Battery problem.

[turbo_billy]

Hi all,
Sun shining so time to take the SP for a spin.......or so I thought! Wheeled it out of the garage, pressed the button on the key fob and nothing. Thought that the batteries in the fob were dead but Sunday, no spares and no way to start the bike
Luckily, the "Legends" SP worked just fine
Anyway, after getting home, thought I would take a look and in fact it turns out that the main bike battery is flat as pancake. Now, bike has not been used for about a month and started just fine at that time and this is the 2nd battery that has gone flat on the red SP.
So, two questions really.
One, I have no accessories fitted to the bike, only the Honda immobiliser, so what could be drawing the current and flattening the battery?
Two, in case it is anything to do with the immobiliser, does anyone know how to remove this from the bike without messing anything else up?
If I didn`t have another bike to go play on today I would have been well pi**ed off so would like to avoid anything like this in the future.
Any thoughts/help appreciated.
Cheers
Tim

[Sppete]

TB Said

I have no accessories fitted to the bike, only the Honda immobiliser,

I think you've answered your own question there.
Earlier this summer I helped remove a Honda fitted immobiliser off big Bros Viffer. It was doing all sorts of naughty stuff and running the battery flat at will.
From my experience they are never fit very well and suffer from wet or condensation problems over time. If you are only having a problem with the battery going flat, I'd suggest fitting an Optimate or similar battery maintenance charger. The batteries are pretty small and don't have much extra capacity in them to start with, especially over the winter. If you are starting to experience any other problems, I'd just remove it. You can normally just follow the wire back and snip the cables. You might have to unwind a bit of loom and resolder the odd cable but it's pretty self explanatory when you get there.

Pete

[sparkysp2]

My datatool alarm draws 0.2amps a day so always keep mine on the optimate never have any problems even after a cold winter

[Unnerving]

Hi Billy,
I think someone else was thinking of ripping out his alarm, must admit they do nothing but cause me grief. I've jotted down a few notes just in case you're interested.

You’ll either be able to brush up on your soldering skills if you have a soldering iron and solder, or if you are a non-believer, you could crimp the two original wires that you will need to re-join. That's right there are only two wires in the original loom that you need to re-join. You may also choose between electrical insulating tape or heat-shrink.
1. Put alarm in service mode (Datatool; ignition on, press and hold small button for 2 seconds, ignition off).

2. Take off the seats and the rear fairing.

3. Locate the alarm unit and by unwinding the added black tape, follow it’s wiring to the various points in the bike’s wiring loom. The joints will probably be taped or shrink wrapped; about 12 thin black wires in all, although the alarm may have others that are unused.

4. Most of the wires just join on to one of the bike’s existing continuous wires: to enable the alarm to trigger the indicators etc. e.g.: -
a. Each indicator side will have a wire leading to it.
b. Two earth wires, usually each going to a different point on the chassis.
c. One wire goes to a permanent +12v and may have an inline fuse.
d. One wire, probably not fused, goes to a +12v that is switched by the ignition. In each case, snip the thin black alarm wire from the join, and seal the loom with tape.
e. Remove the ‘tamper detect’ micro switch and its two wires.
f. Locate and remove the LED alarm status lamp and its two wires.

5. Only two of the original wires in the bike’s loom will have been cut, usually the one feeding the starter relay and one feeding one of the relays (angle, motion, fuel pump) in the engine kill switch function. Each of the two ends of the cut wire will be soldered to a thin black alarm wire.
a. You’ll need to rejoin each of these two original bike loom wires; they will be colour coded so as to be easily identifiable.
b. Locate the two ends of the original pairs of wires, and work out how you’ll rejoin them. E.g. Unsolder one joint, and with the other relevant thin black wire, cut it so that it will be long enough to reconnect the loom. Do them one pair at a time to avoid confusion. Heat-shrink or tape each joint.
6. Remove the whole alarm unit.
7. Replace your plastic and seat units.

The alarm removal, after having removed the tail fairing and up to the replacing of the seats will take about half an hour, including the tidying up of the loom. Only if you are colour blind and fear mixing up the two bike loom wires should you pay £100 for someone else to rip out your alarm.
Mind you, that's easy for me to say, I can still remember which is the hot end of a soldering iron. Anyway, worth a shot, what do you think?

[turbo_billy]

Thanks for the info Unnerving. I`d forgotten about this post to be honest, just make sure the bike goes back on the optimiser after a ride.
Have printed the info out so will go and have a look at the weekend. And as for paying £100, I`m lucky enough to have a mate who`s quite the whizz when it comes to wiring

[5parkyuk]

I removed the alarm off mine in 15 minutes.
2 kill circuits (4 wires), easily traceable .
Simply repair the breaks in the loom and heat shrink.
Im a Sparky ,but it wasn't difficult.

[cheekykev]

In my opinion alarms are nothing but trouble get rid of it
If you don't already know, here's a little tip about your dead battery, If it's gone too far and the battery won't charge and the charger doesn't even recognise there's a battery there, try coupling it up to your car or another battery for a an hour or so, this should make the batteries even out and trickle some life back into it, the result should be when you put it back on the charger it recognise there is a battery and then charges it up as normal. worth a try before you fork out for another one

[turbo_billy]

Cheers for the replies. Since the original post in August, I stuck the battery onto the optimate and, even though it took a while, it managed to recover and is still in the bike now. Works fine, I just make sure it goes back on the optimate after each ride (Not many of those at the moment..... )
I will get round to having a look at the wiring and ultimately the alarm/immobiliser will be removed.

[Sppete]

Give us a shout if you get stuck. I can always pop up with my iron and some heat shrink.
It's amazing how cheep I'll work if there's a cup of tea and a biscuit involved

Pete

[turbo_billy]

Give us a shout if you get stuck. I can always pop up with my iron and some heat shrink.
It's amazing how cheep I'll work if there's a cup of tea and a biscuit involved

Pete

Cheers Pete.