Forza failure on Sunday - any ideas what happened?

[matthew3774]

I ride a 2015 Forza as a courier, covering tens of thousands of urban miles. Last Sunday I was at some traffic lights, the start/stop had activated, and when I went to twist the throttle to leave the lights nothing happened, I looked down and blank dashboard. Oh shit. Pulled it off the road and when I keyed on the abs light was on dimly, then after over a minute suddenly the fuel pump would whir, and the dashboard would come back to life. A few attempts of starting the engine (many times it would kill the dashboard when I pressed the starter, or just do nothing) later and I managed to finally resurrect it, and ride 13 miles home as quickly as possible! It seemed to have a bit more juice after the 13 mile ride home (as in when I turned the key it was coming to life normally) but then soon after it began doing the same thing again.

Next day a local mechanic comes and takes the battery out and back to the workshop, comes back later and tells me the battery is dead, only had a tiny bit of charge, when they charged it it said it was fully charged way too quickly when it wasn't actually fully charged, etc, basically it was shot. So I got myself a new battery the other day, installed it and its been fine since then (a day of riding), starting as normal straight away.

I am posting on here because I am still a bit uneasy about how it initially failed in the first place. Yes the bike is 7 years old and as far as I know never had a battery change before, but how does it just suddenly fail one day like that? Could there be another part of the bike that caused this, for example a dodgy alternator not feeding enough current back into the battery, or maybe faulty and feeding back a little bit of AC into the battery, thus damaging it?

[Jge64]

Seven years is a long time for a battery. Batteries in these bikes are not particularly robust, and just from constant use they wear out for lack of a better explanation. In warmer climates there are people that only get 3 to 4 years out of a battery. Yes, batteries can spontaneously fail, all at once, with nothing else wrong with the bike.

[matthew3774]

Seven years is a long time for a battery. Batteries in these bikes are not particularly robust, and just from constant use they wear out for lack of a better explanation. In warmer climates there are people that only get 3 to 4 years out of a battery. Yes, batteries can spontaneously fail, all at once, with nothing else wrong with the bike.

Yeah I did think 7 years was good and tbh it was probably going to fail at some point soon anyway. However I've decided to borrow a multimeter and test the new battery and charging system of the bike tomorrow, connect multimeter to the battery terminals, check voltage, then check voltage when starter is pressed, then check voltage when engine is running to see if the stator is doing its job charging the battery, then check the voltage with just over 5000rpm put through the bike on the centre stand, to make sure the regulator isn't failing and overcharging (and therefore damaging) the battery.

May seem a bit excessive, I know many folks would just shove a new battery in and call it a day, but I'm pretty sure my regular mechanic will be able to quickly shove a multimeter on the battery and read off some voltages free of charge, its a 5 minute procedure, so I thought why not, I might as well test it and make sure its all working and charging up the battery properly!

[mymitzi]

Got Forza when it was 2 years old. Sat outside those two years in O/P back yard. Believe that may have been a factor??
Stranded me twice actually 3 times. First time, hauled to dealer. They said they could find nothing wrong with it...........
Saw that the fuel pump [recall] hadn't been done and said they would keep it for a week and ride it every day to see if the
problem would resurface, to which I agreed. Rode it for a pretty long time [months] and all was fine till it wasn't. Same
intermittent issue. Once again after being hauled to dealer [around closing time] the next morning started right up.
Went back and got it. The third time...........waited so long for the tow.........decided to try starting it ......just because........yup
started right up ........no problem! Took out all the fuses at home and noticed corrosion on them cleaned and put dielectric
grease on them.........been a year or so.........not totally confident that was it??

[jimmyb]

Batteries fail slowly over time, however, you will suddenly reach a point where in one moment it was okay and the next not. If you do short hops with the engine on and off regularly, this is ultimately when it will fail.

[gn2]

but how does it just suddenly fail one day like that?

The ECU constantly checks the battery for voltage.
There's a set level below which the ECU decides it won't play any more.
When the battery gets to that level it's like hitting a switch, everything just stops working.
So your symptoms are nothing to worry about, its just normal operation.
Ride with confidence and enjoy.