Guys is coil rewinding a good way of improving electricals ? Any whats the best way to get it done . I have heard people saying bad or useless coil rewinding . But I fail to understand except for the material or wire used and use of proper insulation , what other thing could make it bad or crap . Can anyone give some technical information on coil rewinding and how its done?

Guys is coil rewinding a good way of improving electricals ? Any whats the best way to get it done . I have heard people saying bad or useless coil rewinding . Except for the material or wire used and use of proper insulation , what other thing could make it bad or crap ? Can anyone give some technical information on coil rewinding and how its done? Thanks

Sorry for double post guys , there is something wrong .. I am not able to use smileys , toolbar and the Edit option . Please consider the second or the latter post . thanks

If done correctly, it is a good way to improve electricals. In fact if you want more power for your h/l, you can either rewind the coil or cut some loads elsewhere!

The main thing is selecting the proper gauge of wire. Else output could be worse than original. The insulation is very easy to damage and hence needs a skilled pair of hands to wind the stator. (Even I broke the insulation the first time I tried, but I am no pro!) Second part is mating this with a proper RR unit. Zma unit would be suitable. I built my own to save cost.

Good RR Unit for Pulsar 150

Abhi, I have already posted this in the headligh thread. But now only I've seen this thread which really goes with my query. I have seen your DC conversion post and even I tried the same but for me its not sufficient as mine is HID which eats the battery like anything. In the startup it takes up almost 9A and later it comes down to 3.5A. Whereas my RR supports only 3.3A max and I am not an expert in electricals but logically short of 0.2A that should be compansated by the day time charging. But thats not the reality. Battery dies in 40-45 min and beyond that no hid. I have installed a pair of spot lamps to make use of the idle AC light power during this blackouts. In the ealier post you have designed an custom RR unit for Pulsar, is it capable of handling the high Amps to take from the coil directly? What is the charging current in the RR circuit? My coil was supporting a 90/100 like a car which is idle now and thinking of to byepass the two wires from the coil to the new RR unit of your design if its capable of. Like I said in the other post i have some other options like swap the stock RR with Ape 3 wheeler which is a single phase and it charges to a 50AH battery and the entire electricals will be DC. But I want an economical solution. I know its charging will be something higher than it requires but that can be solved by a relay connected to the light, once the lights are on battery will be charged, else it will be charged from the stock RR or without. What do you say? Will this work out?

The battery dies because there are other loads too like tail lamp, console etc etc. Till now, my RR unit has been used with a 60/55W h/l. Its a month till now, and there has been no problems at all. So, I am pretty confident about my design. And, your HID is only 35W, so I guess my RR unit would be able to take the load together with the 100/90 coil.

Else, there is another topic called "Converted by P150 to full DC". You may want to see that. Does not need the 100/90 coil. Stock coil should do.

Else, the Zma RR unit may be a direct fit with your 100/90 coil.

And, where did you get the rewinding done? Would you happen to know the gauge of wire used for rewinding?

Thanks Abhi for the prompt answer. My current charging unit is a Fullwave bridge with 6A diode and its connected directly to the battery and its giving 3.3A avg. But on HID the meter shows -1 that means am almost short of 1A from the charger. Technician at the battery store says if I want to ride with the HID for a min of 1 hr the charging has to be boosted to 6A min to compansate the drain from the battery. So only remedy is to go for a higher amps RR unit. Thatz why I am curious about your RR units output Amp.

Zma RR will cost you around 2K whereas am looking for a economical option as I have already puffed off good amount for this mods for my old good P. This week I will try the RR unit of Ape or Minidoor. Both are having single phase alternator like in the bikes and they are fed directly to the 50A battery, so that should be enough to deliver my requirement from the bulb coil. You can refer this http://zenwinmotorparts.com/regulators.html

And about your DC mod I tried it but before that I got a better option by tapping a line from the white line to the Brindge and thatz the way I improved the recharging to this extend. And more over I need the charging has to be boosted for that the light line to be utilized so your mod doesnt apply in my situation.

