Having some electric gremlins that I am trying to sort out on my Hawk.
She came to me with some PO hacked mods that I need to figure out.
To start, I am trying to use a Shorai battery.
She had her Silenium Rectifier which I have replaced with a unit from Oregon Motorcycle Parts. Looking at the original rectifier, it had a lot of melted black gook, which I am assuming was the insulating material.
The bike ran well, but the battery was not charging, hence the replacement. No problems with installing the new rectifier, good grounds, and now the battery maintains a charge after riding. I left it an hour or so after riding with the headlights and taillight on, and the multimeter showed the battery at 12.8 Amps.
The problem is that my starter will not work with the battery. If I use a “battery” type starter, the starter work great, but not with the Shorai.
So let’s look at what is installed on the bike and see if you can make sense of what they are for.
In the Headlight Bucket, there is a push button switch drilled into the lower side of the bucket:
The switch is acting as a breaker on the Red wire, which controls the Main (High) Beam of the Headlight. Here are the connections:
If I put the switch into the Dimmer (low) position, the engine cuts out. This happens whether the headlight is switched on or off by the hacked in switch. I am assuming the PO was looking for an ignition kill switch, but I am not sure what he was trying to accomplish…
I was thinking if I just bypassed this switch, it would stop shutting the bike down, but since it occurs in both positions of the switch, I am not sure that is the case…
Also, there is what looks to be a combo Voltage Regulator/Rectifier already on the bike, but I am not sure. Can anyone ID this?
Any advice is greatly appreciated. The bike runs great, but I would love to have my electric leg back!
Gersh