Got Gas, Turn key on and BAM ! Nothing

[Greenham]

So today after work I stopped to get gas, Filled up mounted the old steed turned the key and "CLICK" then NOTHING... I mean NOTHING no lights, no indicators NOTHING... I pushed it to the side of the parking lot and commenced the diagnosis. When turning the key off the tach and speedo needle would cycle. If I waited a few min I could repeat the process all with the same result.

It couldn't be the battery, Last August I looked and read all the reviews on here for what battery to buy. I settled on the Yuasa YUAM624B4 YT14B-BS Battery from Amazon.

Took the dash apart looking for a blown fuse etc.... If I waited a few min I could get the dash to light up. I'd hit the starter button and a click and NOTHING...

As luck would have it, the gas station I broke down at was across the street from a Batteries plus.. with no other options I took the battery out and walked across the street. Thinking this battery is less than a year old It couldn't possibly be the battery.

At Barreries plus the kid hooked it to the multi-meter and 11.5 volts.... He said well it has good voltage. He checked the CCA on his store computer and said it's rated at 200 CCA. He then set it up on his stress tester and BAM it dropped to 10 volts.

$91 later I dropped in a new battery and zoom. It started right up.....

So even though I bought the ORIGINAL Yuasa it lasted 9 months and 4,000 miles. I packed all the panels into the truck and rode it home.

All in all it sucked my previous $90 battery investment should have lasted a LOT longer. BUT

• It happened in a well populated area at a Sheetz gas station 1 mile from the office. I could leave my tools, helmet etc unattended and not worry about them.
• The weather couldn't have been nicer in NC. Sunny, warm not hot and a nice breeze with no humidity
• And to top it off it was across the street from a batteries plus

Not my idea of a good time. I am thankful it went down the way it did.

 

[Jer]

Is there a warranty on the battery. I traded my 07 FJR in on a new 2013 and it still had the original battery. I did keep it on a battery maintainer when sitting for more than a couple days.

 

[Mudslide Miller]

You would think. Most batteries have a 2 year free replacement warranty before they start prorating them.

 

[rogdeb]

What happened to the "good old days" when batteries would die slowly

--- yeah, I know

 

[eflyguy]

Could just be a random failure. Not really typical of the brand, but many are happy with cheaper replacements.

 

[Greenham]

Yeah, just goes to show..... You read, research, read some more and still get a crappy battery.

Had a friend who used to say...

Eat healthy, Stay fit, Die anyway !!!

 

[TomInPA]

I would bet the connections were loose or dirty. How many ring terminals are connected to the posts? I'm replacing a cheap cheap Chrome battery I bought for $36 2-years ago, but I didn't expect it to last. It still shows 12.9-13.1 volts so but struggles to crank when the fan is on so the cranking amps is going away. Sudden failure is pretty rare.

A lot of us run volt meters on the bike to check the status of the charging system and battery. Might be a good investment to avoid surprises.

 

[Hudson]

Also, did you have it on a tender (a good one, with desuphate mode?) over the winter? Or did it sit for a long time? This happened with my KTM 1190R - battery was 2 years old, 3000 miles of riding, forgot to turn off an accessory and it drained over a week period (while it was disconnected from the tender). Dead as a doornail and even an 8amp charger wouldn't bring it back to life.

 

[Mihalis fjr]

I had exactly the same symptoms with a Yuasa in my xtz 750 after a stop.But the battery was three+ years old.The problem caused by a broken item inside the battery.I don't know how it happened that after a stop..I always use Yuasa batteries in that bike but first time happened that.

 

[Bill Lumberg]

Great outlook. The suck could have sucked much harder. Frankly, when a battery is going bad, many random and troubling symptoms can pop up that can be hard to figure out. Sometimes straightforward failure (though premature in this case) is a blessing in disguise...

 

[Greenham]

I ride year round. I put a REAL BATTERY TENDER on the day I bought the Yuasa. Each day when the ride was done I'd plug it in. This was a failure in the battery not lack of maintenance.

I didn't even check on a warranty. When you are on the side of the road DEAD things like that aren't that important. I took the savings in the core charge.

I did have the battery tender and the aux fuse box connected to the battery. I thought that was perhaps the source of the trouble and removed all "additional loads" from the battery when it wouldn't start. So it wasn't a connection problem.

It was a defective battery.

 

[Bill Lumberg]

Makes me thankful I can ride as much as I do. My FJR, and the RT that it replaced, have never had a battery tender or charger attached. Not even for a minute.

 

[Fred W]

The testing the guy did at the Batteries Plus store was incomplete. A battery with 11.5V charge is not "OK". You can't load test a nearly fully discharged battery. You have to charge the battery fully, see if it will even take a charge, and only then can you check the battery's capacity. You'd have thought that a Batteries Plus employee would have known that.

After you installed the new battery did you check the charging voltage (after it started the bike)? Your problem may still be there or. as Tomin PA mentioned, it may have been loose or otherwise bad connections to the old battery. Hopefully it was the latter, otherwise you may be in the same predicament later today or tomorrow,

Sure, it could also have been a defective battery. I'd just want to have diagnosed that a little more thoroughly.

 

[RossKean]

Sometimes you get a bad one but, for the most part, the Yuasa's have a pretty good record.

I still have the OEM in my '07 with 150,000 mi. I never use a battery tender; just top-up charge once or twice during a four month winter layoff. Bike gets well used in warmer months.

 

[Gmann]

As I understand it the OEM Yuasa batteries are made in Japan. The replacement Yuasa batteries we buy here in North America are made in the Unites States. My OEM on my 06 lasted 7 years 60,000K's. Only replaced it because of age not performance. Replaced it with a battery from Sask Battery (Canada). They told me it was a Yuasa but branded under another name. FWIW.

 

[Harald]

If you have the same problem reoccur, you may have a failing starter relay. The click you heard was probably the starter relay and low voltage could cause it to not fully engage the main contacts and therefore no current to the starter motor. But as I have personally experienced, the relay could be bad. It's easy enough to troubleshoot with a volt meter if the problem reoccurs.

 

[Fred W]

Faulty starter relay would not result in low voltage at the battery. It is either the charging system or the battery.

And Gman is correct. The OEM battery is not a Yuasa. It is a GS Yuasa (entirely different company)