question for you guys with smaller batteries

[sly409]

Hey fella's,

So I'm switching over to a smaller 5ah battery that I plan on relocating it to under the cafe style seat I plan on fabricating later on and I was wondering what you guys did for the battery cables? The connectors for the small battery are .187" quick connect type. Were you guys able to buy battery cables with those types of connectors already built in or did you have to fabricate some new cables? If the latter what materials did you use to do it? It seems the gauge of the stock battery cables would be too large to use with the smaller connectors too. Im guessing I should looking for something between 12-16gauge?

Thanks!

 

[danisawesome]

I think I used 12 gauge on mine and found some nice weather-proof connectors (crimp and heat shrink) for the blade terminals on the battery and it hasn't had a problem yet. I remember reading that as long as the wire is as big as the wire going to the alternator you should be fine, but I am definitely no electrical expert so I have no way to prove it.

 

[drewpy]

depends if you are using the E-starter.

kicker only, so just used what came with the battery.

BTW it came last week ( 2 month delivery) and is performing really well. I had to get a new Reg/Rec (RR38) as the old one was kicking out 15v and would have killed the lithium cells

 

[sly409]

No estarter. Actually my bike was missing the estart button so I had no way of testing if the estart even works until I buy a replacement which I probably wont do haha. Um your battery came with cables?! I guess mine didnt come with cables due to it being only 15bucks from some seller from china through amazon.

What method would you use to test the reg/rec for output?

Thanks!

 

[xschris]

With the bike running put a volt meter on the battery terminals and it should read between 14 volts +/- .5 volts. Thats what I get with my 1.2ah battery on my tracker. On my 12ah oem battery it reads about 13.25 I guess because of the larger size of the battery. Also my small gell 1.2ah also has a max charging voltage of 15 volts This test should be done with a fully charged battery.

 

[drewpy]

I'm only getting 12.5v but i think its because of the way lithium works (guessing) it was over charging before so so long as it stays charged I'm happy.

BTW my battery was $60 cables should come with it

 

[sly409]

would this sort of cable that is used for RC projects work as pos/neg cable for our smaller batteries?

http://www.amazon.com/Silicone-Wire...?ie=UTF8&qid=1351548335&sr=8-8&keywords=12awg

 

[drewpy]

i would say that's fine, as I am running that anyway!