Charging issues progress!

[Drewcifer]

So I've been tinkering with my charging system since it's gone kaflooey.

I let the smoke out of an old voltage regulator. My brother owned the bike previously and is overprotective, so he shot me another used reg off ebay from his office up north in seattle on friday afternoon. I had it monday. It didn't fix the problem.

I also put in the r-292 (aka vr 291) after market regulator, trying to get around the issue of old electronics. That would have worked if I'd hooked it up, but instead, tired and bleary eyed one night, I actually connected the new after market reg to the old dead one's wires, as it was still installed. I was so tired I thought I was connecting it to the loom.

I rewired the stator, and corrected the zero ohms I was getting in resistance. Now I am getting about 1.8. A bit high, but still legit. The field coil shows me 5.1 ohms resistance, instead of the quoted 4. Again, these are both high and going to toss the amps off but i have no choice.

A lot of guys have helped me on the forum so far. Thanks to Pseudomonkey, Frwinks, and especially Jedi Drewpy for messages and rescue. You guys are all welcome to hang in Hermosa Beach anytime and I'll take you for a pint. It was Campbells success in activating his coil directly that got me thinking.

Finally I figured I'd just add positive to the field coil wire at it closest possible point, in other words, not at the regulator connection green wire, not at the loom leaving the regulator going back to the plug to the coil, but at the coil connection itself.

SEE THAT? IF YOU'RE STUCK, BYPASS EVERYTHING RELATED TO THE REGULATOR.

BINGO! INSTANT CHARGING VOLTS. I did notice the engine revved much more slowly, but it was charging, that was for sure. At 2500 rpm, 14.23 volts. So the stator and coil are legit.

I suspect I have a bad connection somewhere between the loom as it connects to the regulator and the return from the regulator to the coil connector (four wires there, the coil in and out, the oil sensor light wire, and the neutral wire.) I'm going to test the continuity on the green wires and find the break/leak/short.

If I can find the break I can get the voltage to charge all the time and the bike will be back in form. Hoping I didn't short the new voltage regulator I got from O'reilly.

Hopefully I find a broken wire and the aftermarket is in fact the right unit to replace the old stock.

Thanks to all the guys.

 

[ThePsuedoMonkey]

making some good progress!

 

[Drewcifer]

okay, so the connections are good from the loom to the connectors. So it's the aftermarket reg that's not working.

Question. If it takes voltage in from the brown wire (into paired orange and yellow wires on the aftermarket) and it's supposed to send green out to the coil, how can I get it to trigger and send volts to the green wire? With my battery at 12.5 volts it doesn't send it all to the coil. I'm wondering how low it has to go before it opens the circuit to the coil and starts charging again. How do I confirm it sends volts out on that green wire? After all, if it sent 12 volts ALL the time, the coil would be full fielded and the battery would take a beating. How do I test this thing at a lower voltage to see if it sends the power through?

Maybe with a 9 volt?

 

[drewpy]

have you tried adjusting the regulator? (if its the electromagnetic version).

the manual says;

start the engine. Disconnect the fuse box wire leading to the battery and hook up a volt meter from the fuse box to ground. Accerlerate the engine tp 2500 rpm. The voltmeter should read 14.5 to 15 volts DC. If it varies, twist the adjusting screw tin to raise the charging voltage or out to reduce the voltage.

 

[Drewcifer]

I'm using an aftermarket 12 volt system r-292. It was common on a lot of vehicles with swtiched supply alternators. It has 4 wires. A black, a green, an orange and a yellow.

I've read that I can join the orange and yellow and match the to the brown wire. The black and green are matched to black and green.

But when I do that I never get voltage. Just the same volts. It's not triggering the field coil.

 

[Drewcifer]

I even found a more obscure reference on xs650 (I know their bikes have different systems, with brushes, but their rotors have 5.0 ohms resistance, the same as my coil, so it ought to work) showing they have it wired just like I do. Orange and yellow to the brown wire, green to green, black to black.

link to page below...

http://xs650temp.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=Charging&action=print&thread=3246

I am never getting voltage over 13 volts with this set up this way, and I can't even rev over 12.6. I'm undercharging somehow.

 

[Campbell45]

We are in the exact same boat... this is so frustrating

 

[Drewcifer]

VICTORY!

Campbell I verified and reverified! It is all fixed and working now!

So the r-292 is the right regulator for my bike I had an issue trusting shitty bullet connectors that crimped instead of soldering the wires at the loom to the regulator.

Now that they are actually connected, the bike charges at idle, goes up to about 14.5 at revs, but no higher. I will post the pics in a few minutes.

If you want to go to Oreilly, napa, autozone, or whatever, you can go buy this now. as long as you don't mind soldering you'll be riding in 30 minutes.

Feels so good to finally win.

Drewcifer.

 

[Drewcifer]

TRUST IN SOLDER, NOT BULLETS OR SPADES!

Here's how to wire it.

Combine the yellow and orange wires and solder them together, then solder the brown wire directly to them.

Green to green
Black to black

and enjoy your voltage!

BTW, make sure your coil is magnetized by putting a single edged razor blade to the side cover when the engine is running, it will stay that magnetically. If you get no magnetism your coil is off.

Best to all

Drewcifer

 

[Campbell45]

I'll have to go pick one up. Congrats! hopefully I'll be posting excitement soon as well!

 

[branson]

Sounds silly but I have two original voltage regulators and no matter which one I use my bike charges at 13.2v max. I have no idea where this magic adjusting screw should be or if there's anything else I should investigate.

 

[ThePsuedoMonkey]

I think the adjusting screw is only on the mechanical ones, the solid-state one that I have has no adjustment either.