AK 550 and battery drain

[rjs987]

In many of the reviews I've read on the Kymco AK 550 there was mention how this scooter seemed to drain the battery rather quickly. Just recently I watched a video for Bike Trips from 2018 where the owner had his heated grips replaced with the (then) new and improved version. While this warranty service was being done his dealer also replaced a few other things under warranty and updated the firmware for the scooter electrical boxes. One item that was mentioned in particular was that the TPMS was "fixed" with the update that turned that system off when the bike was off. IOW, TPMS was no longer always on... draining the battery. There are a few other electrical systems that can cause phantom battery loads that will run down the battery. One is the Welcome screen function. It essentially makes the Noodoe screen on the scooter glow on and off a few times when you are close. The bike BT has to constantly sense or look for a BT connection with your phone for this option to work. This is one of the phantom loads on the battery. I turned that option off. You have to open the Noodoe app on your phone to turn it off and then turn on the bike to get the change. I didn't see the need for it in any of my situations since I don't park my scooter in such a large parking lot that I need a glowing screen to find it. Besides, there is still the Find My Scooter function in the Noodoe app so there is still something locating my AK to tell that app where it is. WiFi, BT, don't know which? It also must have other sensors running all the time to be able to sense the proximity of the remote fob in order to turn on in the first place. These all must be very low power or the battery would be run down rather quickly. It is not.

Anyway, there have been improvements in phantom loads causing the battery to be run down faster than on other bikes or scooters. From what I can gather the biggest improvements happened with those changes, some of which I didn't mention, that happened in 2018. Some more since then.

Just to see for myself how my own AK 550 battery held a charge... or not... I've been not connecting my Battery Tender Plus during all this week. I'm planning to continue to not plug it in for the whole month just to watch and see what happens. So far I've gone for a few rides during this week with 3 days between rides once, 2 days between rides once, and each day otherwise. I've turned the bike on each day to look at the voltage level indicated. Right after each ride, after a rest of maybe 10 minutes, the voltage level indicated about 12.7 v or 12.9 v. By several hours later the voltage level is indicated to be 12.3 v, and if I watch it for a few minutes it actually increases to 12.4 v rather consistently. Even after turning on the bike to check air pressure just before I go for a ride I'll leave the bike on while I adjust the psi in each tire and the indicated voltage seems to sit at 12.3 v or 12.4 v the entire time I'm letting air into or out of the tires.

This issue was one of my very minor concerns with the AK 550 and through what I've been doing this week and will continue to do the rest of the month I am feeling like it may possibly be a non-issue now with changes Kymco has done to address this. I'll report more later if I experience any change to how it has been going so far.

Just FYI for those who might be interested.

[Stig / Major Tom]

Just an FYI....
Are summaries possible for these....?
ie. You do or don't have a battery drain?
Stig

[rjs987]

Just an FYI....
Are summaries possible for these....?
ie. You do or don't have a battery drain?
Stig

So far there doesn't seem to be any battery drain or phantom load at this time. Or perhaps it's so low I haven't detected it yet. Any bike with any electronic or electrical gadget that is on standby all the time... like a clock or a sensor waiting for some event... has a drain if only minor.

[rjs987]

Update on the testing I've been doing. It's been 5 days since my last ride so I'm seeing a little progress on what to expect. My experience with my Burgman 650 as well as other bikes I've owned is very similar to what I am seeing with my AK 550. Similar but not exactly the same. All my prior bikes would indicate a reduced battery charge after a week of no riding. Since I didn't have a volt meter built in on any other bike I didn't take a read on what the battery voltage would drop to. I was never really concerned about it. But I did see the resulting effect that was due to lower battery power output after those bikes would sit for several days without running. IOW- they would all take a bit more to get started after sitting for 5-7 days or longer. I don't remember which bike it was but there was one or two cases where I was unable to get a bike started so had to connect my battery maintainer to the bike for a time just to bring the battery back to where I could start it. I believe that was after sitting for more than 2 weeks when there was a long period of snow bound streets (we've had a few years when that has happened before I retired). I seem to remember that was more recent so would have been with the Burgman 650, though it might also have been with my CTX1300. So really it is not unusual for a bike battery to run down somewhat if it sits for a time. Even my car batteries do the same since one of my cars rarely gets used, but having a much bigger battery it takes longer to run down enough to prevent starting it.

Anyway, after 5 days of no riding I do have some result on my AK 550 that would seem to indicate what to expect. I've been turning on the AK every day and toggling through the indicators on the dash to give it a moment to settle and to watch what the temps are doing to the tire psi since that part of the display is used to toggle from Volts, to mpg, to front tire psi to rear tire psi to Volts again. Day one and two when I first turn on the AK it showed 12.3 v and after a few seconds it would actually increase to 12.4 v. I guess that's the result of the battery being cold and then having a very slight charge run through it by turning it on making the true voltage show. Days three and four the AK initially would show 12.2 v and then go to 12.3 v in a few seconds and stay there. I even opened the seat latch to put something in there and also let some air out of the tires and put some back into the tires and the volts stayed at 12.3 v on those days. Day 5, today, I saw the display show 12.1 v and then jump up to 12.2 v and again I added some air to the tires and still saw 12.2 v with a very brief jumping between that and 12.3 v, but mostly sitting at 12.2 v, the entire time I had the bike turned on. I had it turned on for about 10 minutes today. I decided to see how it started after sitting for 5 days and after that 10 minutes past with it turned on. It started right up like it always has with no hesitation so that tells me that the battery still had plenty of power after sitting off the BT+ for 5 days without being run to start and run fine. I watched the volt meter while letting it run for another 5 minutes and it started at 12.9 and immediately ran up to 14.1 volts and stayed there while the AK engine was running. After I stopped the engine and waited about 30 seconds it was showing 12.5 v so I turned it all off and left it unplugged still.

