i recently went to use my bike i tried to start it but it had been stood so i charged the batt still wouldnt start i swapped the battery for my dads still wouldnt start so i got out some jump leads and it started i decided to go for a quick ride on it to charge the batt went out for about an hour came back turned it off then wouldnt start again im getting a wierd clicking sound when i try to start it and if i have my lights on when i turn the bike on i get no display on my speedo etc when i turn the lights off it comes up my brother says that it could be the alternator but isnt sure as we dont have the tools to test it properly im just wondering if anyone could help me as i dont want to go and buy one to find out it isnt that.
any help would be much appreciated thanks Carl

usually if you have a full charge on the battery it wouldnt matter that the stater is bad the bike should fire anyways, just wont recharge. But the fact that you rode an hour and it still wouldnt take or hold the charge kinda confuses me. I would definately make sure that both batteries are good and hold a charge before dumping some money on a mechanic to check the stater. Sorry i cant be of more help

Get the bike running and put a 12v tester on the battery it should be charging round 14-14.5 volts rev it up to 4-5k hold it there and see what the volts are if the volts are lower than 14 when revving then its not charging properly you should see an increase of 1-1.5 volts when revved.

Ya dude, you need a multimeter to test the voltage potential across that battery otherwise you have no clue what the batteries are doing.