The usual Shorai woes

So that's it. After three years of investment and perseverance with the Shorai battery system I've finally decided to call it a day.

Another week of trying to start the bike in the winter cold and find that the battery is not able to start the bike - despite being on the Shorai charger for a few days doing it's usual diagnostic check, mad beeping, flashing lights etc. Went to the KTM dealers this morning and checked out the price of a new KTM battery - £140+ so I bought a Yamaha battery which is the same for just over £50.

I'll be fitting it tomorrow along with a trickle charge lead and junking the Shorai and it's bespoke lead and super expensive charger/tender.

Here ends the long saga of Shorai ownership. I can't really say it was a positive experience.

Anyone want to buy my charger and leads - and even the two batteries I have. I don't think they are unusable - just not good for the cold British climate.

To be fair, the battery and charger work OK if you use the bike regularly (which I have done for several years) but if you leave it for a few weeks like I've just done they are shit IMO.

It took four hours to fit the new battery. Four hours in the freezing cold lying on the ground working on the worst job the Superduke has to offer in the way of maintenance. I curse the KTM designers for this one! Didn't help that the rear bolt for the belly-pan was corroded tight and I had to saw a screwdriver slot to remove.

On removal I saw that the Shorai had basically split along its casing at the seam and was full of water - another fail for this overpriced piece of shit. Not recommended.

After five years in a lovely heated triple garage workshop having to work outside at the front of this rented house is the low point for me.

Bic, that bottom picture is just depressing.

Sorry to see your workshop situation, hope you are able to get yourself into a better one soon...

In any case, I was curious about your Shorai situation, I realise you are probably over them, but my buds and I have been running them for years in our race dirtbikes with very few if any bad situations. I forgot to put the tender on my button-only 450sx and ended up sitting the bike for about 3 months. Fired right up with a touch of a button. I was wondering if maybe it has something to do with the crappy 990SD battery location, so I had a look at the Shorai faq. Note that I'm not picking on Bic, just a possible fyi for other Shorai owners, and I'll be moving to a much colder clime soon, so getting myself ready as well.



A couple popped out, under "Water/Corrosion" there was ..."we highly suggest application of sealant to fill the horizontal seam between top and bottom of the battery case..." right where he said his had split... hmmmm.... will be doing this mod in the very near future.

Under "Cold Weather," "...it is good for the batteries to flow some current before cranking in cold weather..." I didn't know that before and might be useful in the future. They even say to leave the lights on for as long a 5 minutes in very cold temperatures, interesting.

Our Florida-grown Battery Tender is pretty much the gold standard around here, I just noticed they have versions with solar panels too:



HTH

Interesting that they accept that their battery isn't waterproof!

The SD battery and regulator position is an appalling travesty of bad thinking IMO.

I guess two bad designs maybe equal a big problem. I'm just happy to be back with a good old lead/aid battery that cost a third of a Shorai.

It does weigh a lot though!

Sorry to hear of your hassles.... nothing worse than an unreliable bike.

For me I've had an excellent experience with LI-Ion and LifePO4 batteries.

I've had the Shorai LifePO4 in my SD990 for 8 months now and haven't had any issues yet (touch wood). But the bike isn't idle much as I ride about 250km's a week, every week.
The bike starts quickly each and every time. It doesn't really get that cold here though and my bike is garaged every night and at work as well.
Coldest I've ridden in last Winter was 5.8C but its more often 10-12 most Winter mornings.

Have to totally agree that battery access and reg positioning is crap on the SD990. Great for weight distribution perhaps, but all that wiring down there with the amount of water that must get in... well.. it can only lead to troubles.

I had the Li-Ion Battery in a Blackbird for 3.5 years and a Li-on battery in a WR450F for 1 year (until I sold them both). They worked great .
Both bikes could be idle for a while but would start without any issues at all.
I did read that they can have issue when its cold and a pre charge may be necessary but never had to do this myself.
I don't run any tenders either (never needed one luckily).

I almost wonder if the battery started out in the tail section in very early prototypes, then someone in the back said, "Umm we need a safe spot for a canister full of gasoline fumes to sit..."

edit: Being stuck on a work problem got me daydreaming as always... I also wonder how feasible it would be to run some extra wire to the tail and mount a modern lightweight battery there, for those of us who have done the canisterectomy, (about everyone).

I might be interested in the charger/tender price depending, had one in for a couple of years and although it has run low a couple of times a good run has bought it back. Been off it for a while sick so was intending to use a smart charger for a top up. But drop me a PM with what you want for it..