Hi everyone,

Does anyone here know if there's a battery out there that offers the same performance but in a smaller form factor than the standard-sized options (Yuasa YTX14-BS, Yuasa Y60-N24AL-B)?

I'm moving the battery and bracket out of the area under the seat and into a space in the front. Right now it's not going to work..

Would a 12V Ninja battery or the like do the job?

Much appreciated!

You can go to a much smaller battery than the 24, the big batteries were an option on the later machines.
Providing the battery is capable of delivering the amps for cranking. I had a battery in my K100 for a couple of years that was only 15 amp/hours which is about 1/2 of the usual capacity and it always started ok.
The Lithium batteries are a small unit with a heap of punch but expensive.

G'day Crazedbiker , I'm using an Odyssey PC680 AGM battery at the moment , probably about half the depth of the stock battery ( it fits into the drop section in the middle of the tray ) plenty of cranking power

JR

Thanks guys...


RicK G
Interesting stuff. Lithium batteries in a motorcycle - why not I suppose! So 12V, 15Ah is the minimum you reckon? Do you remember which battery it was you used?


JR_K100RS
Heard great things about Odyssey. I'll get one if I can't find anything smaller. 18x8x17cm is still pretty chunky. Definitely better but chunky!

G'day Duck , yup I had to flip the battery hold down when I installed the PC680 as well , forgot to mention that

Ta Mate

JR

Cheers Duck/JR,
Useful to know and a good back-up. I'm still hoping to find something slightly smaller as I have to fit it into this space...

https://i.servimg.com/u/f55/18/57/27/28/k100rs11.jpg

Crazedbiker wrote:Thanks guys...


RicK G
Interesting stuff. Lithium batteries in a motorcycle - why not I suppose! So 12V, 15Ah is the minimum you reckon? Do you remember which battery it was you used?


JR_K100RS
Heard great things about Odyssey. I'll get one if I can't find anything smaller. 18x8x17cm is still pretty chunky. Definitely better but chunky!

The small battery I used was a motobatt sealed AGM but cant remember the details. It was all I could get when I desperately needed a new one. I had to use a chock of wood under the clamp to hold it down as it was shorter than the OEM.

Ah yeah - heard good things about them. Cheap but never need servicing..

Would an 18Ah Motobatt would do the job? They have a 32 Ah but that seems excessive.

just be careful mounting something plastic directly to the motor
most probably will be 100 degrees c all the time there.
and that temp will soon burn off electrolyte if lead acid type .

Crazedbiker wrote:Ah yeah - heard good things about them. Cheap but never need servicing..

Would an 18Ah Motobatt would do the job? They have a 32 Ah but that seems excessive.

My wife's K75RT has a 18AH Motobatt and it starts just fine. The Cold Cranking Amps are more than double what is needed.

My K100 starts up just fine with a 15 amp-hour battery.  You might even be able to get away with 12 or 10 but there's only one way to find out.

Note that ABS control units can be power sensitive so getting too small of a battery MIGHT cause ABS faults at start-up on an ABS bike.

I just plopped a Motobatt (bright yellow) into my 87 K100, standard size, not smaller than usual. Part number 51814, fits into the drop in the battery tray, cost me $116 at Beenleigh Battery, Queensland. A good value for OZ.

I've got some experience with the Shorai brand and can say that the first year or so we sent almost 50% of them back to the distributor because they simply failed. In fairness they aren't a bad battery, but their initial catalouging suggested a fair too small capacity for the given application. It took them two catalogues to get it right and now they're selling the proper capacity battery for the bikes listed. Then there's that special charger you have to use...it's almost not worth it unless you're racing, have extra money to burn, or just have to have the latest, but not necessarily the greatest.

In Seattle at a particular workshop we sell a Motobatt for the F650GS singles as it's a good battery for a fair price ($79.95 + 9.5% tax) and one of the only 'AGM' available for that model that actually fits properly. The OEM battery is a flooded lead-acid, old-tech that costs more.

Two Wheels Better wrote:I just plopped a Motobatt (bright yellow) into my 87 K100, standard size, not smaller than usual. Part number 51814, fits into the drop in the battery tray . . .

Thanks for that, I'll be looking for one.

Last ride of the year here, cold morning, bike would not start do to low battery. Jump started by riding down the hill from the house. Brought the bike back into the garage for winter maintenance with the 4L fuel light glowing brilliant red. Now, that's the way to end a season of riding IMO.

Thanks for everyone's input!

Very helpful. Slightly embarrassed to admit that I didn't consider the effects of the engine heat on the battery. I'm hoping that providing there's no actual contact, the battery will just run 'warm' and not actually melt/fail. Fingers crossed there's enough space there to give the battery some breathing room.

It makes me wonder how so many people have managed to clear our that space for the very naked cafe look. Smaller bikes with smaller batteries in the seat pan I guess...

Have gone for the MotoBatt MB51814. As reviewed works well (so far) and fits snugly into the inner part of the tray. Didn't want to risk the battery acid leaking onto the engine so until I work out a way to house a slightly smaller battery in a decent contained bracket, I'll stick with the current setup.

Thanks for the input guys

J

Odyssey are one of the best batteries on the market. I have seen them give 12 years life on a Harley which takes a lot more than a K to turn it over.

Tony the Skin wrote:Odyssey are one of the best batteries on the market. I have seen them give 12 years life on a Harley which takes a lot more than a K to turn it over.

