£1700 later and its still not fixed.....

[haydw]

I am now at the end of my tether.

Roy at RGM has had my 1200ADV for eight weeks. I went to pick it up tonight. It originally went to him after replacing my FD and my ABS unit seemingly failed. I had no rear brake at all- no residual, nothing. I occasionally had the red triangle of death and the brake failure light flashing.

After diagnosis, the ABS unit was knackered- couldnt read the ECU and couldnt clear fault codes. I sourced a second hand one, even though it was off a K1200R, the part numbers are the same for the GS, RT, ST, K1200R, S and RS.

Apparently once the unit has been programmed from the main ECU this setting remains in the unit. The second hand one had to go back.

Another 2nd hand unit was sourced from Motorworks- this unit was faulty and wouldn't work properly. Another was sourced from Motorworks, this was also another K1200 unit and computer said no.

My only option was a new unit. Roy has tested it and I now have brakes front and rear, and the servos operate correctly. He has tested it up and down past the workshop and it works fine.

Thats until I picked it up.

I ran down the road on it and the red triangle of death came up again, along with the brake failure light. The brakes work fine, better than they did before.

Roy is now having to look at it again- he had closed up for the night so the piece of sh*t is now sitting unloved in my garage.

Am after second opinions- have spent £1700 now and it still isn't fixed. The only thing different from when it originally failed is the fact it has a different FD. It is the same model as the FD that failed- the ABS ring inside is exactly the same, and the speedo works - sort of. I cannot get it past 50mph and I am definately not doing 20mph in traffic down a 40mph road.

I have had a quick look in the garage at it just to charge the battery- it starts fine, but am charging the battery anyway as it hasnt been used for 8 weeks. I have also traced back the ABS sender wire and found it perilously close (even touching) the rear shock. Looking at it, it might have a compression in it, so could this be the source of the problem?

At least I have brakes now, but as you can imagine I am far from happy....

Sensible options please- I do have a sense of humour, but tonight it has been totally bypassed.....

 

[JohnnyBoxer]

I am now at the end of my tether.

Roy at RGM has had my 1200ADV for eight weeks. I went to pick it up tonight. It originally went to him after replacing my FD and my ABS unit seemingly failed. I had no rear brake at all- no residual, nothing. I occasionally had the red triangle of death and the brake failure light flashing.

After diagnosis, the ABS unit was knackered- couldnt read the ECU and couldnt clear fault codes. I sourced a second hand one, even though it was off a K1200R, the part numbers are the same for the GS, RT, ST, K1200R, S and RS.

Apparently once the unit has been programmed from the main ECU this setting remains in the unit. The second hand one had to go back.

Another 2nd hand unit was sourced from Motorworks- this unit was faulty and wouldn't work properly. Another was sourced from Motorworks, this was also another K1200 unit and computer said no.

My only option was a new unit. Roy has tested it and I now have brakes front and rear, and the servos operate correctly. He has tested it up and down past the workshop and it works fine.

Thats until I picked it up.

I ran down the road on it and the red triangle of death came up again, along with the brake failure light. The brakes work fine, better than they did before.

Roy is now having to look at it again- he had closed up for the night so the piece of sh*t is now sitting unloved in my garage.

Am after second opinions- have spent £1700 now and it still isn't fixed. The only thing different from when it originally failed is the fact it has a different FD. It is the same model as the FD that failed- the ABS ring inside is exactly the same, and the speedo works - sort of. I cannot get it past 50mph and I am definately not doing 20mph in traffic down a 40mph road.

I have had a quick look in the garage at it just to charge the battery- it starts fine, but am charging the battery anyway as it hasnt been used for 8 weeks. I have also traced back the ABS sender wire and found it perilously close (even touching) the rear shock. Looking at it, it might have a compression in it, so could this be the source of the problem?

At least I have brakes now, but as you can imagine I am far from happy....

Sensible options please- I do have a sense of humour, but tonight it has been totally bypassed.....

There-in lies the nub of you original problem......................I would have ripped out the Servo and bypassed it and re-routed the brakes directly to the master cylinders

Then I would have had the final drive rebuilt to fix that

I bet it would have been cheaper than £1700

Servo ABS has no place on a motorcyle

 

[TeaPig]

The most obvious cause would be a fault with the rear wheel speed sensor, and/or the wiring as you suggest.

The sensor, I assume, sends out as pulse as each 'tooth' of the sensor ring passes the sensor. The computer uses this to measure how fast the wheel is rotating so as to detect both the wheel locking up and to convert to a signal to drive the speedo.