Am sorry I dont know anything about the wire guage because I have done it in Cochin a local battery servicing shop, where lot of coil mods are done. But I dont think its not a big thing for me, as I used to wind transformers in my early stages for my own use, the same excercise is more than enough to fix this. Make sure that the length of the stock wires are correct as we cant rewind with the same no of turns as there is not much room to accomodate the higher guage wire with the same no of turns but still you have enough voltage as the rpm increases.

IF I am not getting the desired output from this RR defnitley I am going to rewind it myself as am retainig the stock coil with me.

Thanks

Well, if you are sure your coil can put out the required power and that the RR unit is the bottleneck, use my RR unit. As I have said, it worked with a 60/55W h/l. So, your HID will be supported. Only case is to make sure the stator coil can provide the required power.

BTW, which bike is this?

Thanks Abhi, well am quite sure about the output of the coil as it was feeding a 90/100 without any delay. You are right I think a good RR can solve the battery drain issue because it can compansate the power from the battery within no time. This week I will isolate the light wire from the coil and try to feed through the new RR. Tell me the approx cost of your RR? Any heatsink has to be provided? If then I have to buy that also, am still a fresh person eventhough I know some DIY assembling. whats the current rating of your design? 20A? Pls forgive me for my ignorance in this. Can you measure the Charghing current?

Mine is the good old Pulsar 150 dtsi first version. Am looking for a suitable projector beam lens as the stock reflector is throwing a lot of stray glares to the oncoming traffic eventhough the reflector is set to its min position and the beam pattern is also not good. Can you suggest something?

Right now, I am using it with a 60/55W h/l - that is 5A. Consider 2A for battery charging. So, right now, it is delivering about 8A. This is without any form of heatsinking or proper air circulation. My circuit is found here. Theoretical limit is around 30A with heatsinks for the diodes and proper air circulation. But, I have not tried it out till now.

I use a Ambassabor headlamp. Mine is P150 Classic with round headlamp. The beam is quite good compared to stock. But, even I want to try out a projector setup but don't know where to source it from!

Thanks Abhi, If your RR can deliver upto 30A its well good enough feed a 50A battery and its much more than what I required cause stock battery is only 9A, and I will see how much current is coming from my coil and if its morethan 8A, i should put a relay in between to control the charging. Any other battery level controller in mind? Whats the total cost of the RR circuit?

P Classic has got the worst HL reflector among the Bajaj stables, one of my friend was having later we changed to Gypsy dom, whereas in DTSI stock reflector is good enough to challenge any one in the category. But thats all for incadecent bulbs max of halogen beyond that you have to find some other good spot/single focal reflectors especially HID. Once you started using only you will come to know the reflector performances before that I was also having the conclusion that this will be the final as I have got the brightest and the latest bulb in the world in the auto industry. But there is still a long way to pursue. Could be my greediness for the best!

As for the projector lens, you can try some of the scrap merchants salvaged from the laxury cars for an economical way out or you can try the good old ebay.com. Its a time taking affair to retrofit the projector to the stock reflector as there are different types of lenses. Few are just a snap on type to the stock reflector after removing the glass and few types are required to cut holes and fix to the reflector and you cant go back to where you have started. Any way I have made an enquiry about this and let you know once its materialised. My first priority is the charging issue, once its fixed, I can go in for that.

No need for any relays. The battery will consume only what it needs, even if all 100W is available from the coil. Cost was about 200 bucks for the components. If you are confident about your ability to assemble the electronics circuit and have some free time, go ahead and do this.

And you don't really need a heavy duty RR unit for a simple HID which draws about 3A. Your total load with the HID would be about 5A-6A under normal conditions.

Best would be to use a 100W stator coil with Zma/P220/APE RR unit. If cost is too high, go for my RR unit. I went for this custom RR unit because I wanted to see if I could build one and to save costs.

And yeah, more light is always better! Let me know if you can help me in sourcing a projector from scraps.

Yeah, I hope I can do this, only thing is time. Let me see what I can do in this. How about the over charging the battery with higher currents all the time? It can reduce the life span right? Yes you are right thatz what the battery technician also adviced me about the power requirerment 6A should be enough.

