Topic: Dead battery question- cb550f excited field alternator

[StreetSpirit]

Hey, so I have a 77 550 Im working on and it's got a lithium ion battery pack in it.  When I'm working on the bike (testing wiring/syncing carbs) it will sometimes become drained.  When this happens i have tried kick starting and bump starting without success.  Just no juice.  When I jump it from my car it fires right up. Is this normal behavior for a bike with an excited field alternator or do I need to be worried that my charging system is on the way out?  I've always been able to bump start a dead bike and this really pisses me off.

[luap]

your not going anywhere on that bike with a dead battery, I would suggest not jumping it with the car running
I used a 4 cell ballistic on my last build tested everything-good- battery sucked 30.00 lead battery from walfart no more problems, Id start with a proven good before you tear your electrical apart just my 2 cents

[lucky]

Why would you try to kick start a bike with a drained battery?
QUOTE:
"When I'm working on the bike (testing wiring/syncing carbs) it( battery) will sometimes become drained.  When this happens i have tried kick starting and bump starting without success." 

It will not start with dead battery.

Never push a car or motorcycle to get it started. If you do do that at least put it in 2nd gear not 1st gear. It will be a lot easier.

When you say you tried kick starting it did you put a clamp on timing light on one of the spark plug wires to see if it is getting a spark?

How many volts was the battery when you tried kick starting the bike?

[Bodi]

The excited field alternator need voltage to excite the field in order to make power. With a dead battery, you don't have this voltage. You can turn it as fast as you want, still no power.
The ignition system works from the same voltage. You can not kick or bump start these bikes when they have a dead batter.
Many bikes have electrical systems with battery and alternator only for lights and electric start: the spark is supplied from a separate magneto. Not ours.

[StreetSpirit]

Ya, when I jump it it's always car off...

As for bumping, I've had bikes that fire right up if you get them rolling in neutral and pop up to 2nd.  The 550 is not one of them apparently.  If it's normal it's normal.  The battery holds a charge and will crank hard when it's full but in this recent case it was very drained because I was testing for a fault in the headlight wiring and had the ignition on for a while trying to find it.