I spent a couple hours working on my motorcycle last night. The battery doesn’t charge while riding, and runs down after a day or two. Replacing the battery did not solve the problem, so I’ve been plugging it in to a charger every night. Jenna suggested that the regulator might be at fault; this made sense so I ordered a new one, which arrived yesterday.

I rode over to the Rocket Factory after work, stopping for a brief visit with Ava. It was really nice to roll into a warm, well-lit, well-equipped shop and go to work, without having to sit on gravel or improvise work lights or make do with an inadequate toolbox. The old regulator had fallen off the battery box and was hanging free inside the body of the bike, so I had to scrounge up some appropriate bolts and bushings for the new one. After hooking it up, I poked around with a multimeter, and found that the voltage is now 12.8 at idle and about 14 at 2000 rpm. This is still a little on the low side, but should be enough to keep the battery charged, so I’m going to stop using the charger for a couple of days and see what happens.

I also replaced the speedometer cable, but that did nothing to solve the speedometer problem. I’m not sure whether the issue is with the speedometer itself or with the sender gear in the front wheel hub.