GearJammer
12-30-2005, 12:17 PM
The chopped Trumpet doesn't have a battery. Am running a battery eliminator (Mity Max) that has an internal capacitor for at least some electrical storage.
During these colder months, have ridden less & alternated between the chopper & the Rebel, choosing the Rebel a bit more for convenience & to keep some miles off the Trumpet.
The last 3 fire-ups of the Trumpet:
Chop had been sitting idle for about 3 weeks, stored inside an unheated shop. It took about 100 kicks to finally get her started. Initially, I'd attributed it to not having changed the straight 50W to 20W50 (and that does play into this to some degree)
Next fire-up, another 3 week interval, same thing...kick, kick, kick & then FINALLY fire-up.
Third fire-up, 2 day lay-off since last ride, started getting spark on the 2nd kick!
Here's my theory: The internal capacitor only stores x amount of juice (sorry, but I don't know the actual rating & the Mity Max is a closed unit) The colder temps gradually drain whatever juice is in there & if left idle for too long, it nearly depletes the capacitor charge. These 100 kicks before fire-up on the 1st two examples: I'm thinking that the non-spark kicks are adding juice to the internal cap, amp by amp, (generating a low-amp charge from the alternator with every kick, which manually turns the crank & in turn the alternator), until the cap is near full charge again & then it starts to allow actual spark for fire-up. This is based on the 2 day lay-off that gave me spark quickly/normally since it hadn't been allowed to drain off for a longer period of time.
Does this sound likely ?
During these colder months, have ridden less & alternated between the chopper & the Rebel, choosing the Rebel a bit more for convenience & to keep some miles off the Trumpet.
The last 3 fire-ups of the Trumpet:
Chop had been sitting idle for about 3 weeks, stored inside an unheated shop. It took about 100 kicks to finally get her started. Initially, I'd attributed it to not having changed the straight 50W to 20W50 (and that does play into this to some degree)
Next fire-up, another 3 week interval, same thing...kick, kick, kick & then FINALLY fire-up.
Third fire-up, 2 day lay-off since last ride, started getting spark on the 2nd kick!
Here's my theory: The internal capacitor only stores x amount of juice (sorry, but I don't know the actual rating & the Mity Max is a closed unit) The colder temps gradually drain whatever juice is in there & if left idle for too long, it nearly depletes the capacitor charge. These 100 kicks before fire-up on the 1st two examples: I'm thinking that the non-spark kicks are adding juice to the internal cap, amp by amp, (generating a low-amp charge from the alternator with every kick, which manually turns the crank & in turn the alternator), until the cap is near full charge again & then it starts to allow actual spark for fire-up. This is based on the 2 day lay-off that gave me spark quickly/normally since it hadn't been allowed to drain off for a longer period of time.
Does this sound likely ?