[th32070]

I'm going to purchase some sort of battery charger. Is the battery tender Jr. the best option? I found them on ebay for about $30 with shipping included. If I ever do run into a dead battery on my bike, how long will it take a battery tender to fully charge it again?

Also I have seen on here where several people have come across loose battery leads. Has anyone made any attempts at doing something to prevent them from loosening? I haven't had the tank up on my bike yet so I haven't seen what the installation looks like. Are the leads just ring terminals tightened down with nuts or is it something else? When I go in to install the extension leads for a battery tender I want to do something to prevent them from loosening.

Thanks.

 

[Allan]

I'm going to purchase some sort of battery charger. Is the battery tender Jr. the best option? I found them on ebay for about $30 with shipping included. If I ever do run into a dead battery on my bike, how long will it take a battery tender to fully charge it again?

Also I have seen on here where several people have come across loose battery leads. Has anyone made any attempts at doing something to prevent them from loosening? I haven't had the tank up on my bike yet so I haven't seen what the installation looks like. Are the leads just ring terminals tightened down with nuts or is it something else? When I go in to install the extension leads for a battery tender I want to do something to prevent them from loosening.

Thanks.

The tender Jr. is going to take at least overnight to charge a dead battery. But you can plug it in and forget about it because it will not overcharge. I have also heard that if the battery is %100 gone it will not charge because the tender cant see any load and will not think its hooked up to anything. When I had to get a new battery for my Seca I put in on the tender and it was ready to go by tomorrow.

The only thing I could think of is to make sure that you clean and tighten the leads up nice and good. Not to tight I bent the posts once on an old battery. I dont know if you can use locktite in electrical situations. Anyone?

 

[th32070]

What about lock washers?

 

[Paddy3-17]

The battery tender can also be used as a power outlet attachment. I went to Wally World and bought a cigarette lighter jack that has the dual male/female end for a couple of bucks and it works great! Now I don't have to hard wire a power jack.

 

[MrVvrroomm]

What about lock washers?

I would suspect any battery terminal fasteners that were found loose were not properly tightened when installed. I have never, ever had a battery bolt/nut come loose on any vehicle. Just tighten it normally. No magic needed.

The Battery Tender Jr. is a wonderful device. I actually have 8 of them. I have all my toys plugged in over the winter.

 

[FZTurtle]

It is all that you'll ever need. Works great, costs nothing (cheap anyway) and will save you heartache every spring, at least.

 

[AbstractLab]

Loose

I might have been one of the people that you saw that had the problem with the wire coming loose.

My impression was that it probably wasn't ever tightened down all the way. I really tightened it down and i added a phillips head screwdriver and larger hex wrench (for tank bolt) under my seat. If it hapens again, I can repair from anywhere. Also, I intend to lift the tank again in a week or two and see if the bolt has loosened back up at all

 

[MacBandit]

In my experience as a tech I found the Accumate and Optimate chargers to be better all around chargers with a few more mAmps and a better charging routine to keep the battery healthy.

As for keeping it on all the time you can with the sealed battery in the FZ6 but if you have a high output charger you can force a sealed batter to vent and once it does it will dry up fairly quickly. Also I don't recommend leaving any charger on for long periods of time unless they are on a time so they are only on for a couple hours a day. The reason is all maintenance charges output some current even when the battery is fully charged this warms the battery very slightly but enough cause gassing.

Another very cool slick charger is the ChargeX this thing is the size of a small pack of gum and stays wired to the battery and on the bike. When you want to charge you just pull out the AC plug and plug it in.

If you run your battery completely dead you will need to jumper it to another battery before you can charge it with any smart charger. Once you get it going you can disconnect the other battery and leave the charger which will likely take a minimum of 24 hours and as much as 48 hours to fully recharge the battery depending on the output of the charger. I wouldn't buy any charger that outputs less then about 1-1.5amps for a motorcycle battery.