reading about Shindengen regulator

[andy york]

I thought it was an interesting read. Roadster cycles.com. I'm toying with the idea of this unit since I found 4 old stock ones under the workbench.

The part about a balanced system was good. As designed, the electrical system is balanced so that it only has to get rid of 

a couple of amps of unwanted power. When we start changing that we upset the "balance". All the stuff we do to reduce the the amount of energy 

our bikes consume upsets the balnce. LED headlights, running lights, etc...reduces the amount of power needed but increases the amount of 

amps that needs to be sent to ground and that in turn creates more heat.

Now, I don't know what a good balance would be or even how to achieve it .....

 

[Kiwi_Roy]

The OEM Ducati Energia didn't send Amps to ground, it just let the circuit go open circuit.

[luhbo]

Yep. Sending or wasting surplus energy to ground was funny English pre-war technology. They had bikes with heated foot pegs for this. 

Balancing was necessary with magnets-based light/spark installations on light 50cc bikes. Rather tricky systems, but light and cheap.

Which site is still spreading such things in context with modern bikes?

[68C]

Do I spot a reference to the zener diode bolted to the Norton Commando RH footrest carrier?

[luhbo]

Not sure about the details. I think I read about big resistors bolted to the pegs resp. the carriers