lucas ignition switch went bad a couple of years ago, the flickering light helped me figure out what the problem was.

Debby

I have used the solid state battery voltage switch from RGM to good effect. It basically measures battery voltage rather than charge rate, but any time the voltage drops below 12 volts or so the light comes on which effectively gives the same information as a charge warning light.

Dave

I have used the solid state battery voltage switch from RGM to good effect. It basically measures battery voltage rather than charge rate, but any time the voltage drops below 12 volts or so the light comes on which effectively gives the same information as a charge warning light.

Dave

P.S. Can I have my peanuts now Debby?

james said:

Hi fellow tinkerers!,what do I need to do to get rid of the assimilator

Click to expand...

= Disconnect it?

james said:

and possibly wire in a volt. / amp. meter?

Click to expand...

Fitting a voltmeter is probably the easier option of the two, as all you need to do to wire it in is connect it to the white wire from the ignition switch and a good earth/ground point. (make sure the polarity is correct).

The early Commandos were fitted with an ammeter, and that was connected along the battery to ignition switch wire (should be brown/blue wire?) but the horn circuit should not run through the ammeter.

So that would mean connecting the horn feed wire between the battery and the ammeter. I'm not sure the original horn switch could easily be used with that setup or not?

There are other battery status units available now as has been suggested already (RGM?), also a better assimilator available from AO Services http://www.aoservices.co.uk/ It seems the 850 MkIII AO unit can now be used on the earlier models if wired as advised.

Hi fellow tinkerers,thanks for the info.,not such a big deal to get the assimilator out of circuit.Thanks again.Ride safely. James.

hello james, what was your assimilater doing or not doing? mine has been acting up for awhile. now it is on all the time. i just took a 150 mile ride and she seems to be charging. i know it is putting out more than 6 volts. the solid state replacement is 30 bucks. are they that un-worthy? seems mine worked for 33 years (73 850 commando) are you doing anything for an alternative? cheers, jerome

Hello Jerome,

If it is on all the time, it probably has broken. Put a voltmeter across the battery with the engine off. You should see 11.5-12.5 volts. Start the engine and check it again. You should see at least 12.5-13.5 volts at 2500-3000 rpm. If not you have a charging problem.

You are very lucky it lasted for 33 years. My one owner '73 750 has gone through 3 mechanical ones and now wears a solid state. The mechanical one is amazingly delicate and if the spring it mounts in allows it to touch the frame, it will shake to pieces very rapidly.

What I would really like is a tri-state LED (red/yellow/green) voltage monitor that would fit in the original idiot light position with a stock appearance. It would display the appropriate color depending on voltage. It's not a critical issue for me, with points/2MC cap/no e-start, but would be nice to have.

Wouldn't be too hard to make one, and the electronic components are readily available from places like digikey. But I'd imagine anything I could build would be quickly destroyed by the heat cycles and vibration.

Has anyone heard of something like that on the market?

Debby

J & P Cycles offers a smallish device that utilizes LEDs to indicate the health of a motorcycle's charging system: red=overcharging; green=just right; and yellow=undercharging.

I bought one for my old Electra Glide and it works great! I mounted it on the vertical face of my front brake master cylinder reservoir, very unobtrusive looking.

debby said:

What I would really like is a tri-state LED (red/yellow/green) voltage monitor that would fit in the original idiot light position with a stock appearance. It would display the appropriate color depending on voltage.

Click to expand...

Not quite a stock apearance but Paul Goff sells one:

http://www.norbsa02.freeuk.com/goffyelectrex.htm

Look for 'Battery Status Monitor'

Under 10.75 Volts. If the battery Voltage is very low, the LED will flash red slowly

.At 12V the battery is still low and the LED will maintain a constant red.

12.5 - 13.5V battery fully charged (engine not running) the LED will show orange.

Over 13.8V battery charging the LED shows green

Over 15.25V Overcharging. Fast red flash.

Two GREAT tips in one day L.A.B. ... http://www.norbsa02.freeuk.com/goffyalt ... wiring.htm

How the heck have I missed this vendor site?????????...

oh this is going to cost me BIG time!