Hi, I am new here.

I have an 03 Grizzly and the battery won't recharge. I just assumed it was the battery and bought a new one. Didn't help much.

I was a couple of hours back in the bush when the battery went dead again. I did find a blown fuse that was labeled "terminal" and I replaced it. I had not seen anything else on my machine that was not working. But after driving out (3 hours), the battery was still dead.

I am good with a wrench, but I am dumb with electrical and I don't really get a quad's charging system at all.

Can someone point me in the right direction? Could there be an easy fix somewhere??

Thanks

 

You need to check your charging system but, It sounds like you need to charge your battery fully first.

Using a 10 amp or so battery charger, charge your battery for a full 15 hrs. Use a digital volt meter to check the
battery charger while its charging the battery. It should be charging at more than 14 volts.
Charge the battery with the negative cable disconnnected.

Atfer you have charged the battery as described above.
If you have a digital inline dc amp meter. Most didgital volt meters have this function. set it up for amps
and touch the negative post with one meter lead and the end of the negative cable with the other meter lead.

It should read zero. If it isn't there isa gound or other problem on the system and is killing the battery.

If you don't hava an inline amp meter as described above.

Once you have charged the battery, reconnect the negative and look for any slight spark on the terminal
when it is being connected to see if it has a load on it with everything turned off. It should not spark at all.
You may have to touch the cable to the post multiple time to make sure it not sparking. Do it in the dark

If there is no spark or measured amps on the meter.

Use a digital dc volt meter and test the battery with it in the machine but everything turned off, keyswitch etc.

The battery should be about 12.6-12.7 vdc after a full charge, not less than 12.6 unless you've been craniking it and
use up a little of the battery. If it's not the battery has something wrong with it or the charger
has something wrong.

The charger output as measured in an above step should have been above 14vdc when charging.
If it wasn't get another charger until you get a good output when charging.

It sounds like mine a few years ago.

I had a new machine in 98. the battery lasted until 2002. I went to the dealer and got another one. they said they
had charged it already. I didn't charge it again, Just installed it.

It would go dead if i needed more than minimal cranking even if i rode it all day. This went on for about 6 months.
Then i decided to charge it. I put it on charge then forgot about it for about 16 hrs. I thought i had overcharged it
with that much time but. It has worked very well since then with absolutely no cranking or charging problems. That's even
with night riding and winching.

Fully charge your battery then do the test above if needed. It's probably not the charging system but may be.
The dc volt meter and the test above should help you solve your problem. Let me knwo if you have any questions.

Just my $.02

 

Using a charge rate of 10 amps for 15 hours will damage your battery. It will literally boil the water from the cells.

A lead acid battery of this size requires a charger of less than 250 mA. That is 0.25 or 1/4 amp. With that rate a charge of only three to four hours should be enough to charge it fully.

As for the charging system, Take the charged battery and install it on the quad. Measure the voltage on it with the engine off. On lead acid batteries the open circuit voltage should be roughly 12.7 volts about one hour after removed from the charger. The actual spec in the book is 12.8, but this is slightly high according to general standards.

With the battery voltage reading 12.7, or so, start the engine and then read the voltage with the engine at 1/4 throttle. The voltage should climb to 14 volts at 1000 RPM.

If the charging voltage is too high (over 14.6v) or too low (under 13.5) there may be a charging system problem. If you do have a problem with the charging systems then post back.

 

Typically a battery charger, even an uncontrolled charger will taper it's charge rate downward as the
battery charges. This is due to the voltage differential between the charger and battery becoming less as the battery is charged. It would be incorrect to think that a battery charger will charge at the same rate until it is turned off.

This puts a charge cycle on a curve that will extend the time. and will decrease the charger output until you take the charger off the battery. At some point the charger and battery will become almost the same voltage and the charge current will be near zero. This will vary based on the size of the charger. If you have a very large output charger it will not be able to taper enough before teh battery becomes overheated. Large batteries need large chargers and small batteries need small chargers but not a 1/4 amp unless you just need a maintenance charge.

A Grizzly charging system has an output of, depending on whether we are talking about the 600 or the 660, Of 120 to 180 watts. Thats 10 to 15 amps. That system will not charge a new uncharged battery to a level that will keep it strong during normal use.

If you try to charge a battery with a 1/4 amp charger you will be waiting a long time.

A typical atv battery like mine is rated at 15 amp hours. Going by the old school rule of thumb that says you can calculate the amount of time needed based on two factors. The actual charge rate and the battery amp hour rating. That would put your charge time in excess of 60 hours on a 15 amp hr. battery.

The charge time would actually be much higher because of the taper of the charger output during the charge period would go lower than 1/4 amp.

You want have a problem charging as i described above unless you use a large capacity charger that will not taper to a low enough rate for this battery because of it very high initial starting point.

 

I come to the table here with 15 years of lead acid battery charging, maintenance, repair and recycling. I have maintained wet cell NiCad, dry cell NiCad, nickel metal halide, and dual alloy and calcium/calcium batteries. In just the past two months alone I have replaced or maintained no less than 45 lead acid battery sets ranging from 4 Ah to 33Ah.

The batteries have ranged in size from rechargeable 6 volt that will fit into a camera up to the larger 8D battery. An 8D battery can be rated in excess of 1400 CCA and typically weigh 130 pounds or more. An 8D battery can typically supply 25 amps of power for over 7 hours at room temperature while generating 88% of its rated voltage. In ATV talk this one battery could most likely start 60 separate ATVs at the same time at room temp if cabled properly.

I am well qualified to speak of the charging requirements on most commercially available batteries including sets strung together to produce 600 volts dc power for heavy duty UPS emergency back up applications.

An 8D battery when 40% discharged can recover to 90% charge in less than 8 hours with a 1/4 amp charger if it is in good condition. Remember that this battery is 125 pounds or more. An ATV battery might weigh 12 pounds at best. Using 10 to 15 amps is like using a sledge hammer to swat a fly.

The actual rule of thumb to lead acid charging is to use a charger rated at no more than 20% the amp hour rating. This would equate to a 3 amp charger for a 15 Ah rated battery. A battery may take as long as 8 to 10 hours, or it may only need 1 or two hours if the depletion is not severe. The only way to determine if the battery is completely charged is if a meter is used, or if the charger has an automatic shut off.

Using a smaller size will help the lifespan if the charge is complete, conversely using a charger larger than that will shorten lifespan. The reason I recommend a 1/4 amp for three to four hours is because it is usually enough to do the job without overcharging.

Overcharging at an such an obscenely high rate as suggested would without doubt dramatically shorten battery life.

 

Lubricants and power sources are what I know.

 

You're saying you can charge practically any battery with 3.5 watts of power .25amps x 14.5 volts = approx 3.5.

If you can do that, you can take over the whole battery charger industry.

Here is a decent website talking about battery charger selection.

http://www.batterystuff.com/tutorial_chargers.html

In my first post i was talking about the initial equalizing charge that is needed on most batteries, particularly when they are new.

For years i maintained a fleet of battery powered pallet lifts and diesel fire pump batteries and have never seen where you can even have an impact on a large battery with .25 amps from a charger. That not enough to cover the daily losses on some batteries.

Experience is not and issue here. I have a masters in electrical engineering and have had and associates degree
in industrial electronics since 1979. I worked as an electronics technician from 1979 to 1993 at a large plant then went back to school at night and got my bach then my masters. I've worked for GE industrial systems for 5 years as a system designer and have worked for a large plastics producer as a maintenance engineer for 8 plus years.
That's about 28 years of experience.

 

That is interesting. You have 28 years of experience and you still would oversize your charger. Well it is your battery and you may do whit it what you will.