Date: Tue, 6 Aug 1996 18:17:18 -0400
From: Gary Slabaugh
My experience with an RM23 three phase alternator showed that it puts out plenty of amps to supply the halogen headlight, taillight, brakelight simultaneously plus keep the turn signals blinking at good rate on my 850 Interstate but at a cost of the stator also generating a lot of heat.
Soon after installing it I noticed the stator showed signs of the encapsulant turning brown and getting brittle. It lasted 20K miles until one of the windings burned out. At least with one of these units with three windings, if you lose one winding, you still have about 11 volts output. This will then cause an unreliable idle speed if you are Boyer equipped. No comments from the points crowd. :>) I should also add I live in the Sonora desert but I only have had problems with the three phase unit.
Gary Slabaugh
850 Interstate with built in loss of phase (LOP) alarm circuit
Date: Thu, 8 Aug 96 09:19:04
From: Jerry Jensen
> Are British watts different from the one's on this side of the
> pond?? (You know, like 1 Imperial watt equals 2.2 U.S. watts??)
> Why else would the manual recommend a 35 amp fuse for a 180 watt
> system?? ; )
> (I use a 15 (U.S.) amp fuse.)
180 watts refers to the charging capacity. The total possible load would be with the high beams on, indicators (optional), braking, and using the horn. Total load could exceed 180 watts with the additional power coming from the battery, thus the need for a fuse greater than 15 amps. Now 35 amps may seem like overkill but it will permit the bike to still run with an intermittent short such as a dangling brake switch wire (ask me how I know) without shutting down the whole system or burning it up. A tip for debugging your electrical system (in the shop) is to replace the battery with a K-mart 4 amp car battery charger. These have enough power to operate the system including headlight and a brief toot of the horn and also have a circuit break to shut down the power when the dead short is encountered. Very useful when constructing your own wire harness.
Jerry Jensen