Electrical Farkles, when is it too much for the bike/battery?

madman4049

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First off sorry if this is posted elsewhere I did use the search and browsed a while. I have been farkling pretty heavy over the last 6 months and plan to do quite a bit more. So it dawned on me that a lot of what I want to do/have done is electrical, first and foremost I have everything going to a PDM60 with a timed start so there is no drain while trying to crank the engine. Below is a list of what I have done and what I still plan to do. How do I tell when I've got too much shit running and the bike/battery can't keep up especially since I'm sure some of the manufacturers claims are probably fluffed a bit? I'd hate to get stranded somewhere due to too many things running at once.

PDM60 - installed
Oxford Heated grips - installed
Lightech integrated LED turn signals w/running lights all 4 - installed probably way better than incandescent on draw
Phone charging cable - installed in OEM 12v cig lighter in dash
Usb charging cable routed to tank bag - installed, typically charges girlfriends phone or black diamond lantern or cardo while eating or stopped.
Denali D4 2.0 - not yet installed says 6.6A
Givi V47 with brake lighting kit - installed
Supabrake 3 brake modulator - installed
Heated seat - plan on at minimum riders seat maybe pillion too. - not yet installed
Garmin Montana in charger - not yet installed no idea on draw guessing 2A
Heated jacket plug - not installed no idea on draw
Innov dual dash cam - not installed, live in Louisiana people drive like idiots however this is the most sacrificial item on this list.

Thanks for your input.
 

Juan

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First off sorry if this is posted elsewhere I did use the search and browsed a while. I have been farkling pretty heavy over the last 6 months and plan to do quite a bit more. So it dawned on me that a lot of what I want to do/have done is electrical, first and foremost I have everything going to a PDM60 with a timed start so there is no drain while trying to crank the engine. Below is a list of what I have done and what I still plan to do. How do I tell when I've got too much shit running and the bike/battery can't keep up especially since I'm sure some of the manufacturers claims are probably fluffed a bit? I'd hate to get stranded somewhere due to too many things running at once.

PDM60 - installed
Oxford Heated grips - installed
Lightech integrated LED turn signals w/running lights all 4 - installed probably way better than incandescent on draw
Phone charging cable - installed in OEM 12v cig lighter in dash
Usb charging cable routed to tank bag - installed, typically charges girlfriends phone or black diamond lantern or cardo while eating or stopped.
Denali D4 2.0 - not yet installed says 6.6A
Givi V47 with brake lighting kit - installed
Supabrake 3 brake modulator - installed
Heated seat - plan on at minimum riders seat maybe pillion too. - not yet installed
Garmin Montana in charger - not yet installed no idea on draw guessing 2A
Heated jacket plug - not installed no idea on draw
Innov dual dash cam - not installed, live in Louisiana people drive like idiots however this is the most sacrificial item on this list.

Thanks for your input.
The heated grips are catered for by the electric system of the bike.
You're using Denali D4 which are LEDs and rated at 10amps (considerably below what the OEM aux lights draw).
Your LED turn signals consume less power than the OEM (Gen 1) signals.
USB chargers, phone chargers and Garmin chargers do not draw a lot of power.
The Givi V47 light kit has LEDs and does not draw a lot of power.
The brake moulator and the dash cam will not draw a lot of power.
It is the heated seat and the heated jacket that need attention, as these draw relatively high power.

I would say that the excess power draw from the heated seat and jacket will be somewhat offset by lower power draw from the aux lights (Denali). So, off the top of my head and without having established power consumption for the above items, I would say that you'll be fine, but you should watch out as you might be at the max the bike electrical system can handle.
 

madman4049

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Yeah that's what I figured I'm working on trying to get solid draw on each item, I remember seeing somewhere a site that showed real world vs stated capabilities for each bike but for the life of me can't remember where.
 

EricV

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Add a voltage meter to the bike. If you have the heat cranked up a lot and are running aux lighting, it can be possible to draw the voltage down below 12v. Mine is normally 14.5V w/o any heated gear or lights. If you are pulling it below 11.8v, you will be draining the battery down and in danger of not being able to start the bike after shutting it off if you've been riding a while like that.

Typically you have around 120 watts of overhead from stock. The heated seat and jacket are what would draw the most power, as Juan has said. Managing those with a Heat-Troller instead of an off/low/high type of controller will help significantly. It pulses on the ground side to maintain heat level, and is more efficient than many other types of controllers. You can set both the seat and jacket liner up with Heat-Troller.
 

Spider

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I believe our alternators put out about 600 watts (max...so at highway RPMs). So just spitballing here, but say the bike needs maybe 300 of those watts just to do its thing. That would leave 300 to spare when you're cruising down the highway...less around town or off road. You can run over that occasionally, but will draw down the battery if you do. (And some folks say if you run right at the limit all the time it may wear our your regulator but I haven't seen that happen myself.) Volts times amps equals watts. Use 12 volts for the calculation. Your Denalis on full bright at 6.6 amps would be about 80 of those watts. Heated grips might max out around 50 watts...it should say on the package. All those LED's together, including on the Givi case, aren't drawing much more than the stock lights. Those chargers and your Montana together probably aren't drawing more than 30 watts at most. So that leaves roughly 150 watts maximum at highway speed. About enough for a heated jacket and a heated seat. This assumes everything is on at once. Eric is right...add a voltage meter of some sort to keep an eye on your system draw and you'll know when to turn down the heat or turn off the driving lights. I have these on my bikes (https://www.clearwaterlights.com/products/clearwater-voltage-sentry), simple and unobtrusive. But others like the "airplane cockpit" look so there are others far more impressive.
 

EricV

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The stator puts out 42.9 amps at 5k rpms. That equates to 514.8 watts. (42.9a x 12v) The headlights alone use 110 watts. The rest of the bike burns up some 120 watts or so, IIRC, leaving you an overhead of about 284 watts. (not accounting for the heated grips) So be careful when you're running full wattage on seat and jacket liner. Especially if you're running a lot of lighting. Mostly this is not an issue for the Super Ten. I've run heated jacket, grips and a single 42 watt HID with a pair of 10 watt LED spots and not pulled too many watts that the voltage meter was down below 12.

Add up the max watts on your farkles and see where you are, but at the end of the day if you can't monitor it during the ride, it could become a problem that you won't realize until you stop, then try and re-start the bike. The injectors won't fire with voltage under 11.6 as I recall. And we already know that the Super Ten really likes a strong battery to start easily.
 

madman4049

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Interesting, thank you all for the guidance/input. I don't imagine I'd ever be running all of it at once full blast but I'd rather keep an eye on it. I have one of those dash infill panels, what volt meter do you guys recommend? I don't really want the 3 in 1 usb port, cig lighter thing that I've seen others run.
 

EricV

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I like the Datel and MicTuning meters. Easy install with either screw, wires or terminals. Any sealed 12V meter with a range up to 19.9v will work fine. Any point in the system will give you accurate readings to allow you to establish the base line for your bike and see what changes occur when you increase the electrical load by using farkles.
 

OldRider

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One thing I like about the Oxford grips is that they are "smart" grips and will shut off if the voltage drops below a certain point.
 

jjc1957

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This is the $14.00 Digital Voltage that I went with. Just plug it in when I want to and it works great. I use heated gear a lot and have LED driving lights on and the voltage never has gone below 14.3. It does run at 14.5 with nothing else running. I do turn off my heated gear about 1 mile before I get to work just in case. I have changed my head lights and marker lights to LED also.
 

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