Charging issue

[Screwloose]

Has anyone noticed that if you connect a trickle charger to a flat battery, you can fry the trickle charger (over 20 years I've fried 2 CTek trickle chargers on flat dud batteries) . In my view you would need to consider how robust the charging system on the VMax is before trying to get the actual bike to charge a flat battery. I wouldn't chance it without knowing more about this.

I keep one of the old chargers that you can put +Ve to -Ve on the contacts and check if it's sparking, then connect it to the battery, I.E. one of the old robust units for dud batteries. Plus new style (eco) batteries in allot of cases do not want to recover after being completely dud.

 

[Fire-medic]

I've read articles and posts on the old chargers vs the 'new' chargers, and info about the lead/acid, AGM, and Li-ion batteries for motorized equipment of one sort or another. Apparently the Li-ion batteries need to have a certain level of partial charge to accept the re-charge. If the residual Li-ion battery charge is below this then the 'smart' battery charger will not allow the charging to initiate. Supposedly there is a way to bring up to above that threshold the depleted battery, and then once that is reached, the battery accepts a charge from a 'smart' charger. I don't recall what type of charger it was where the internet pundits used it to charge the Li-ion depleted battery. Using a charger not rated for a certain type of battery sounds like a recipe for potential disaster: overheating, a fire, an explosion, dogs and cats living together, I dunno.

I have a couple of vintage 'old-style' battery chargers, one is well-over 50 years-old and it still works fine. I also have Battery Tenders of various sizes and capacities, those are rated for Li-ion batteries, and that's what I use on my Li-ions.

The old-style battery chargers are useful for electrolysis like rust removal in gas tanks. When the leads are connected to the anode & cathode and it's plugged-in the bubbling starts in the electrolyte.

 

[hsjosh]

dogs and cats living together

Complete chaos....

 

[MaxMidnight]

Unless I'm my memory is failing, I'm certain of seeing old footage of motorcycle race starts that show the bikes all lined up, the racers running up to them, then pushing them to bump start and then leaping on to them, presumably done as there was no battery/starter or kickstart (to save weight).

Your memory is good - common practice before the 'modern era' of motorcycles. An example here @ 7m 50 secs.

 

[02GF74]

Not quite what I had in mind, it was a case of the bikes lined up along the side of the track and the riders having sprint to reach them followed by bump starting them.

 

[hsjosh]

Not quite what I had in mind, it was a case of the bikes lined up along the side of the track and the riders having sprint to reach them followed by bump starting them.

I raced hare scrambles for years....they still start like that for some events (Except you can kick start a dirtbike, but same idea)

 

[MaxMidnight]

Not quite what I had in mind, it was a case of the bikes lined up along the side of the track and the riders having sprint to reach them followed by bump starting them.

Oh, you mean like this or this?