Electrical drain at battery.

I have a electrical drain of .3 volts at the battery with the key in the off position. I also have constant power at the main fuse. From what i could see in the wiring diagram the power at the main fuse being constant could be normal. The odd part is after the motor is run for 5 or 10 minutes, then turned off. The drain was .9 volts then after 30 or so minutes it slowly dropped to .3 volts. Is the .3 volt drain at the battery normal? Any thoughts? Is this normal? Does not seem right to me. 1983 XJ750 Seca. Thanks for any help.

 

12 volts at main is normal main fuse is always hot. by drain you mean battery voltage keeps dropping?
how old is battery

your math does not add up
.9x 30 = dead battery so I am not understanding what you are saying

are you talking about the drop from 14 volts to ~12 volts?

 

With a full battery charge. After i ride it for 15 minutes I disconnect the negative battery cable and put a volt meter in between. it shows .9 volts. After some time maybe a hour or two it shows .3 volts. Over night, the next morning i checked it again and it shows .19 volt drain. I did pull the square connector from the ignition switch and the diode block in the headlight bucket and the drain stopped. Had to disconnect both for the drain to stop. So the fuse is always hot?

 

So the main fuse is always hot, is that correct?

 

Yes it is, as long as the battery is connected.

Parasitic drain on a battery would be checked using the current mode of the meter, not the voltage setting - and some caution in the current mode as you can blow the internal fuse in the meter if done incorrectly.

With the connection you are applying, the type of meter and input impedance becomes a factor on the actual measured voltage. Most DMM's have an input impedance of >10 megohms, many analog meters are in the 20 kohm range. Therefore, a quick calculation with the setup you are using (assuming DMM) would mean the parasitic drain converted to ohms is somewhere near 100 megohms, which would not be an issue.

I guess the next question might be do you think the battery is discharging when the bike sits for any length of time?

 

I do think it is discharging after a day or two. That's when the battery is dead almost, about 10 volts. the battery disconnected holds 12.79 volts. Connected to the bike after one day it is down to 10.0 volts or around there. The battery is 10 months old. i have a new one on the way. Maybe wednesday. It is under warranty so free. I did drop my bike sitting still and lost half the acid. Refilled with distilled water and charged over night at 1.5 amps. I never had a problem before the drop. So my question is does your bike show any discharge with a digital volt meter connected between the the battery ground and ground?

 

yes

 

bingo you only have half the acid your supposed to have this is the only case where you should have added more acid instead of distilled water.
i think what your seeing is normal but i can not explain why you would have any voltage reading from bike frame ground and a battery neg terminal pull the main fuse and see what happens.
I will try this in the morning to see if I get a reading

@Rooster53 is correct in what he has stated

 

Using a Fluke DMM I measured .15 volts, which would equate to approximately .015 microamps assuming a 10 megohom input impedance for the meter, which is virtually nothing.

As stated earlier, the correct way to check for a parasitic drain on the battery would be to use the current mode. If you connect the meter as you mentioned earlier and place the meter in current mode, you should have a reading of zero. The caution here is don't overload the meter by turning the key on and enabling circuits that would exceed the typical 10 amp rating of the meter.

 

Take the battery to a parts store and see if it's holding a charge.

Gary H.

 

My brand new battery came in the mail today. I already installed it. Fully charged. I will see what happens tomorrow morning. I'm pretty sure my battery's dead. I am hoping I can take it to a parts store drain it and refill with acid and see if that might save it for a spare. Good to know that you are drawing .15 volts. My lowest was .19. So that's not draining the battery.. the battery must be shot..Thank you very much for doing that.

 

OK, the new battery works great. But the bike is charging a little high. 2,000 and above it is charging at 15.1 v0lts. I tried another regulator and there is no difference. Max output is supposed to be 14.8 volts. Any thoughts?

 

this link discribes the charging system and issues
http://www.xjbikes.com/forums/threads/the-ultimate-relay-switch-sensor-and-diodes-guide.27543/

over voltage is considered to be the voltage regulator and your manual
XJ750 manuals
will have the test for the regulator, did you swap used for used? and got the same results?
next step
5) Check the condition of your main circuit terminals.....they should be zestfully clean and uncorroded, or you're primed for a variety of problems......not only will your circuits not be getting full power out of your battery, but to add insult to injury, your charging system may think that the battery needs more juice, and so it starts cranking out amps like there's no tomorrow. It's pretty safe to say that neither of those two occurrences qualify as a Good Thing (tm), so...........start at the beginning, and inspect and clean (and then protect, like with di-electric grease or equivalent) all the [/b] terminal connection points[/b]:

* the positive battery post connection to the positive battery cable.
* the positive battery cable connection to the starter relay (or "solenoid").
* the main harness terminal connector from the starter relay.
* the main lead from the starter relay to the starter motor (both ends).
* the "main fuse" contacts inside the fusebox.
* the battery ground cable contacts at both the engine case and at the negative battery post (poor ground are just as bad as poor positive feeds; after all, it takes two to tango, or to complete a circuit, and electricity doesn't care where the restriction occurs).

 

Sounds like a plan. I have already started to replace the fuse box, not on purpose. I was cleaning the fuse tabs and snap :-( I have a couple different fuse boxes on the way. Experimenting with different ones. I have one that is a 6 way glass type, and 2 different ATC type. I will get started cleaning. I have read a few different ways to mount a new fuse panel. I don't like the idea of removing the document holder. I do have a thought ( brain storm) for mounting it. I will let you know how it goes. I am also in the middle of rebuilding a front fairing.

Thanks...again.

