Hey guys, I have tried to search... but couldn't find an answer. I just bought this bike ('99 F4) for a decent deal and now I'm having hesitation issues. The battery also seems to be close to shot. I use jumper cables, connecting them to the car and the other to the bike. Bike starts up right away and idles fine. After I take the cables off, the bike dies after about 5 minutes. Once it dies, it doesn't start up unless I hook it up to the car's battery again. I also started it up and tried riding it around (thinking it might charge the battery)... but as soon as I come to a stop, the bike dies. The bike also hesitates like crap, and some times doesn't even let me get higher than 7k rpms.
Could this all be because of a dead battery? Would a bike hesitate like that because it's not getting enough power from the battery or is this something else? I have cleaned carbs andthe intake filter... what else should I check for?? Spark plugs, wires? If it's just a battery issue, that would save me a lot of hassle. Thanks for any help.

Igor

 

Everything you mentioned could be caused by a shot battery. Probably a good bet and a good place to start anyhow.

 

Anyone else? It's almost hard to believe that a dead battery would cause that much hesitation.

 

sounds like a dead battery.. but first check the connections and terminals on the battery. Sometimes if there loose they will immediately kill the bike. It will die if it doesn't have a good voltage on the battery. IMO that is your cheapest thing to check! What does it sound like when you try and start it up?... have you trickle charged your bat?

 

sounds like the battery to me

 

def. get a new battery

 

Thanks for all the help guys. I'm charging up the battery overnight. I will check it later tomorrow with a multimeter and see if that's really what's wrong. The connections and terminals are pretty good, I have checked that. When I try and start it up, it doesn't sound like anything. I only hear a loud "tick" from behind the battery, the bike doesn't even crank over but the gauges stay lit. The headlight dims pretty bad though... so I'm sure it's the battery... or a stator. I just wasn't sure if it could cause THAT much hesitation while riding... wow.

 

OK, last night I left the battery to charge overnight. I checked the battery today (after it was fully charged) and it was at 12.83V. I started up the bike and checked it again, it was down to 12.26V... after about 15minutes of just running the bike on idle, it has dropped to 11.71V. Do you guysthink it's the stator that's just not charging the battery? Or is it normal for a battery to drop below 12V while the bike is running?

BTW, it seemed to run a whole lot better!

 

Check your regulator, all bikes have crappy regulators or it might even be the alternator itself. 12.83v is kinda iffy, a good battery should be 13.0 - 13.2v. It wouldn't hurt to change your battery, but I'd check the atlernator and rectifier just to be sure, it wouldn't hurt to know thier condition if you just bought the bike.

 

mine ran like shiat because of a battery...the stator was overworking itself, which means the engine has to work harder as well..

a new battery fixed my problem. Try running some seafoam in the gas tank once you get a new battery too.