Its been a busy summer, and I simply have not had the time to work on the bike. I hooked up the battery tender and plugged it in every night. That was generally good for @50 miles. Finally this weekend I was able to get up to Pat's (Dinqua) house and he did some troubleshooting. Ed (Biker) also came over and we spent a few hours going over everything with a fine tooth comb. Finally we used Pat's bike as a doner bike and swapped out the stator. Still the same results and everyone was scratching their head.
Finally Ed started pulling on wires and checking connections and when he pulled on the ground wire, it came off in his hand. It turned out to be just like Friar John's problem earlier this spring, the splice I put in the ground wire when I relocated the battery. The crimp connectors I put on didnt hold up. I had a very poor and/or intermittant ground. Pat did the job right, soldering the connections and shrink wrapping it. Since then its been charging at 14 volts and the lights have not flickered at all. Rode through a full tank of gas and it started up after that with no problem at all. Thank you Pat and Ed!
Its a good lesson learned, and especially usefull for all you people that are doing the battery relocation. When you splice in some wire to extend the ground, do it right and solder it!
