think my battery is dead after the winter. left it in there

[dannylightning]

so i charged it up, it cranks a few times than starts cranking slower and slower till it will crank no more, what a bummer. first nice day we have had in months, i at least wanted to take it around the block a few times today. probably better off, my tags are expired. thursday is going to be up to about 60 degrees, got to get a new battery by than and renew my tags, and the best part about that is i should have the day off thursday.

[alanmcorcoran]

It might not be. I'd try charging it up before I gave up on it. Also, as many other threads cover, you should be able to start it up with a near dead battery by coasting downhill and popping the clutch. (I figure if I can do it, it can't be that difficult.) I've run both of my batteries completely down (due to stupidity) and successfully recharged them (the GZ twice!) and they still start the bike a year later. Eventually I'm sure I'll have to buy new ones, but a year is a year.

[patrick_777]

Like Alan, I doubt you need a new battery. Charge it, or push-start and ride it for 20-25 minutes straight at speed (no turning it off to go into a store) and go back home. It should fire back up right away.

Look into buying a battery tender. Especially when you know you're not going to ride for a while.

I have two of these and alternate my non-riding bikes on them weekly. Never had a problem.

Battery Tender Jr.

Look around at different parts sites...sometimes you can get lucky and find one on sale.

[blaine]

If not a BATTERY-TENDER any 2 amp charger will work fine.

[patrick_777]

True, but Tenders will turn themselves off when the battery is fully charged.

[Water Warrior 2]

:2tup: Yup, the Tender is an electronic babysitter for your battery.

[dannylightning]

i should get one of those, i left it charge for a while last night and it looked like it charged up. last time i had to charge it, after putting in my jet kit it was hard to start till i got the gas back in the carb and i ran the battery dead, it only took about 20 min to charge. but after setting so long it seems that it needed a longer charge. when it gets warm out today ill try to fire it up and see what happens.
for it.

i should get a tender, one of my friends uses one on his bike.

[alantf]

Originally Posted by dannylightning

i ran the battery dead, it only took about 20 min to charge.

???????????????? What charging rate did you use? This seems very quick for charging up a flat battery if you used the correct charging rate. Don't forget that you can harm the battery by charging at too high a rate. :jo:

[blaine]

I have a MOTOMASTER 2 amp charger.It goes on "float" mode at 95% to keep battery toped up.As do several other brands.

[Easy Rider]

Originally Posted by blaine

If not a BATTERY-TENDER any 2 amp charger will work fine.

Originally Posted by patrick_777

True, but Tenders will turn themselves off when the battery is fully charged.

Well, it is NOT true that a plain low capacity charger is OK for continuous use during storage. It has no automatic function and will try to keep the voltage ABOVE the fully charged level. This is not good.

If you DO use a non-automatic charger, it should only be for 12 hours or so, once a month.

The objective is to keep the battery fully charged. Exactly how you accomplish that isn't really important........except that too much charge can be as bad as too little.