Are you saying that the battery will outlast the HD then?
Being serious, I love the Odyssey and have on on my microlight.

Hi, might be tad late but I've used odyssey 680 it's really thin but tallish

Works a treat

bikerboy wrote:

Tony the Skin wrote:Odyssey are one of the best batteries on the market. I have seen them give 12 years life on a Harley which takes a lot more than a K to turn it over.

Are you saying that the battery will outlast the HD then?
Being serious, I love the Odyssey and have on on my microlight.

Modern H-D batteries are very good indeed though often dearer. I find Odyssey better but regret that on my newer Harleys they don't make ones that fit,

I've got a five year old Odyssey PC680 sitting on the bench in the garage, waiting for its time again in a bike. I give it a charge every now and then, but it doesn't need it. I've load tested it three times in over a year and it always pops back up to 12.7 volts even with the load tester smoking hot.

I grabbed it off the rubbish battery bin last year (Summer 2012) because the parts manager threw it there when he saw that the case had swollen. I tested it then and it came up strong, so I took it home and charged it just for good luck. When the Westco (Vietnamese-made) 12V20P karks it I'll whack the Odyssey into my R1150RT (same battery as a K100/K1100) and keep on going. I expect it'll be fine as they often are.

My first use of an Odyssey came eleven or twelve years ago when a police motor came in after a parade day with two 'flat' Odyssey batteries. In the interest of 'customer service' the new service manager plopped a new one into the bike and rolled it out. That supposedly flat PC680 sat unloved and unattended for another eighteen months until the owner of the shop told me to clear off the shelf. So I took it home. It went straight into a stripped R1100RS I was building. That bike got wrecked so it went into the next R1100RS build. I used that bike for two years, fulltime, then sold the bike to a mate. Three years later he was still running that battery in the bike.

Several years ago I attended the annual Indianapolis Motorcycle Show - for the powersports trade. At the Hawker Energy booth sat a man surrounded by show attendees. He was answering questions about his company's batteries - Odyssey. He stated that the Odyssey can be fully discharged up to 200 times, and as long as it's brought back to full charge quickly using high amperage, it'll last. I never trickle charge my PC680. I hit it with ten or more amps for an hour or two. Six months later, even if left alone, it'll take a load test that'll smoke any other battery. I like Odyssey batteries.

I was able to kill an Odyssey in about five years.  It had a pretty hard life though.

BTW: In order to minimize the strain on a battery when starting:

- If you have a Euro headlight switch then turn the headlight off before turning the key.

- Same for heated grips and other accessories.

- Use synthetic oil since it isn't affected by low temperatures as much as dino oil so the bike will spin more easily when cold.

No need to switch everything off, the load shed relay does it for you!

sidecar paul wrote:No need to switch everything off, the load shed relay does it for you!

Yeah, that's what I used to think too - until a friend proved otherwise when he demonstrated the difference to me and, much to my surprise, it made a noticeable difference in how quickly/easily the bike started.

It must have been messed about with AFAIK no Ks ever came out without the Load Shed Relay.
My wifes K75 has no switch like the US models and it used to stay on at start up but it had been played about with.

Nope. This was a low mile bike with good electrics.  And I can demonstrate the exact same phenomena on all of my K bikes since they all have "Euro" headlight switches.  To start with, from an electronics perspective, the load shedding relay is a relatively slow mechanical device driven by electromagnetism that does not disengage instantaneously.  On top of that a battery is going to put out more cranking amps going from a minimal loading situation (headlight and other accessories off) than going from one load to another such as when the load shed relay disengages power to the headlight and other gear.

Have a look at this:



and this: 

Crazedbiker wrote:Thanks for everyone's input!

Very helpful. Slightly embarrassed to admit that I didn't consider the effects of the engine heat on the battery. I'm hoping that providing there's no actual contact, the battery will just run 'warm' and not actually melt/fail. Fingers crossed there's enough space there to give the battery some breathing room.

It makes me wonder how so many people have managed to clear our that space for the very naked cafe look. Smaller bikes with smaller batteries in the seat pan I guess...

I don't know if you got an answer to this, but most mods extend the wiring, and place the battery in the tail.
I intend to do that, as well as my master brake cylinder, and my EFI.

D

duck wrote:Nope. This was a low mile bike with good electrics.  And I can demonstrate the exact same phenomena on all of my K bikes since they all have "Euro" headlight switches.  To start with, from an electronics perspective, the load shedding relay is a relatively slow mechanical device driven by electromagnetism that does not disengage instantaneously.  On top of that a battery is going to put out more cranking amps going from a minimal loading situation (headlight and other accessories off) than going from one load to another such as when the load shed relay disengages power to the headlight and other gear.

Hey Duck,did you have to gain wght to put on that Santa suit?

Nope, it's an armored Santa suit.

defied wrote:

Crazedbiker wrote:Thanks for everyone's input!

Very helpful. Slightly embarrassed to admit that I didn't consider the effects of the engine heat on the battery. I'm hoping that providing there's no actual contact, the battery will just run 'warm' and not actually melt/fail. Fingers crossed there's enough space there to give the battery some breathing room.

It makes me wonder how so many people have managed to clear our that space for the very naked cafe look. Smaller bikes with smaller batteries in the seat pan I guess...

I don't know if you got an answer to this, but most mods extend the wiring, and place the battery in the tail.
I intend to do that, as well as my master brake cylinder, and my EFI.

D

Why put all of that weight high and to the rear?