Dead Vector, any ideas?

[slymax]

My 05 vector would not start with the instrument unplugged. Plugged it in and away she went, maybe the 03 is different.

 

[Snowman269]

Snowman....is this the charger you are refering to?

http://www.mcmyamaha.com/dlrindexse...umber_103322-OptiMate+III+Battery+Charger.htm[/code]

That's the one! Best money spent!

Quote:
Our sleds are not like cars, they will not fully charge a battery by riding them, it took many years to convince me of this. They will only maintain a battery.



Not true.


Sorry LB, you can take that one up with Yamaha! I'm only repeating from the Yamaha Tech dept. Plus after after 8 years experience at a Yamaha dealer, I now agree with them.

Again, this is one thing that took me awhile to change my original opinion. I believed by running a machine long enough, eventually a battery would reach a full charge. Nope, you can always add to a charge in a battery (but you shouldn't be able to). If a battery is fully charged with an Optimate & then installed in a unit, the unit will keep it charged. If it’s thrown in a unit first, you will always be able to add a charge with an Optimate later. We averaged 1200 units sold a year, one wrong setup guy guy can cause a lot of grief, this how I came to believe Yamaha.

Occasionally you get a defective battery, but that's seldom.

 

[BigMac]

Ok guys, I did not have a particularly great weekend this weekend. The wife and I drove 350 miles, got to Shawinigan Quebec at midnight only to find our room reservation was completely screwed up and I didn't actually HAVE a room. Finally found one, in another hotel and got to bed by 1. By morning I was over it. Got up, had breakfast, unloaded my RX-1 and the Wife's Vector and headed out. Noticed while warming her sled up that it would turn over slow. (at first I didn't think much of it since it was about 10 below. (Fahrenheit) Anyway, it started finally and ran fine for a few minutes and then died. I restarted it and it was ok. We got on and crossed the street, and my wife pointed out that her speedometer and odometer and the rest of the display was not on. I thought, "Well, it's pretty cold and I have read where a few guys had this problem, maybe it will come back in a few minutes." Then I said to her, "Shut if off and restart it." When she shut it off it would NOT restart. The engine would not even turn over. About 20 minutes later we tried again and it fired up, only to quite 1/4 mile down the trail. 30 minutes later it ran again, and this time I rode it and made sure to ride in as much powder as I could find because I was thinking that it was overheating. It died again LESS than 1/4 mile later. Bottom line is this. I think that the sled is running only on the battery, and as soon as the voltage drops, the display goes away and eventually the ignition fails and the sled quits. It isn't seizing up, because I can turn the primary clutch and it feels fine and makes no odd noises.

Anyway, no dealers open after NOON in Quebec, so we trailered it all the way home, and dropped it off at the dealer at 8 tonight. We called on the way and he said to just leave it behind the building, so we did.

Any clues? About the time I got home I wanted to shoot myself for not thinking to check any fuses, but when it happened I was really stuck on the overheating idea since the trails were pretty icy and cooling was tough to find.

Having had Yamahas since 1984, the first thing I always do when I have a problem is bypass the TORS.

 

[Nice Rumble]

Having never had to do that, how do you bypass the TORS?

 

[stinx]

QC,
I am curious what you have found out. My wife also has a Vector ER and we are going to canada for a week in Feb

 

[BigMac]

Having never had to do that, how do you bypass the TORS?

It used to be simple. Early TORS systems were problematic and the instructions for bypass were even included in the owners manual. You disconnect the throttle wires (they were bullet connectors) and connect the throttle position wires together, so you could have an open-closed condition. Same procedure for the RS since it works the same, but I confess that it appears to be more difficult since the old bullet connectors are replaced with connector blocks.

 

[QCRider]

Bottom line is that Snowman is right on the money. I could NOT believe it when the service guy told me that it was simply a low charge on the battery. They measured the output of the Stator and it was fine. The sled will NOT generate enough energy to charge a discharged battery AND run the sled. To me this is RIDICULOUS. So now we have a sled that will not only NOT START without a fully charged battery, but it will also NOT RUN. So, there is no real point in using the leads provided to jump the sled with another sled, because it will just die once you remove the leads and try to ride. I honestly cannot believe that Yamaha would design something this way.

 

[Tfin]

I can see the sled not being able to START without a fully charged battery. I can also see the sled when running not being able to FULLY CHARGE a low battery.

But you're saying that the sled won't even RUN without a fully charged battery?

 

[QCRider]

I can see the sled not being able to START without a fully charged battery. I can also see the sled when running not being able to FULLY CHARGE a low battery.

But you're saying that the sled won't even RUN without a fully charged battery?

I don't know what state of charge it needs. The battery had enough charge to start the sled though, and the sled would NOT run. Does this make sense to anyone? Not me.

 

[Flipper]

Not me.

I know the SDI sleds won't run without a decent battery due to the injection system.

It doesn't make sense to me that the RS sleds wouldn't run without a battery.

 

[Wilson]

So what did the dealer find wrong with the charging system? I assume it is fixed by now .

 

[QCRider]

So what did the dealer find wrong with the charging system? I assume it is fixed by now .

That's the thing, there is NOTHING wrong with the charging system. The battery was not fully charged to begin with, and the charging system was not strong enough to both charge the battery AND run the sled.

 

[impalapower]

Wife's Viper last weekend had no highbeams and the gauge cluster took a bit to start. Let the sled idle for 10 min, everything was fine. Good luck with the fix.

 

[Wilson]

They fixed it and didn't tell you what was wrong . These sleds put out enough amps to charge the battery and run the sled .I think I saw a spec some where that said 30 amp alternator .that is lots .

 

[Oak Hill]

I would believe what the dealer is telling you. They obviously did not charge the battery befor delivery and/or the battery was run down (key left on, started to listen to engine and run very little).. I have 29 years experience in the automotive field. A low voltage condition can raise havoc with electronics. If the battery is low it has a high resistance and will take all the juice the alternator has to try and recharge it, causing the electronics to go crazy. A 30 amp alternator is not that big. A battery is used to start a vehicle period. Then the alternator is used to maintain the battery and run all of the electronics. If the alternator is using all it has to try and recharge the battery the electronics will not operate as designed. Not a Yamaha design flaw, just the way the system works and electronics. Cars and light trucks have been this way for years. A buddy of mine just got his Polaris out of storage a few weeks ago. It started up great, but every time you went to accellorate it, it would die. It has electronic fuel injection. Code flashed on the dash. Bad battery! Replaced battery, no more problem. The first thing when you are having problems with electronics is to check for proper voltage and grounds. In your case ther was not enough votage to operate all of the electronics due to a low charged battery. Just my opinion.