Come on in and confess please

[Trip]

Originally Posted by zed

theory isn't reliable in the real world.

ask any EE if you can jump a bike with a car battery, in theory it works, in practice I have seen electronics fried.

Hello, I am a practicing EE here to tell you that you are wrong. Starting a motorcycle from a car battery is fine as long as the car isn't started.

Originally Posted by Mikey

I've done it dozens of times with no ill effects. As long as the car isn't running, it's not a big deal.

Correct, the charging system for a car is much more powerful and can fry electronics. It's not the battery that will damage the motorcycle, it's the charging system from the car.

12 volts is 12 volts as stated earlier in this thread, what's different about the car battery is it's capable of providing for a much larger load. Capability doesn't not mean that it will distribute it's full load to what it's connected to. Take your wall plug for example, it's capable of much more than the normal small electronics we plug into it, but it doesn't destroy them...