Very Odd question on JD Gator with Kawasaki

[kgsc]

OK folks,

Just wanted to check my sanity.. Neighbour has a 2008 or so JD Gator with the Kawasaki engine. Was starting to drag a little when starting cold, fine when hot. She figured the battery was bad and changed it. Worked fine for a few days then same deal. Asked me to take a look. First thing I noticed was she hadn't tightened the cables. I'm thinking OK, that's it and started to tighten them. It was then I noticed that she had hooked them up backwards.. + from starter on Neg and - from frame on Pos. My thoughts were is this thing Pos ground ? Then started looking for something to check to determine. OK, lift bed, up was down, down was up. Cig lighter was backwards. So she had it backwards. I put Pos on + and Neg on -. Bed was correct and so was cig.

OK, now the sanity part.. How in the hell did it start and run with the cable backwards ?? Is the starter AC ?

Now it is doing it again but I'm thinking now the original problem was the battery but the voltage regulator may be toast now because she hooked it up backwards. Haven't had a chance to test yet.

[spriddle]

What in the wide wide world of sports, kept the battery from blowing up when hooking the pos post to the frame?

[kgsc]

Originally Posted by spriddle

What in the wide wide world of sports, kept the battery from blowing up when hooking the pos post to the frame?

Doesn't matter to the battery which is hooked to the frame as long as they both aren't at the same time. She hooked the + red wire to the - post and the ground cable to the + post. Just backwards, not a dead short. I haven't had a chance to do any more but it is very possible the voltage regulator is toast. I just do not understand how the starter motor spun the correct direction to start the motor. It must be AC..

[bbriggs]

I would expect that a forum such as this would have its share of DC motor experts. However, my 2 cents with reversing the leads on a DC starter motor is that I'd expect the rotation to remain the same. To reverse a non-permanant magnet DC motor we need to reverse the current in EITHER the armature or the field. In reversing the battery leads both the armature AND field reversed, resulting in the same direction of rotation.

[kgsc]

Fair enough.

[simple man]

You may have a fuse or fuse link to protect the alternator and the voltage regulator. I'd give that a look first. Actually it should have arced fairly heavily when those cables were first hooked up wrong! The part I don't get is the backwards lighter? It should make no difference to a heat coil. You can advise her how lucky she is, in that if this was a car, she would be replacing 3 computers!!! They will not tolerate reversed current!

[kgsc]

Originally Posted by simple man

You may have a fuse or fuse link to protect the alternator and the voltage regulator. I'd give that a look first. Actually it should have arced fairly heavily when those cables were first hooked up wrong! The part I don't get is the backwards lighter? It should make no difference to a heat coil. You can advise her how lucky she is, in that if this was a car, she would be replacing 3 computers!!! They will not tolerate reversed current!

I haven't had a chance to get back to it but I hope there is a fuse. As for the lighter polarity, I should have been more clear. It is just a 12vt socket, not a true lighter. Checked the center post and ground.

And yes I told her multiple times, tisk tisk tisk.. Guess I could have told her it was ruined and she needed to buy a new Gator. I would take it off her hands for her