Weird Charging Issue 84 200es

[zppeacock]

Its been doing this for a while and I finally am getting sick of it. My 84 200es has a new battery in it. It will charge the battery and work perfect with the lights off. But during night riding with the headlight on low, it will drain the battery in 30min, even when cruzing in 5th. Then you come to a stop and kill it and try to restart and it just clicks. :mad: Do these not charge when the light is on? My 85 trx and 87 trx 125's both charge with the lights on.

[atctim]

No - you have something wrong for sure. 3 things to check - #1 parasitic drain. Put your volt meter on it when it is shut off. note the voltage - check the voltage in one day. Note the change. Should not change. If it does - something is draining your battery.

#2 - faulty stator. Check your batteries voltage when fully charged. Then start the Big Red and check it with it running. Should be 12.4 - 12.65 at full charge. If less than 12.4 it is low on charge. When running battery voltage should read 12.9 - 13.4. Also - check this with headlight on and off.

a 3rd problem - but doubtful is too high wattage bulb. Check you headlght bulb.

One last thing that comes to mind. Is this the first battery that has done this for you? You may have a bad battery if you never had this problem with another battery,

[zppeacock]

Thanks for the tips, this trike is not currently stored at my house but when im at my buddys next I will do some of your suggestions.

The battery does not have a drain on it as far as I can tell, I can let it sit for a month and it will still start up off the battery. When I got the bike the electric start didnt work, it had a battery in it but didnt take a charge. So this is the first battery I put in it since I have owned it.

[atctim]

One last thing comes to mind......not to insult you, but are you sure it is the correct battery for that machine? I am sure it is - just something else I thought of. There is a really good chance it is a bad battery. Any battery shop will be able to do a quick drain down test and tell you if the battery is bad.

[zppeacock]

No insults taken. Im pretty sure it was the correct battery, when I bought it I looked in the energizer book and picked out the one for the 200es. I think ill pull the battery and get it tested to see if its bad. If its bad Ill get another and go from there.