Jump Starting Your Bike - Is It Safe?
By Dave Miller
The answer to this question is YES. I have found that all riders share a common denominator—we all have, at one time or another, had a DEAD BATTERY. It usually seems to happen in the most obnoxious and worst possible places. For those of you who have had this happen from a short or simply leaving the ignition key on Accessory, I’m sure you did not have jumper cables or a battery charger in your saddlebags. So what is a person to do! You can use a battery from an automobile or equivalent; however, there are several precautions to factor in:
By Dave Miller
The answer to this question is YES. I have found that all riders share a common denominator—we all have, at one time or another, had a DEAD BATTERY. It usually seems to happen in the most obnoxious and worst possible places. For those of you who have had this happen from a short or simply leaving the ignition key on Accessory, I’m sure you did not have jumper cables or a battery charger in your saddlebags. So what is a person to do! You can use a battery from an automobile or equivalent; however, there are several precautions to factor in:
- The automobile must never be running if you must use this option. This will destroy the diodes in the voltage regulator/rectifier and this component is expensive.
- Bigger jumper cables are more likely to arc against the frame or other electrical components and this will ruin paint and possibly start a fire.
- Motorcycle batteries use less amperage than batteries such as auto, boat, lawn tractor, etc., so jumping will tend to over-stress the wiring harness and this can damage the harness. Jump a battery only long enough to start the bike.
- Cables must be attached using ONLY the parallel method. Series circuits have not been used for quite some time, and if this is confusing, a simple rule is positive to positive and negative to negative—do not go by the jumper cable color as this can be confusing and do more damage than good.[/SIZE][/FONT]
- Start with both bikes off.
- Clamp the positive (red) booster cable to the positive post (+) of the dead motorcycle battery.
- Clamp the positive (red) booster cable to the positive post (+) of the booster battery.
- Clamp the negative (black) ground cable to the negative post (-) of the booster battery.
- Clamp the negative (black) ground cable to a metal part of the motorcycle away from the battery. For a good ground, you need an unpainted, uncoated, metal part of the bike that isn't rubber mounted - part of the frame, a chassis bolt, or foot peg mount.
- Try to start the dead bike.
- If it doesn't start and you're jumping from another bike (not a car), start the booster bike, let it run, and turn it off. This uses the donors system to put a charge in the dead battery.
- Again, try to start the dead bike.
- When you're done, remove the clamps in the reverse order: Negative from the bike, negative from the booster battery; positive from the booster battery and positive from the bike battery.
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