Hi My BMW R80 G/S has been garaged for 20+ years, and was stripped, frame blasted etc, and rebuilt (not by me, but by a mate who has now, sadly, passed away) All this was 8 years ago, and my mate had told me the bike had started, but would be the better of a new exhaust. I took the bike back home, but work commitments meant that it lay forgotten in my garage...until now.   Things were OK when last I charged the battery and fired her up, but the battery was quite knackered due to not being in use for so long. I charged and fitted a new gel battery this week, and although I am getting horn, lights, and indicators, there is no red charging nor green neutral light, and absolutely no response from the electric start button. I don't have a multimeter, but wondered whether the +ve & -ve leads might need replacing, as both were looking a little corroded. Motorworks sell a Hicap Starting Upgrade Kit:http://www.motorworks.co.uk/vlive/TheShed/PDF/hicap.pdfand I would appreciate any advice from anyone as to it's effectiveness, and whether it might resolve the starting problem for my bike. Thanks meantime DM 

hi, check your fuses. It could be the starter solenoid.                                                                                                                                                                              

Yeah....second thing I checked, but thanks for the reply ;)  I'm figuring that I maybe have a bad earth, and will probably go for the cheaper option of procuring a multimeter first.  I think new leads will deffo be in order at some point in the near future as they are in poor order.

Ride safe y'all ;)                                                                                                                                                                             

If it was the + and - leads then you would not get any lights at all. Have a look at the Ignition plug on the wiring harness. Also the the 3 wires at the ignition. Test for resistance in all the wires from the key onwards.

                                                                                                                                                                             

The hi cap kit worked well on my R1200, not sure how power hungry the older R's are the 1200's are very greedy for power.

Have to check see what the resistance is on your old cables to make up your mind i guess.                                                                                                                                                                             

Any wierd noises when you tried to start it.?...rev counter gone haywire at same time as noises.?...i had this on my 1150...turned out to be the ignition sensor...aka hall sensor...failing that i'd opt for ignition wiring too..