On a 09 EG classic

Getting the click....click .... sound when trying to start it.

Been thru the loop of thinking my battery, charging etc might have been the issue, i.e. thought the batt was low.

But now i have a full charge on it, it is my 1st start of the season so it has been sitting.

Anyway when talking to someone else they said maybe the solenoid was sticking and try to give it a light tap, ( I do remember doing that in the day, with cars) I did tap it a bit but nothing yet still clicking.

Anyone have experience with this ?
I don't have a manual yet, so not sure how hard it is to remove it and/or the starter.

Any other possibilities , tricks to try , or troubleshooting ?

 

If the battery holds the charge then I would try changing out the relays, they're only 6 bucks or so. Or if u have a voltmeter just touch the tip right on the metal where the wire plugs into the starter where the solenoid is. If u get 12 volts there then the solenoid is not making contact or damaged and you probably need to pull it.

 

Jump you car battery onto the bike battery. If it starts, your battery may be the 12.7 volts but it has no amps (warn out) The click is probably the relay in the fuse box. However with low amps, it does not have the power to draw the coil in and hit the big contacts. Have you removed and reattached the cables at the battery. Worry about starter when all else is OK. Starters are tough. However some people do not hole them in long enough and hit the starter switch 3 or 4 times starting. They get 1/4 of the life out of a starter if you just crank it till it starts. If you are a one cranker, you starter is good for 50K+

my canned answer for battery info

After a good 24 hour low amp controlled charge and the battery has set about 2 hours voltage should be about 12.8 volts.

12.8 = full charged

12.6 = 75%

12.3 = 50%

12.0 =25%

With a DC volt meter hooked across the battery terminals and reading 12.8 or so, crank motor and while its cranking it should not drop below about 9.6 volts and as soon as it starts and throttled up to 2000 rpm or so should read around 14.8 volts. The crank check shows a rough check of the reserve amperage capacity of the battery while cranking with a 150-200 amp load on it. The 14.8 shows a good alternator and if you leave it on a while as the regulatory will drop the voltage a little showing itself working. However, with the lights and stuff always on it will never drop back much.
When a battery wears out a good charge will show fairly good voltage, but the battery can still have very low amperage capacity which will show in the crude crank test above, but it really should be checked after a good charge by removing it from bike and getting a free check at a place like AutoZone that has a fancy load meter check that gives you a print out of the battery health. Battery MUST BE CHARGED to check it. Be sure they set their meter to correct cold cranking amperage stated on the battery. Never charge the AGM absorbed glass mat battery with a regular car battery charger. Also by taking battery out you know you have good connections. Vibration tends to loosen the connections or a little corrosion will prevent charging or cause starting problems. Using the maintenance charger can get 5 years from a battery but be careful here. You do not want the last start 5 miles from home. If it still grunts when you first hit starter or kicks back, replace it. After a few years, charge and pull battery and have it checked for cold cranking amperage ever spring. If they have one, Wal-Mart's AGM absorbed glass mat battery is just as good as any one's for half the money. Do not jump, push start or run bike with a half dead battery. It will kill alternator stator or the voltage regulator or both. Probably a $500 repair.

 

Which relays ?

p.s. the bat is new this winter and the Tender says it's charged.
like I said you can hear the sol spinning/clicking.... would the relay make that kind of noise ?

 

The relay he is referring to is the small black cube about 3/4 x 3/4" in the fuse box. It only makes a light clicks. Should be two, probably both the same. One is the start and the other is the system(ecm) both usually have a 3 second timer for fuel pump and are interchangeable. What you are hearing is confusing sounding. The solenoid does not spin. It is a electrical magnet that when voltage from the relay is applied pulls the center iron plunger in pushing the starter gear in. Right before it goes in, that large contact on the solenoid hits and that takes apx 150 amps load to spin the starter motor. It's reduction geared to spin the drive gear that turn the big ring gear on the clutch drum. The gear has a sprag clutch. If the gas motor start and runs faster then the starter, the sprag clutch runs up a ramp and disengages the electric motor to keep it from spinning to fast and blowing the armature apart.

 

New battery rules that out. So starter relay could be bad (under seat near battery on mine) or testing voltage to the starter where the relay wire plugs in the starter as I mentioned. That will give your answer. Touch a voltmeter to the metal around that wire contact area, hit the start button and see what voltage u get. This is how I found out my starter contacts were toast last year.

 

After looking at several things, I did take the batt out and had it tested at the local parts store.
It was at a low charge.
Of course I would have done this much sooner, but since it was a new batt from this fall, I figured it should be fine.

Some things I learned and questions;

one guy at the parts store said not to use a old style batt charger, and that you should use a new digital one that says it will do AGM batteries...

Which then brought up the question about using a Tender on it, will that work as well ?


So I'm going to get a new batt, just wondering why it wasn't charged, had it on the Tender, and also, did put it on my regular charger for a while.
So either these are different animals as far as charging, or I have a drain somewhere...

 

There is nothing magic about AGM. It's just a mat between the cells that absorbs the liquid. You battery had simple sulfated. It had correct voltage but simple no amps. The correct voltage tricked the regular charger to show OK. The tender is simple a low amps slow system that make it somewhat safer. If you had a DC meter and had left the battery off the charger a day or so, it probably would have showed the low charge in it's DC volts as referenced in post 3 above. I also misread your charge in post one thinking you charged it correctly. Harley's batteries say only use maintenance chargers. Left on for a few days may have brought a fairly new battery back but it does take a while. You probably should maintenance charge once a month if bike is not used. The ECM is always draining battery and the alarm till it goes into hibernation but I think that takes a month