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[another Allan]

Thanks Aethelric.

I've heard of needle probes used with a meter, so I'll give it a try.

[Jamesy]

What workshop manual is that? A needle,wire and insulating tape? totally unnecessary.There are plenty of connectors on an Enfield to check voltage and continuity.Sorry I would rather do it my way than start piercing insulation on any electrical cables.

[Aethelric]

This manual Jamesy.

Each to his own on the needle probes.

Cheers, A

[Jamesy]

And on the previous page this very brief explanation.

[Jamesy]

As you can see from your diagram the AC voltage in the first instance is fed to the bridge rectifier then smoothed and zener regulated for delivery to the battery.All really basic stuff.

[Aethelric]

Well Jamesy you can either believe the explanation on page 61, or believe the schematic on page 62 which is pretty unambiguous. Also it states "the regulator can be disconnected from the circuit and charging will take place without any regulation of current." It could not do that if the regulator was after the rectifier.

The manual IS a bit flakey, I don't think it mentions the regulator for the AC lighting at all and the diagram is for DC only system.
However that is the regulator method that most fairly low power motorcycle regulators work nowadays although the rectifier and regulator are usually mounted together in the same package.

Cheers

A

[Aethelric]

Jamesy, that zener is not regulating by itself. It is feeding a signal back to the thyristors SCR1 and SCR2. R1 and R2 will be chosen to compensate for variations in the zener, They are usually only +/-5%.

[Jamesy]

I know the zener is not regulating by itself.You can run the bike on the rectifier as stated but it would only be for an emergency short period of time before cooking the battery.I learned all this basic electronics back in 74 on power supply units which I had to build.I am thinking you are looking at that diagram and coming up with your own analysis/explanation.Which is wrong.

[Aethelric]

I'm sure I'm interpreting right Jamesy. I was an electronic engineer for most of my working life (retired now), mostly in design, but also in test and maintenance. There is not really another way to interpret the diagram correctly.

You are thinking of the older power zener diode regulators where it IS just a zener across the output of the rectifier. That was used on british bike for a while. The Bullet does not use that system.

[Jamesy]

Are you kidding me on.An electronic design engineer without a basic knowledge of an AC to DC power supply.