deilenberger wrote:Knocking on maple grained formica(tm)..
I have never used a charger on the R1200R - and it's at 28,000 miles and change today on the original battery. It has rarely sat for more than a week without riding - but a few longer car vacations did leave it for a few weeks. I probably have, and use more electronic farkles than the average bear (lights, heated gear, heated butt, more lights and more.. GPS, etc..)
I think the charging system on the bike is more than adequate - if you have problems with the battery discharging you have a bad battery.
YMMV as may your battery..
(At MOA rally in TN - 748.9 miles from my door.. I had figured 750. Almost all back roads. Found some WONDERFUL roads in VA - Rt 42 - parallels 81, then Saltworks Road and Old Saltworks Road.. just heaven! Make Rt 100 in VT look like the overrated road it is.)
Totally agree that if you ride your bike every month or so a charger probably is not needed. I use the trickle charger mostly during the winter months when a bike may sit for three months without being ridden. A battery becoming discharged is what causes it to fail or lose life.
What I am not sure about is whether the claims of getting seven our eight years out of a battery are true if a tender is used. I never keep stuff that long. My tractor will be the true test.
There is also a big differnece between bikes in heated garages vs. outside bikes. Batteries discharge a lot quicker outside.
My buddy who puts less than 40 miles a year on his Soft Tail Classic needs a new battery every couple years. When he goes to ride it is often discharged so he uses a car charger to get it going. That is the best way to kill a bettery IMHO.
We had some cooler nights here lately. I'm not sure if it's the overly concerned owner, but I have a feeling the bike doesn't turn over as strong in the morning after standing 2-3 nights. Mind you, it always does start though.
Anyways, I thought I connect my battery tender to the aux outlet, but that apparently doesn't work. The aux outlet appears to be switched, preventing the charger to establish the connection. I bought an adapter cable that was touted to allow using the battery tender on the aux outlet.
Is it my charger? I think to remember having read that the BMW charger will work when connected to the aux outlet.
At any rate, if my battery was indeed on the way out, can this high compression engine be started by pushing in case of an emergency?
You may be able to push it, but it won't start without battery power to fire the fuel injectors. On the bright side, your quads would get a bitchin' workout...
Boy you guys are scaring me too. I have a 2007 R12R with an mfg date of 9/06. I've used a battery tender on it 4 or 5 times when it sat while on vacation or whatever. Other than that my bike hasn't shown a hint of problems. I direct wired the battery tender hookup and when hooked up it turns "green" within 30 mins. Like many other posts here I hate to fix something not broken but appreciate the "sudden death" of these batteries.
I finally got got an RT!
'11 R1200R Classic, '07 R12R, '99 R1100R. Gone but not forgotten
I don't think this is a situation of sudden death. It just sometimes doesn't start as strong. I hooked it up to the battery tender, and it was full after 30 minutes. It might all just be in the imagination of the imaginer.
I had to clamp the charger directly to the battery posts. So what about the aux outlet? Did I waste my money on the adapter? I assume it has to do with the canbus. The aux outlet only shows 0.25V when the ignition is off. There is clearly some kind of switched circuit at play.
