Lose weight from your battery

1967 R50/2 · 08-08-2005, 12:39 PM

http://nortonsflorist.com/ds/store/braille.htm

Braille Rally Battery...dimensions seem small, AMPS seem good and only 11.5lbs.

...The real question is: What is the weight of the stock battery?

Dr. Curve · 08-08-2005, 04:28 PM

Hey /2, that looks good to me. Those dimentions would make remounting to almost any location a piece of cake. Nice find. Is it a gel or sealed unit maintaince free.......I'm sure it is.. TIA

Ducati-Rider · 08-08-2005, 04:45 PM

$145 retail - what are we smoking?

1967 R50/2 · 09:09 AM

Here is more info which I found on http://www.helix13.com

Quote:

The “Braille” battery (11.5 lb) is designed for rally racing, but is equally suited to daily use. There is no easier way to drop 25 or more pounds from your MINI. Furthermore, it is far stronger, is lighter and smaller than any other unit developed specifically for automobile use.

Remove that weight and the improvements in handling and braking will become immediately obvious. These drycell units have true deepcycle charge capability, meaning that they can be heavily discharged and recharged repeatedly without weakening over time. This is a significant advantage over other lightweight batteries (especially on the street). Consistency and reliability are thusly assured.

Rival batteries come nowhere close to the cranking power of the Braille unit. With a whopping 360 cold cranking amps available, they outgun the typical competition's 260CCA by almost 40%. In terms of amp/hours (the size of the electrical "gas tank"), batteries with equivalent capacity weigh 20% - 30% more. Thus, there is no better blend of high power, large capacity, and light weight.

Although, frankly I have an Odyssey battery in my bike and I did NOT pay $120 for it. More like half that.

Still, if you are looking to lose weight, it's still cheaper than a Z-technik exhaust.

DavidSoine · 08-08-2005, 06:40 PM

Stock battery is 9.2 lbs. Non-abs 99 of course.

Looks like a close match has finally been found...

best,

Dave
99 R11S

roger albert · 08-08-2005, 09:02 PM

I don't believe that's a wet weight is it? I've measured wet stockers at right around 12#8oz

BMW new gels are 13#12oz
Panasonic 14#6oz

DavidSoine · 08-09-2005, 08:04 AM

I put my old battery on the scale last night (even topped up the water). The non-ABS batteries were quite a bit smaller - only 5.25 inches high.

best,

Dave
99 R11S

roger albert · 08-09-2005, 01:55 PM

Wow, I wonder if I measured the wrong battery way back when in mine (also non abs) I'd have sworn it was the small one, but maybe I messed that up.

JonyRR · 08-09-2005, 02:24 PM

Yeah, I'd like to know that myself. When I first brought home my '99 S (build date 7/98) in the fall of 2000, it had sat on the dealer's floor for, they claimed, most of a year. The first thing I did was go for a fresh battery and mine got the AGM aftermarket battery the stealer recommended. It SEEMED a bit big at the time, but what the heck did I know about BMW's back then...next to nothing (but my learning curve went straight up, starting with that f**king battery replacement nightmare), so perhaps a non-abs S could get by with something physically smaller. For sure there's a lot of 'wasted' space under the tank to exploit with a non-ABS scoot. I've wanted to mount the battery horizontal and the CPU in the tail, which would generate a BUNCH of room under the tank for all sorts of foolishness like an external filter (one already lives there) an adjustable fuel pressure regulator (yay RBracing for using the bosch billet adjustable regulator...great minds think alike) and an external fuel pump.