[drifterthruthemtns]

Hi i have had a tw200 for two years now with over 20k miles on it. how do you get the top off the battery to replace or add more acid to it? somewhere i saw someone mentioned something about adding distilled water, local auto shop said to add acid. i already got the acid. unscrewed the six plugs and cant get the top off. any advice?

 

[r80rt]

The top doesn't come off, you fill it through the six plugs. Use distilled water to top it off.

 

[drifterthruthemtns]

The top doesn't come off, you fill it through the six plugs. Use distilled water to top it off.

thanks thats what i was guessing since the top was not coming off. why distilled water over acid?

 

[r80rt]

It's the water that evaporates from the battery, not the acid.

 

[drifterthruthemtns]

It's the water that evaporates from the battery, not the acid.

got it thanks i will get some distilled water to add

 

[Tirebiter]

Be careful not to overfill it. The electrolyte level should be just touching the bottoms of the filler tubes.....not full to the top. Some batteries are opaque and have a high and low level line on the side too so you can see the level in each cell. Make sure the overflow hose is connected to the battery too.



You probably already know all this but I thought I'd mention it.

 

[assquatch20]

+1 on the overflow hose. Make sure it's connected and routed to spit the acidic water away from the swingarm and frame and such. It'll corrode stuff pretty quick.

 

[silverhead]

I always figured that batteries lost most of their fluid when bikes tipped over or you were cornering hard in a lean. I know that they bubble and 'boil' when they're fully charged and it makes sense that water leaves the battery in that manner. However, do they actually lose more water due to gravity and wrecks?



I have a half used up jug of 'battery acid' from Napa that I use to fill my batteries back up. I imagine it doesn't make much of a difference given I'm only adding maybe 5cc of fluid to each cell every year at most. I don't really have a problem with my batteries going dry either. I put battery tender pigtails on everything I own now because I got tired of buying new batteries in cold years when I was too lazy to disassemble them from all of my bikes. Now i just play battery tender roulette all winter long and it's been working well for me.