I have never had any problems with it after buying it new. Recentlyit wouldn't start. I bought a cheap battery ( $25 instead of $50 ) It worked for a while. I thought I would try the solenoid , but shouldn't have. My brother put a $10 tractor solenoid on his and cured his problem ; wanting to try the same thing instead of paying $65 for the Honda solenoid. Needless to say, the solenoid did not cure my problem ; and I almost cut the wires to close on the stock solenoid. ( I lost the color coding and sould have these crossed). Finally , I bought the battery that was listed for the Foreman and it was now $70. Everything was fine for a few weeks , then this past week it failed to start electrically, had to use the pullrope. Is there a charging system ? Could that be my problem ?
Thanks for any help.

 

I have a 98 Foreman ES and had a similar problem when I first got it last year. After a lot of trial and error I found out that the system was not getting any return charge to the battery, and it ended up being the Regulator/Rectifier. I bought one off E-bay for $20, put a new battery in it, and it fixed everything. Might be a good place to start looking.

 

Thanks. I plan on trying that.

 

About 90% of the time the problem is the regulator/rectifier but you should check the alternator first ..

 

Ok . Thanks.

 

Where is the alternator located ? I took the side panels off the other night looking for the regulator/rectifier like one on ebay and didn't see it yet ; got to look some more.
thanks,

 

The alternator is inside the rear cover .. The wires (3 yellow wires) are just in front of the right rear wheel .. The reg/rec is just above the right rear wheel ...

 

Thanks again. I found the rec/reg. Before i start on something else i probably need to be sure the solenoid is wired back correctly. A while back i cut the 2 small wires going to the solenoid so short that i lost the color coding and there had to be a lead soldered back on. Would it be possible to tell me which wires go where ? ; for instance - with the solenoid rotated with the clasp in the front facing the open compartment: Does the short large wire from the positive battery lead connect on the left of the solenoid and the large long lead from the far side of the battery compartment go on the right of the solenoid; then the small wires - below the new soldered leads the old leads are colored 1) green with a red stripe and ) yellow with a red stripe. Which side does each of these go on ? probably with me standing on the left side of the 4-wheeler looking across the battery compartment.
This is asking a lot ; if it could be answered i woould appreciate it ; might avoid going down the wrong way again.
thank you ,