Oh no no, I cant go in for costly RRs, I will look for the cheapest available and tested method first and if the problem still persists, go for the other options.

Here we dont've a good junk yard to salvage am also looking for one and once I get one will get back to you. But I feel its worth to go for a projector but there is trap, you have to sacrifice the existing HID bulb with new D2S bulb as the projector takes only D2S. Its a matter of bulb base, if you can manage to glue it hopefully.

If the RR unit output voltage is maintained at around 13.8V, the battery will never overcharge. Once it finishes charging, no further current will flow thru it, provided the voltage is at 13.8V or thereabout.

No junkyard here too!! I will use it with my 60/55W h/l. HIDs are too costly for me right now!

Found an article on Lead Acid Battery charging From BATTERY UNIVERSITY. Very Informative. It is attached here. I have deleted the Graphs etc as they are not appearing in the Post.



[Charging the lead-acid battery(BU13)

The charge algorithm for lead-acid batteries is similar to lithium-ion but differs from nickel-based chemistries in that voltage rather than current limiting is used. The charge time of a sealed lead-acid battery is 12-16 hours (up to 36 hours for larger capacity batteries). With higher charge currents and multi-stage charge methods, the charge time can be reduced to 10 hours or less. Lead-acid cannot be fully charged as quickly as nickel or lithium-based systems.

It takes about 5 times as long to recharge a lead-acid battery to the same level as it does to discharge. On nickel-based batteries, this ratio is 1:1, and roughly 1:2 on lithium-ion.

A multi-stage charger first applies a constant current charge, raising the cell voltage to a preset voltage (Stage 1 in Figure 1). Stage 1 takes about 5 hours and the battery is charged to 70%. During the topping charge in Stage 2 that follows, the charge current is gradually reduced as the cell is being saturated. The topping charge takes another 5 hours and is essential for the well being of the battery. If omitted, the battery would eventually lose the ability to accept a full charge. Full charge is attained after the voltage has reached the threshold and the current has dropped to 3% of the rated current or has leveled off. The final Stage 3 is the float charge, which compensates for the self-discharge.


Correct settings of the voltage limits are critical and range from 2.30V to 2.45V. Setting the voltage limit is a compromise. On one end, the battery wants to be fully charged to get maximum capacity and avoid sulfation on the negative plate. A continually over-saturated condition at the other end, however, would cause grid corrosion on the positive plate. It also promotes gassing, which results in venting and loss of electrolyte.

The voltage limit shifts with temperature. A higher temperature requires slightly lower voltages and vice versa. Chargers that are exposed to large temperature fluctuations should be equipped with temperature sensors to to adjust the charge voltage for optimum charge. Figure 2 compares the advantages and limitations of various peak voltage settings.







Car batteries and valve-regulated-lead-acid batteries (VRLA) are typically charged to between 2.26 and 2.36V/cell. At 2.37V, most lead-acid batteries start to gas, causing loss of electrolyte and possible temperature increases. The exceptions are small sealed lead acid batteries (SLA), which can be charged to 2.50V/cell without adverse side effect.

The cylindrical Cyclone by Hawker requires a very high peak voltage of 2.60V/cell. Failing to apply the recommended voltage threshold causes a gradual decrease in capacity due to sulfation. Follow manufacturer's recommended settings on these lead-acid variations.

Large VRLA batteries are often charged with a float-charge current to 2.25V/cell. A full charge may take several days. It is interesting to observe that the current in float charge mode gradually increases as the battery ages in standby mode. The reasons may be electrical cell leakages and a reduction in chemical efficiency.

Aging affects each cell differently. Since the cells are connected in series, controlling the individual cell voltages during charge is virtually impossible. Even if the correct overall voltage is applied, a weak cell will generate its own voltage level and intensify the condition further.

Much has been said about pulse charging lead-acid batteries. Some experts believe there is a benefit in reduced cell corrosion but manufacturers and service technicians are not in full agreement on the effectiveness. There are also disagreements on the 'equalizing charge'. An equalizing charge raises the battery voltage for several hours above that specified by the manufacturer. Although beneficial in reversing sulfation, the side effects are elevated temperature, gassing and loss of electrolyte if the service is not administered correctly. A periodic discharge of about 10% is said to benefit the battery but little conclusive evidence is available.

