Battery Eliminator Questions

[MrStalePretzel]

I've been looking at several battery eliminator setups for my 2000 Bullet Classic, and all the ads seem to use the term "FOR MAGNETO AND GENERATOR ELECTRICAL SYSTEMS ONLY". Now i can adjust and maintain alot of things when it comes to the bike world, but i've never been a big electrical buff. I probably couldn't wire a lightswitch correctly. Does the 2000 bullet classic have a magneto or generator electrical system on it? I'm sort of embarrassed to post this here, because i'm afraid it's a very stupid question.

[ERC]

Your's should have a distributor and an alternator. ERC

[barenekd]

A mag or generator can generate their own electricity. An alternator needs a battery to get the generation cycle going. Battery eliminators do not work well with alternators. You will have one miserable starting bike trying them.
Bare

[motomataya]

Your bike has a permanent magnet Alt. not a field coil. So like a generator it will generate without battery voltage. Should work???

[ERC]

Motos right you could put an eliminator on it but could be hard to start. Easier if you use a battery with the distributor in place.  ERC

[t120rbullet]

Being that yours has the AC headlight the DC side of your alternator will be a bit on the weak side for battery less operation.
You don't really need a "Battery Eliminator" all you need is a 20/40 volt electrolytic capacitor of about 5000 uFd and wire it in place of the battery. Paying close attention to the polarity of the cap.
You also need to be able to turn off all lights and anything that will drain the cap while your starting the bike.
After all that you'll be rewarded with a bike that the lights flicker at low speed, poor starting and the added bonus of if the motor stalls at night your sitting in the road with no lights waiting for the next cell phoney to mow you down in your prime.
Yea, I'm a big fan of running a battery on a street bike.
CJ

 

[AgentX]

I'm running the Boyer Powerbox.  Would have been much cheaper to wire in a cap as T120 says, but this is a neat, compact solution.

Bike starts and runs batteryless, but lights flicker at low RPM and it likes to die at idle.  (I run all-DC wiring.) It's a great backup to have, and has enabled me to get home one day when I blew a fuse, but I still run a smaller dry cell battery because there's no real drawback to doing so.

Edit:  Bike's not that hard to start, either--haven't much noticed a difference with or without battery, hot or cold.  Spark seems to be spark seems to be spark.

[The_Rigger]

Bike starts and runs batteryless, but lights flicker at low RPM and it likes to die at idle.

I've been looking at this for ten minutes, and I can't for the life of me figure out why this would be an advantage over just having a battery.  Surely the wet cell doesn't weigh that much...

[Arizoni]

I would think that rather than frinkling around with trying to delete the battery it would be easier to just replace the big, old fashioned wet cell with one of the little sealed batteries.
Some of them are very small and could be hidden under the seat, out of sight if that was the goal.  A little 12v, 4AH battery might be the ticket.

[Ducati Scotty]

I would think that rather than frinkling around with trying to delete the battery it would be easier to just replace the big, old fashioned wet cell with one of the little sealed batteries.
Some of them are very small and could be hidden under the seat, out of sight if that was the goal.  A little 12v, 4AH battery might be the ticket.

+1.  If you don't need enough juice to run a starter almost any of the new tiny batteries would provide all the advantages of having a battery be smaller than a coffee cup.

Scott

[AgentX]

It's a great backup to have, and has enabled me to get home one day when I blew a fuse, but I still run a smaller dry cell battery because there's no real drawback to doing so.

Yep.


I think the real attraction to batteryless operation is aesthetics.  Not just visual, but visceral.  Just like many people (me included) wear an archaic auto-winder watch when a quality quartz keeps time better and overall requires less maintenance. 

A new watch battery is something you can pop in yourself if you have to every few years, or takes a jewler just a minute to do...a regular, required servicing of an auto watch?  A week or more in the shop doing very expensive labor, at an interval possibly more frequent than a battery!  But there's still something cool about having something in this day and age that doesn't need a disposable battery, however less-practical the option.

Again, me?  I run a battery on my bike.

[RGT]

I ran the Boyer powerbox on my bike as well, it started fine without a battery, my bike did not have the dedicated ac circuit for the headlights as some bikes so my lights dimmed quite a bit at stop signs, the bike idled erratically and died once in a while too(as experienced by Agent X) but why I put a battery back in, smaller and in the tool box, was because I did not like the idea of being on the side of the road in the dark with no lights if the bike died...

[Scottie J]

I have the Sparx battery eliminator on my Indian and it works fine.  I do get the low RPM flicker as well, but I guess that's just to be expected.  Though, I am installing a 4-BS battery on my bike because I'm converting to the electronic ignition and need power for the ignition to work while the engine isn't running.  The 4-BS batteries are basically the smallest battery you can buy.  And, because of their size, they are fairly inexpensive and easy to hide if needed.

But, as far as why battery eliminators are getting so popular, I believe it's due to the bobber and cafe bike scenes.  Most guys building these kind of bikes are building them from bikes that aren't running and have been sitting.  Installing a battery eliminator on one of these projects is a cheap way to finish off the electrical.

Scottie

[barenekd]

My experience with the old Nortless that came with a battery eliminator was a PITA to start. I changed to a Boyer ignition and had to install a battery. I put a very small one between the rear motor mount bracket plates where it was virtually invisible. It turned the bike into a 1 or 2 kick starter. The lights were much better, too. I wouldn't go back to a battery eliminator for anything.
Bare 

[ERC]

Bare is correct on that, more than a PITA.  ERC