Flat Battery Again

[Bill Thomas]

Many thanks Norman, I must be going Daft !, Yes still vincent.bournemouth .
Don't know how I worked out it was to fit the reg', It just looked long enough and the were no holes in the reg' for fitting and had strange angles on the fitting.
I am fitting to a Comet, So don't need it. Cheers Bill.

 

[timetraveller]

OK Bill, I will send you the fitting instructions in a few minutes. You might only need the wiring diagram part of it.

 

[vibrac]

I can confirm that modern Altons do not drain the battery someone more closer to the action could pehaps give a date from when this upgrade occured and if the change needs the regulator that alton supplies or if it is a function of the Alton itself. At a guess It was at least 2 years ago maybe more

 

[brian gains]

No ancillary outlets just lights, stop light and idiot lights. Indicators had been fitted but I removed them.
It has Lucas RITA EI and never had the tell tale firing at fully retarded which they normally do when the battery voltage charge starts to drop.
I bought the machine through a middle man so history is only what I have gleaned from supplied paperwork, John Renwick whom I had the opportunity to speak with briefly and others that have recognised the machine and 'know' a little of it's history. John Roberts (?) ran the motor in a grass track machine in the Horsham area, this would at least explain the Norton gearbox.
Hopefully people are not being misguided by mention of the 'Kubota' alternator. I can't find any reference to this in the paperwork so believe I have repeated what an observer told me. All I can say is it appears to have two wires coming from it and the laast time the battery discharged and was recharged , placing a meter across the battery terminals indicated it was receiving a charge.
The battery has been recharged and is connected and all I can say is that in the last 3 hours it has not depleted.
See attached blurry photos that will only give a rough idea of fitting and physical size of the alternator. Not very helpful I know, but if anyone can make any knowledgeable observation of what alternator it may be if this appears to be a standard up grade I would be grateful. Thanks for comments up to this point.

 

[bmetcalf]

Can you post some overall photos of your bike? What those show is interesting!

 

[timetraveller]

Nothing to do with me Guv! It looks interesting and as far as I know it is a one off. If the alternator is inside the front of the extra housing then it is thin and could even be one of the old Lucas ones from 60+ years ago.

 

[Peter Holmes]

As Norman says, that does look interesting, most of the Lucas alternator conversions are quite ugly, the primary chain case bulge is extended further out, so much so they almost look susceptible when cornering enthusiastically, your looks far neater, as did the John Emmanuel conversion was using a Ducati alternator, it looks like your extension addition to the ESA bulge is just to accommodate a pulley wheel to drive the fore mounted alternator, I wonder what alternator was chosen.

 

[brian gains]

i work on the 'if it ain't broke don't fix it' principle. sure as eggs is eggs if i remove the cover the paint will chip. the machine has a Newby belt primary and I am curious to know if it has a diaphragm clutch with the Norton box. Curiosity will get the better of me and shall probably look this winter. After the Burman box saga all I want is a season of regular maintenance items only.

 

[Monkeypants]

A battery load tester will instantly tell you if the battery is OK or not.
I limped along for years just using various small multitesters. Those give you some info but not enough. If a battery fails the load test, even if it's still holding a good voltage, chuck it.

 

[b'knighted]

Many decades ago Colin Jenner brought a small Kubotu alternator to a North Kent section meeting. It was different in design to any car alternator I'd ever seen in that it had one flat end that carried all connections and mounting points while the rest of it was the rotor. The whole outside cylinder of it rotated with a pulley end which looked like the visible pulley of Brian’s alternator. I couldn’t see any way of using it in a standard Vincent mounting position. I can see how it could be mounted in front the engine to be belt driven. I think Colin had Conways by that time so this may have been produced by Conways as a charging system for chopped engines.