SCR or FET R/R on M620?

[Syscrush]

Here you go:

Nice.  All that gear behind that big fairing plus the handguards give your bike a kind of taped glasses geek cred that I wouldn't expect from a Monster.

Like Howie, I'm running the Ducati OEM VR, which is a later version than the one that got so much flack on DesmoTimes book.  I removed the oil vapor separator under the seat and fabbed a mount for the VR so it is upside down exposed to whatever airflow is between the tire and the seatpan.  It has two extra braided ground straps and the spade connector has dielectric grease to protect it.  Even then, one terminal was beginning to show burn signs.  If I'm still running this next year, I may cut out the connector and solder the wires  together.

That stuff will all help, but to me increasing airflow/cooling is a bit of a band-aid solution.  Of course, a lot of the time all you need is a band-aid.

I'm not an EE but when I had the CBR600RR unit on my SV, it would hold a rock-steady 14.4V from idle to redline and in the driveway it stayed cool enough that you could hold your hand on it for as long as you want.

The 1st gen SV had a similar lack of cooling air for the R/R, and some folks do take the approach of mounting it to an Al heat sink, moving it out into airflow, or even adding a CPU cooling fan.  Others wire it straight to the battery with 10ga wire (and a 30A fuse), or add better ground straps, etc.  All of these things help and will keep the SCR R/R alive longer than it would last otherwise - maybe longer than the rest of the bike.

Still, my own experience with the FET R/R was so compelling that I consider this swap to be cheap insurance.

You may want to also check these other threads from our friends Down Under:

Thanks.

[Syscrush]

OK, I've got an FH008 on its way up from the states.  I'll update here in a couple of weeks once I've had a chance to install it.

[Syscrush]

Anyone familiar with Rick's Motorsport Electrics R/R?

The site says "Hot Shot Rectifier-Regulator: Designed with Mosfet technology."

Of course, the ElectroSport unit uses MOSFETs too but doesn't do away with the SCR's.  Since this is a similar (but slightly higher) pricepoint, it's hard to know what to think.

Moot point for me since my FH008 is Toronto-bound as we speak, but still worth looking into.

[Speeddog]

Just for the record, what is an FH008?

[greenmonster]

It's a Shindengen reg/rec from a CBR 1000.

[Syscrush]

It's a Shindengen reg/rec from a CBR 1000.

It's used on other models, too - Honda, Kawi, and I don't know what others.  It's an all-MOSFET design so it keeps cooler and holds a steadier output voltage than the R/Rs that use SCRs.

These R/Rs work on the same principle as the stocker: rectify the incoming A/C voltage and shunt off current to ground when the voltage exceeds some threshold.  But the MOSFET transistors manage to do this in a way that is more efficient than SCRs aka thyristors.

[greenmonster]

These R/Rs work on the same principle as the stocker: rectify the incoming A/C voltage and shunt off current to ground when the voltage exceeds some threshold.  But the MOSFET transistors manage to do this in a way that is more efficient than SCRs aka thyristors.

I`m certainly no electrics expert but from what I`ve read,
FET just stops excess charging, therefore no heat to get rid of via ground.

[Syscrush]

I`m certainly no electrics expert but from what I`ve read,
FET just stops excess charging, therefore no heat to get rid of via ground.

I think maybe you're thinking of an alternator that controls the field to prevent excess charging.  The rotor/stator setup in these bikes is going to generate the same amount of voltage on its output regardless of what R/R system is downstream of it.

[Syscrush]

OK, I've got an FH008 on its way up from the states.  I'll update here in a couple of weeks once I've had a chance to install it.

It arrived yesterday - I'm a bit busy these days but I'll put it in and snaps some pics of the process sometime this month.

[Cider]

I just put one of D'Ecosse's R/R kits on my gen1 SV track bike a couple weeks ago.  Worked like a charm.

He posted some good information on how to diagnose the charging system and swap out the R/R here: http://eviltwinsbk.com/forumz/index.php?PHPSESSID=8c0c25dde3a35b11563ef004e2dd0f3d&topic=276.0

[Syscrush]

I just put one of D'Ecosse's R/R kits on my gen1 SV track bike a couple weeks ago.  Worked like a charm.

He posted some good information on how to diagnose the charging system and swap out the R/R here: http://eviltwinsbk.com/forumz/index.php?PHPSESSID=8c0c25dde3a35b11563ef004e2dd0f3d&topic=276.0

D'Ecosse is the man.  Anything I say about R/R's that turns out to be true is due to him.