Newbie Here! awd doesn't work on 2000 xplorer, another thread suggested needing a battery, even a dead one. Bad for system to have no battery. Can some one confirm this. I have no electronics, just electrics, no speedo, no lite on AWD switch.

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Not having a battery in it can blow your electronics. The voltage that should be going to the battery has to go somewhere.

 

Thats odd I rode my 500 Sportsman with a spent dead battery for a month before getting around to buying a new one.

Besides needing to pull start it every time everything worked normally.

I rode my Yamaha 1989 Big Bear 350 4x4 without a battery period for 5 years since the electric starter did not work anyways and the only thing I noticed was it had dim head lights.

Same with a few snowmobiles I had,I just pull started them for the winter since thet started in one pull . Everything worked ok though even the hand thumb warmers. But I left the dead battery connected in the system though.

I just though the newer ATVs with computer brain boxes and EFI needed a heathy battery.

 

All the machines have a charging system to where it returns voltage back to the battery whether it's an older or newer model. Just the module change is the only difference. Most of the time on the older ones especially I had to replace bulbs that were blown out by electrical surges when they had dead batteries,or didn't even have a battery hooked and recoil started them. The voltage has to go somewhere and the least resistance is the bulbs and would hit them first.

 

Guess I just got lucky. Never blew a bulb on any of them.

 

Yes ,you must have been lucky

 

Just curious, electric is sure not my thing. But I had a few large cc snowmobiles and motorcycles that had no battery with electric start and were only pull start or kick start. What kept there headlights from blowing?
I though it was the Regulator or Rectifier and those things where on electic start modles also.

It was the opposite on my Yamaha 350 Big Bear, the headlights where dim and brighten up abit above idle rather then blow out. With the battery removed.

 

Same thing on a few KTMs that had kick start only,no batteries and we added lights,etc. The regulator/rectifiers in the kits were designed to only provide enough output from the stator for the lights without dimming or blowing out bulbs. Don't know about the sleds being from the South,but has to be the same principle involved. On machines with batteries it's entirely different. The voltage is greater. Don't know if this helps.http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j...,d.b2I&cad=rja

 

Guys, Thanks for all of the replies. I will reinstall the dead battery first and chew on getting a new one.

 

A dead/sulfated battery is not much better than no battery at all as it still can cause voltage spikes on bulbs and electronics if this old battery can't take any of the voltage from the reg/rectifier.I'd get a new one,charge it up then install it and then you can check that the charging voltage is at least 14 volts back to the battery.