My XS literally caught on fire.

Hey everyone on XS400.com, on my last thread people's responses were super helpful, so here goes my new, current dilemma: about a week ago I was riding my bike and I had just started it up and had ridden about 6 miles when I noticed that there was a burning smell coming from my bike. I pulled over and I was shocked to see that there were flames coming from under my seat. After putting out the fire, with my backpack, I realized that the positive cable to the battery had been the source. Specifically, the connection point between the cable and the battery.

I'm currently getting a new battery and cable but I need to find the reason why this happened and fix it before I can go riding again. I'm thinking maybe the generator or possibly the voltage regulator went bad and were sending too much charge to the battery. I was wondering if anyone had some input for this problem, I would really appreciate it.

Can you show a pic of the area that started burning? Usually the area the burns is where a short is.

I'll do that soon. It was hot enough that it actually melted off the post off the battery. By the way, that is really nice what you have done to your bike.

Sounds like the connection between the battery and cable must have been poor to start with, maybe made catastrophic by a faulty charging component.

The battery and the "+"Cable will not catch fire because the connection is dirty or a Little loose. There must have been a short from the cable to the Frame or to the "-"cable maybe. Or the rubber piece that covers the "+" and the cable on the battery is missing and some metal Piece made a short to Frame and/or the seat base.

Viele Grüße aus Wuppertal, Uli

Is your seat missing those rubber bumpers? Could it have shorted on the seat pan and set your foam and other flammables in the area ablaze?

So I've my running again; I replaced the battery and positive cable and so far nothing is burning yet. I did have a question for anyone who knows: I took my bike to a NAPA and had them test the alternator. At idle the bike is reading 13 amps/watts, not sure which, but not charging. It is charging when the bike is revved so I don't know if this is good or bad.

The bike should put out 14.5-14.7 volts at 5k rpms at the battery. The manual states the bike makes 13 amps also.

Yeah xschris, at revs it was reading in the 14s. So the manual says that at idle 13 is good?