Lead-acid batteries must always be stored in a charged state. A topping charge should be applied every six months to avoid the voltage from dropping below 2.10V/cell on an SLA. Prolonged storage below the critical voltage causes sulfation, a condition that is difficult to reverse. (See also: "How to restore and prolong lead-acid batteries")


Charging lead-acid batteries with a power supply

Lead-acid batteries can be charged manually with a commercial power supply featuring voltage regulation and current limiting. Calculate the charge voltage according to the number of cells and desired voltage limit. Charging a 12-volt battery (6 cells) at a cell voltage limit of 2.40V, for example, would require a voltage setting of 14.40V.

The charge current for small lead-acid batteries should be set between 10% and 30% of the rated capacity (30% of a 2Ah battery would be 600mA). Larger batteries, such as those used in the automotive industry, are generally charged at lower current ratings. Cells constructed of a non-antimonial lead grid material allow higher charge currents but have a lower capacity. The cylindrical Cyclone is sealed and can sustain a pressure of up to 3.5 Bar (50 psi). A pressurized cell assists in the recombination of gases.

Observe the battery temperature, voltage and current during charge. Charge only at ambient temperatures and in a ventilated room. Once the battery is fully charged and the current has dropped to 3% of the rated current, the charge is completed. A good car battery will drop to about 40mA when fully charged; a bad battery may not fall below 100mA.

After full charge, remove the battery from the charger. If float charge is needed for operational readiness, lower the charge voltage to about 13.50V (2.25V/cell). Most chargers perform this function automatically. The float charge can be applied for an unlimited time.
State-of-charge reading based on terminal voltage

The state-of-charge of a lead-acid battery can, to a certain extent, be estimated by measuring the open terminal voltage. Prior to measuring, the battery must have rested for 4-8 hours after charge or discharge and resided at a steady room temperature. A cold battery would show slightly higher voltages and a hot battery would be lower. Plate additions of calcium and antimony will also vary the open terminal voltage with calcium being a little higher than antimony. Furthermore, AGM has a higher voltage plateau than the flooded lead acid and the readings on Figure 3 may not apply for AGM systems. Due to surface charge, a brief charge will raise the terminal voltage and provide inflated state-of-charge reading. For example, a 30 minute charge could wrongly indicate 100% SoC if no rest is applied.

With sufficient rest and stable temperature, voltage measurements provide an amazingly accurate SoC estimation for lead acid batteries. It is important that the battery is free of polarization. If connected in a system, such as in a car, there are steady auxiliary loads, not to mention frequent starting and driving.



Figure 3: BCI standard for SoC estimation of a 12V flooded lead acid car battery.

Test the battery at room temperature. Allow 4-8 hour of rest after charge or discharge.
Courtesy of BCI
12.65V =100%
12.45V=75%
12.24V=50%
12.06V=25%
11.89V or less=Discharged


Note: The BCI readings apply to flooded batteries with antimony doping. Calcium will raise the voltage by 5 - 8%. Calcium is commonly used for maintenance-free lead acid batteries.
After charge or discharge, allow the battery to rest for a minimum of eight hours before assessing the state-of-charge by measuring the terminal voltage.


Battery as a buffer

While dwelling on float-charge, an external load can be connected to a lead-acid battery. In such a case, the battery acts as a buffer. Micro-towers on cell sites work this way. During off-peak periods, the batteries get fully charged. On peak traffic times, the load exceeds the net supply provided by the rectifier (charger) and the battery supplies the extra energy. A car battery works in a similar way.

When configuring a battery as a buffer, make certain that the battery has the opportunity to fully charge between loads. The net charge must be greater than what is drawn from the battery. Some chargers switch to fast charge after a deep discharge, others simply use the float charge to recharge. Allow up to 48 hours to fully recharge on float charge. Deep discharges should be avoided if possible. Assure that the float charge voltage is set correctl]


Moderator, pls edit as appropriate.