I am being convinced that there is no battery run-down issue with this bike any more than many other bikes I've known and the bad reputation about that issue stems from the initial model years 2017-2018 before the firmware updates and changes that turned off the TPMS and other features while the bike is not running. I will continue to monitor and will likely end up regularly plugging my AK into the BT+ in the future after I am done with this test period.

So far what all this means is that I have nothing to fear about going on the camping trips I usually go on each year. I usually do ride every day I am out on these trips but no worry about letting the bike sit without being started if that were ever to happen on one of these trips.

[jermwars]

Day one and two when I first turn on the AK it showed 12.3 v and after a few seconds it would actually increase to 12.4 v. I guess that's the result of the battery being cold and then having a very slight charge run through it by turning it on making the true voltage show. Days three and four the AK initially would show 12.2 v and then go to 12.3 v in a few seconds and stay there. I even opened the seat latch to put something in there and also let some air out of the tires and put some back into the tires and the volts stayed at 12.3 v on those days. Day 5, today, I saw the display show 12.1 v and then jump up to 12.2 v and again I added some air to the tires and still saw 12.2 v with a very brief jumping between that and 12.3 v, but mostly sitting at 12.2 v, the entire time I had the bike turned on.

Mine was showing the same voltage...12.2 then 12.3 after the prime/ect when turning on with the stock battery. Replaced it with a low end battery and it bumped up to 12.5-12.6 which it still considerably lower than my other bikes.

The lithium battery satisfied my OCD nicely...now its 13.2-13.3 every day and operates at 14.1-14.2 just like im used to.

Probably would have been just fine with the original battery, but thats entirely beside the point

[rjs987]

I do believe there is slightly more draw on the AK battery than on most bikes even though it is tolerable to me for now. I also note that this battery is different than what I am used to, at least the model is different. The stock battery is a Kymco/Yuasa TTZ12S. One of the replacement batteries for this AK 550 is the Yuasa YTZ12S. So that may be the difference. I'm not familiar with the TTZ series but have used the YTZ series. Per the Yuasa web site they state that their batteries will naturally discharge between .5% to 1% per day when not in use. This is in fact what I am seeing. That is, a battery that is initially at rest showing 12.6 v will then drop to approximately 12.475 v after one day, 12.35 v on day two, 12.225 v on day three, and 12.1 v on day four. This is for a battery just sitting there not being used according to Yuasa. And I know there is likely electrical drains happening on this bike that may be a little bit more than older bikes, but also likely the same as newer more modern bikes with a lot of the newer gadgets installed. I have decided to end this testing of my battery since it is apparent that it is really not draining more than would be expected for a modern bike with a lot of electrical gadgets. Noodoe alone uses battery constantly to maintain screens and settings so that right there would be more than older bikes with no more than a clock and trip meters to maintain (which are all also on the AK).

[rjs987]

Mine was showing the same voltage...12.2 then 12.3 after the prime/ect when turning on with the stock battery. Replaced it with a low end battery and it bumped up to 12.5-12.6 which it still considerably lower than my other bikes.

The lithium battery satisfied my OCD nicely...now its 13.2-13.3 every day and operates at 14.1-14.2 just like im used to.

Probably would have been just fine with the original battery, but thats entirely beside the point

Didn't find if you posted earlier what battery model number you initially put in? Not the Lithium but the one in between the OEM and the Lithium.
Looks like a Yuasa YTZ14S battery would fit and has 230 CCA instead of 210 CCA. Slightly higher Ah than the YTZ12S (11.8/20hrs vs 11.6/20hrs). Otherwise the same specs for what really matters.
Just looking around for that time when I'll need to replace. I will still stay with the OEM until time comes when it needs to be replaced.

[jermwars]

Didn't find if you posted earlier what battery model number you initially put in? Not the Lithium but the one in between the OEM and the Lithium.
Looks like a Yuasa YTZ14S battery would fit and has 230 CCA instead of 210 CCA. Slightly higher Ah than the YTZ12S (11.8/20hrs vs 11.6/20hrs). Otherwise the same specs for what really matters.
Just looking around for that time when I'll need to replace. I will still stay with the OEM until time comes when it needs to be replaced.

The Mighty Max Battery YTZ14S 12V 11.2Ah 230CCA was the one i got to replace the Yuasa TTZ14S that was in there...must have changed is since the last service manual edition that calls out Yuasa TTZ12S...I would have guessed the Yuasa to be the better unit just based on price and Japanese mfg

[Stig / Major Tom]

The Mighty Max Battery YTZ14S 12V 11.2Ah 230CCA was the one i got to replace the Yuasa TTZ14S that was in there...must have changed is since the last service manual edition that calls out Yuasa TTZ12S...I would have guessed the Yuasa to be the better unit just based on price and Japanese mfg

I dropped the Yuasa YTZ14 into my LIKE200I 's battery box, replacing the stock Kymco 8. Only needed to trim 5mm off the hold-down posts under the lid.
VERY healthy EFI starts miles from home on 25°F dawns.
Stig