This years Shorai shenanigans

Living in Bristol without a garage means that I have a rented storage unit a few miles away from my house, not great but better than nothing.

Trouble is it has no power supply so now of course my Superduke is sitting there with it's vulnerable Shorai battery just waiting for the cold weather to kick in and fail me one morning. I've been popping in at regular intervals just to fire the bike up and satisfy myself that it works OK. But today it wouldn't, (it's very cold) and despite every trick I have learned about pre-warming the bike will not fire up. If I was at my old house I'd have simply kept the bike on trickle charge but I can't do this here. Neither can I now just plug in and recharge the battery. I've looked at solar powered chargers but they are not suitable for the Shorai type units.

So I now have three options. Take the battery out, bring it home, charge it up and then go reinstall it - which you all know is a time consuming pain in the ass. Or I could replace the Shorai with my old lead/acid battery for the winter. Except that is also dead and will need recharging anyway, maybe it's really dead and I would need to buy a new battery. Or the third option is to push the bike home where I can just hook up my Shorai charger to the bike by running a power lead out the window to the street. Lock-up unit to my house is 1.4 miles But it's pretty flat

My son is staying this weekend so he's volunteered to help me do the push option. We're sitting down to a good Sunday lunch then we're going to go for it. Not sure whether it will be easy with two or not. Hope so.

Push bike aw Fook That
Personally i would buy a cheap generator to fully charge the battery,just running the bike wont full charge the battery.
Once a month go to the garage n fire up the generator n charge the battery.
Or find a garage closer to you house.

Mission accomplished!

Two people pushing it was easy. But that was only after we set off and I was thinking, "Jeez, this bike is hard to steer!" and then realised that the front tyre was flat.

Had to ride back home on the Kawasaki, get a pump, and ride back. I left Ruben to inflate the tyre whilst I put up the other bike back in the shed. When I got back he said, "How much pressure do you want in it? I've pumped it up to 65psi already". He was going to put about 100psi in like he does with his pushbikes!

Anyway, got home in about 20 minutes and now the bike is on charge so hope it's all OK tomorrow.





Joe, the problem with a petrol generator idea is that you need to trickle charge these batteries overnight really. A few hours isn't enough to get them diagnosed and charged up and I'm not going to sit around a lock up for 12 hours pouring petrol into a generator! There aren't any garages closer to where I live, this is about as good as it gets.

Your bike reminds me of that scene from the movie "Spinal Tap". "How much more black could this album cover be? And the answer is none, none more black"

Love seeing pics of your bike Bic.

Cheers Aphex.

You know, in other lives I am not so black.

In the world of Kawasaki triples I am a fan of sparkling, metal flake purple, gold and green. I love the nineteen-seventies psychedelic colour and vibe.

In the world of Ducati I am a fan of red (obviously) and the classic green, red, white, tri-colour.

In the world of Yamaha it has to be yellow and black and white speed block only.

But I do like the KTM orange brand colour and what it stands for. As a brand designer I understand its power and ability to be distinctive and differentiated.

But it is not for me. I like the SD aesthetics and styling with black. Always have done since the bike was launched. For me the styling and shape of the SD is about stealth, menace, foreboding, power, darkness.

So I like to make this more with black parts, carbon and generally getting rid of distracting shit like brand logos. My bike does have a lot of performance 'bling" that makes it a better bike but I de-brand it all make it part of the whole. That is why there is no room in my world for rim-tape and crap like that.

I have a anti gravity xp-10 jump pack.
Not only starts the bike but with start anything you can think of.
Hook it right to tender lead !!!!
Got mine on flea bay 139 bucks.
What i really like is the size of the unit.

If there is a unit like this that is guaranteed to wok with a Shorai battery I'd be very interested in hearing about it.

What I'd like, is not some crude "crocodile clip" jumps system but a more sophisticated method of plugging in my Shorai lead into a 'boost unit' (that didn't require conventional 240 volt mains input) that would make me capable of riding in the winter - whatever the weather or temperature.

Well FWIW, I'm liking the all black look myself

What if you purchased another battery, kept it on charge at home and then boosted the installed battery through the tender lead left on the bike. You could determine if an inexpensive lead acid booster battery is okay to install as a booster to cut down on buying two lithium iron batteries.

If it were me I would buy a big cheap lead acid car battery and jump the bike from that when starting cold. This can be done without much hassle and once running I'm sure it would be fine.

If the car battery ever went flat a cheap charger at home solves the problem

Yes, I've come to the same conclusion myself. I'm currently trying to work out whether I can plug a booster battery to jump-start direct into the Shorai charge socket or whether I'll will have to hard wire in another set of conventional battery leads that are easily accessible. The problem is that the Shorai charge socket has more than an earth and live wire connected to it and I don't know what they are all for.

Don't think Shorai advise battery jump starting - once fully charged, wouldn't just disconnecting the battery earth at the rhs of the frame solve problem?