doohickey replacement, spring broken.

[Trent James]

Hey Friends, Seems I have a bad regulator/rectifier on my '89 KLR. I have "cooked" one battery already -- to the point that it will no longer hold a charge and had to be replaced. I am measuring greater than 15 vdc (15.48 at 4,000 rpm to be precise) at the battery terminal and the Kawi manual says that I should have less than 15.00 vdc. I am looking for a good, but used regulator/rectifier -- anyone out there have one for me? I see several voltage regulators list on e-bay for Kawasaki bikes, but does anyone know what models/years are interchangeable with our bikes (if any)? Thank you! Trent James San Diego, CA __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Make Yahoo! your home page http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs

[jeff]

Spring is finally approaching in Northern Michigan. I started getting the itch, but wanted to finish some maintenance before getting out my A-18 for the summer. I bought the doohickey kit from Fred last year, but wanted to wait until winter to do the replacement. I'm glad I did the "doo" last night. I got the first cover off and the doohickey itself looked fine, although it was about 2/3 through its travel. My KLR has about 8000 street miles on it, by the way. I had done the adjustment procedure twice. Looking further, I discovered the spring just flopping with the end that attaches to the post broken off. It had worn a groove in the bottom of the case, so it must have been that way for a while. No sign of the broken off part. Fred's kit came with 2 springs, so I installed the shorter of the 2, (34mm?)and bolted her back together. Thanks to Mark's great site, with the availability to download the procedure in .pdf format, this non mechanic was able to complete the project in a couple of hours. It only took me that long because it took forever to get all the old goop off the mating surfaces of the covers. I will post some pictures of the broken spring if anyone is interested. Now I just need to do the subframe lube procedure, and slap on a new front sprocket and we will be good to go! Oh, I also painted the front fender black using some of that Krylon paint that bonds to plastic, I will let you know how that turns out after the first few spills this year, hehe. Jeff A-18

[April Neave & Norm Keller]

make sure that you have no problems with regulator or other wiring harness grounds. A bad connection in the sensing side of the regulator or ground side can cause high charging voltage. No time to go into more detail. Norm