25 degrees F Chattanooga today and three year old battery

25F this AM---my bike 2013 left over---battery is 3 years old.

Background: on bikes I keep I get up to five years use/life use when bike is used daily.

As SilverWing has no kick or push start possibilities, battery start very important.

This morning slow turn over, but started quickly. Temp? or battery nearing end of service life? I do not have or use battery tender and bike in daily use, including today.

Important: I will watch cold start up performance and will plan on battery replacement as I hate walking. Only replacement for me, Battery from local Honda Dealer....saving a few cents on finding at another place does not make sense to me......using dealer keeps him in business and available to me when I need their help/service
in emergency.

Riding today.....buy another Power Ball ticket.

Hi John,
I put a Battery Tender Lithium Ion battery in mine last season. It's lots smaller and weighs 1.75 Lbs with 240 Cranking Amps. It cost me around $100 from Amazon dot com. I also have a Battery Tender charger and put it on about once a month during our winter. It comes with self-stick dense foam spacers to take up all the empty space. I haven't had any problems with it. It also has two + and - posts so you can hook up any accessories if you want.

Sounds good Dale but sounds like John will get his from the dealer in any case. My battery will be 4 in May, but is still doing fine. I do put it on charger if I am going to be gone for a time though. Probably on the downhill slide so will keep an eye on it.

john grinsel wrote:

25F this AM---my bike 2013 left over---battery is 3 years old.

Background: on bikes I keep I get up to five years use/life use when bike  is used daily.

As SilverWing has no kick or push start possibilities, battery start very important.

This morning slow turn over, but started quickly.  Temp? or battery nearing end of service life?  I do not have or use battery tender and bike in daily use, including today.

Important:  I will watch cold start up performance and will plan on battery replacement as I hate walking.   Only replacement for me, Battery from local Honda Dealer....saving a few cents on finding at another place does not make sense to me......using dealer keeps him in business and available to me when I need their help/service
in emergency.

Riding today.....buy another Power Ball ticket.

My Silver Wings battery is five years old and works fine, it's always connected up to an Optimate 3 when it's in my garage. I've used one on all my previous motorcycles and maxi scooters since I first bought an Optimate in the early Nineties.

In fact my old US import Helix that I bought from new still had the original battery in it when I rode it up to Scotland to trade it in for a Majesty eight years later.

Of course with a UK spec Silver Wing I just plug the Optimate straight into the 12v socket in the glovebox, but it's a simple job to connect the leads with it's waterproof plug to the battery terminals.

As for saying you hate walking or usually "walking sucks”, don't we old boys all need a bit of regular exercise mate, whether it's walking, cycling, playing golf, gardening, or going to the gym etc. to stop seizing up. Even the blokes with the knackered knees!

After a month off for a South East Asia cruise and Christmas and New Year, I'm back to regular early morning gym sessions to shift the extra pounds I gained. Walking into town or pedalling a few miles on my push bike regularly is more beneficial to me than going out aimlessly clocking up miles without purpose on my Silver Wing.

I spent 17 of20 years in the Air Force----standing up 8 hours day----plus 2 years on US CISM Biathalon team with 50k events. I get paid for bad knees by VA----remain in good shape, but do not go out of my way to exercise----if I lived in different place would be often alpine skiing.

Knees work fine if I don't think about them----walking still sucks to me....or bike/scooter quits running.

As I ride my bike or bikes see no need for battery tenders----people do not do that with cars that are in regular use.

This AM priced SilverWing batteries,at local Honda Dealer, $58 for aftermarket, $138 for Genuine Honda part number battery. Should I need one, will go with aftermarket....as I do not want to keep this SilverWing very long.

As bike has been used around town----ran some highway miles today, to make sure battery got fully charged.Trip was to Dr.

I recently read a post from a rider who installed a lithium battery. Lighter, smaller and just as powerful as an OEM. I have an OEM battery only about 6 months old, but I plan to replace it with a lithium when the time comes.

Hi Kenjj50,

That was probably me with the lithium battery. I put it in last spring and also have a Battery Tender Jr charger that I put on about once a month to maintain it. The SWing does draw a small bit of juice just sitting due to keeping the computer, or whatever you want to call it, active. In Minnesota we don't/can't do a lot of riding during the winter months, probably similar to where you live.

I also have this battery in my 1974 Honda CB750 and it cranks that over very nicely. I don't have to keep that battery maintained due to the 750 not drawing any power when shut off.

I put my SWing on the maintainer today and the green and yellow lights came on. Usually this means a problem with the battery. Need to use the scoot tomorrow and it hasn't been driven in a couple of weeks hence the charge. Guess we shall see? If it won't start, will have to use the big Wing. Maybe time to shop for a new battery...

interesting, on my Schumacher unit, the green and yellow will light at the same time if the battery is close to fully charged, but not quite there

Art wrote:

interesting, on my Schumacher unit, the green and yellow will light at the same time if the battery is close to fully charged, but not quite there

Perhaps this is my answer. Some chargers though error out in this manner. Anyway, I ran the scoot and put nearly 100 miles on it. It occurred to me that I hadn't checked the battery connections since installing the maintainer pigtail (nearly 4 years ago). Checked and re-tightened the battery connections and put it back on charge. It went to yellow for charging then to green for full. Perhaps it was loose and I dodged a bullet. I will keep an eye on it for a while!!!