 

I don't know if this worked or not. few pics of the fairing.

 

the atc style does not want to be the kind where all fuses go hot with 1 wire,
nice job your all over the house better not get any paint on the rugs

 

This is one of three i am trying.

 

Two of three

 

Three of three. I do likemthe glass type. Clean and neat and less then a inch tall! Oh, i take the fairing outside to work on. I would hate to ruin the carpet. I painted the whole bike like that.

 

Where did you find these? I had to do some in-line mini fuse holders a few seasons ago to get the bike going.
I would really like to put one of these fuse blocks in to clean up the wiring a bit.
Let me know if you have any links for the 3 fuse blocks you just showed.

 

Good thought on the fuse box, as almost all of these bikes need this done. If after doing this you still have a slightly high voltage at the battery then:

First verify your meter, not sure what you are using but check it compared to another meter or a known value voltage source.

The brown wire at the output of the ignition switch is the "sense" line for the regulator. The voltage at this wire will determine how much excitation is applied to the field coil, and consequently how much voltage is produced by the system. In the troubleshooting section for the voltage regulator, the instructions actually have the measurement done at the brown wire on the Rect/Reg connector rather than across the battery. If there are no losses in the system, then the two should be identical.

So, a slightly high output could be caused by unintended voltage drops in the system that affect the voltage on the brown wire, and the two most likely places for this to occur would be the ignition switch and its connector. Therefore, a cleaning of the ignition switch and inspection of the connector would be in order if you want to pursue it further, although out of spec by .3 volts is not likely to cause an issue.

Ignition switch cleaning:

http://www.xj4ever.com/clean and lube the ignition switch.pdf

 

I can't see the pictures.

Gary H.

 

Gary, I am using Google photo. I think it is not compatible here for the photo's. Dean, The ATC fuse panels i got from Ebay. The glass type from Amazon. I think i saw the ATC type on Amazon also.

 

I have tried 3 different meters. All show the same. Next i will check the voltage Regulator. I did try a different one from a running bike and there was no change in the voltage at the battery, 15.1 volts. I had the ignition switch off the bike 6 months age to replace the locking mechanism that was broke. At that time the switch was in pieces and wiped clean. As i recall it was clean and the contacts looked good. The connectors, i have had them unplugged a half dozen times . i completely rebuilt the gauge cluster and need some tweaking a few times. needless to say i had remove the gauges to work on them at the bench ( kitchen table ).. I will check the connectors for the switch again. I had switched out the bulbs in the dash to LEDS. They burned out after a month or two. Now i know why, to much voltage for them.
The photo's, i guess i will sign up at photo bucket and try again.

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Car-Truck-V...Fuse-Box-Block-Holder-12V-24V-fu/271681142307.
Try this link, it might work.

 

Thanks man!

 

You are welcome!

 

Sounds good, hopefully that means checking the charging voltage at the brown wire at the regulator connector compared to the battery and see if you get a different reading.

 

This one fits under the seat without any modification, and leaves room for the document holder.

 

your connectors look like they are over heating possible bad crimps on the red white wire, red yellow wire, brown wire, yellow wire with 2 leads. and the brown wire leading to the yellow wire in back of the heavy black wire
or is it dielectric grease picking up crud?

 

Yup, today...

 

OMG!! Junk Volt meters. Three meters off .26 volts. 3 of them. Harbor freight junk. I decided to go to my storage space and get my 30 year old Ballantine 3100 just to triple check. Well i am pretty sure the ballantine is right on the money. 4,000 RPMs 14.81 volts. Harbor Freight junk! So all is good. Can't wait till i get my new fuse box. Thank you everyone for the help.

 

Not junk, low resolution

 

the wiring on k-moe's fuse box look like they are waterproof connectors that he forgot to heat shrink or chose not to. I could be wrong.

Gary H.

 

They look like waterproof, heat-shrinkable terminals, but they melt instead of heat-shrinking. Yay for standardization of molds across all product lines? I grabbed the box without looking at the label, and assumed that they were heat-shrinkable based on the shape of the terminal casings.

You can see the heat shrink tubing that I added over the auxilary (far left) circuits after I had already finished the primary harness.

 

Geez..... How many times have I told you" it's ok" !?! Lol

Dave

 

No resolution, I had 2 compression testers from them that where both defective. They stopped at 60 PSI, both of them. I should have known better.

 

testing equipment is where you spend the extra money , Your test equipment is what determines replacing expensive parts. would be a shame to re ring a motor because of a 19$ no name compression tester. Multi meters are the same way if its a 10$ meter it is for ball park measurements if you find your self at the cusp of readings you will want to borrow the better meter It would be wise to be able to test the meter using an assortment of 1% resistors in the range of tests your going to do as well as being able to do a voltage test on a known good power supply.
same with torque wrenches they are good for consistancy of tightening . if you know someone with a high end torque wrench you can test yours on theirs to see how close yours is to spec

 

Normally i buy good tools. I have been a auto mechanic for 35 plus years. I will be testing my old torque wrench. I had the same plan in mind. Most of my tools are snap on or Mac.. I did use a stable power supply to test the meters.

 

Finished the fuse box. Went with glass tube style. 1/8 lower then ATC type of box. I also like the look. All stainless steel with brass screws. 2 extra open circuits if ever needed. I am using the 2 spots for spare fuses.

 

nice setup would you supply the vendor andd/or part number

 

Amazon

Amazon,
DC32V 6 way Glass Tube Fuse Holder Car Auto Circuit Current 6 Fuse box

 

Ships from and sold by Zowaysoon.

 

Hope this helps.