If your speedo is reading low it clearly suggests that there are too few pulses arriving at the computer and that the sensor is 'missing' some of the teeth as they pass by (sensor distance to ring too great - have you got 2 O rings in there by mistake? or a fault in the wiring, or faulty sensor.

I imagine the ABS unit is clever enough to detect erronous pulses and throws up a fault code, ie red triangle of death as it wouldn't be 'safe' to allow the rider to continue as the ABS could no longer function properly without knowing how fast the rear wheel is actually going.

If you found someone with an oscilloscope it would be v. easy to 'see' the pulses coming from the sensor, if the sensor is working correctly a regular train of pulses would show up on the 'scope with a frequency dependent on the rpm of the wheel. A faulty sensor would produce weak pulses or miss some altogether.

I'd guess you've got a partial connection between the signal wire and earth somewhere which is giving you weak pulses at the computer, some of which are missed. You certainly need to try swapping the sensor for aknown good one just to get that possibility put to bed once and for all

 

[autogs]

i think your prob started in the 3rd sentence.i think all concerned need to stop and step back,and look at the original prob.from your post that would suggest fd replacement,unless ive got the wrong end of the stick.
fd,linked to abs system good place to revisit i think good luck

 

[Pukmeister]

Am after second opinions- have spent £1700 now and it still isn't fixed. The only thing different from when it originally failed is the fact it has a different FD. It is the same model as the FD that failed- the ABS ring inside is exactly the same, and the speedo works - sort of. I cannot get it past 50mph and I am definately not doing 20mph in traffic down a 40mph road.

Did the ABS play up before the FD was replaced, or has it only just started since replacing the FD ??

Due to the speedo and ABS errors, it does sound like it is rear wheel speed sensor related.

You could be right about a damaged sensor cable, if it has been crimped and damaged, who knows how poor the square-wave signal to the ECU may be. How much are new sensors, can you 'borrow' one from a mates bike to try a road test ?

 

[haydw]

Checked the cabling again. The ABS wire is fine, its the brake switch that has the slight crimp in it, and that works fine.

Roy told me that the programming of the braking system has changed and the assistance that it gives- at speed the rear hardly works independantly, but at slow speed its fine. The rear brake cuts in hard when using the front brake- its as if the new unit is using the assistance it needs to when stopping. The speedo still under-reads, have checked it with my zumo to make sure. Its OK to 20mph then it is way out.

If I switch the ABS off it reverts to a standard braking setup- the rear works all the time as normal and doesn't try to be clever with the front. When I get the ABS fault the ABS is turned off and reverts to conventional braking, not being 'assisted' which is a strange feeling. Can someone tell me whether this is true?? It feels disconcertingly like the rear brake is not working which is the situation I had in the first place- but the rear brake wouldn't work at all. I have paid out for a new servo and am still not confident in the way the system chooses when I should brake- I am sure I had full control when it worked previously.

Am taking the bike back to Roy on Saturday for the faults to be read and to replace the ABS sensor to see if this does the trick. I still have a suspicion that the eventual issue will be the different FD- the ABS ring is the same,and there is a date stamp of 2005 on it- the bike was reg 04/06. I still have the old drive with the knackered pinion bearing- is it possible to swap the good crown wheel set etc from my old drive to the one I have that has a good pinion bearing?? Would this need shimming to set it up??

 

[(RIP) Kaister]

how bad is the old FD ? Can't you swap it just to confirm ? bearings sholud be interchangeable for sure

How is the speedo pulse generated ? if that sensor is the problem, then it won't match the braking signals and give an error output ?

who knows ?

options ?

sell or trade it in quick.

http://www.ukgser.com/forums/showthread.php?t=248558

is it insured for fire ??

 

[Tarka]

is it insured for fire ??

I mentioned a while ago how "unfortunate" a mysterious overnight burnout and subsequent total loss may prove to be.

 

[Demongroover]

I mentioned a while ago how "unfortunate" a mysterious overnight burnout and subsequent total loss may prove to be.

I was afraid that this mysterious phenomenon might happen to mine for a while.
Luckily fixed and for sale now though.

 

[sven]

Servo ABS has no place on a motorcyle

Not sure I totally agree with you there - the braking from very high speeds two-up with luggage on my K1200S was amazing. The biggest problem was the lack of sensitivity as I was stopping far too soon when I first bought it using the same braking points as my VFR800

Mine failed at 4500 miles though. It was repaired within 3 working days by AJ's under warranty, but I was worried once the warranty ran out that I had a £1200 timebomb whirring away beneath the bodywork

 

[JohnnyBoxer]

Not sure I totally agree with you there - the braking from very high speeds two-up with luggage on my K1200S was amazing. The biggest problem was the lack of sensitivity as I was stopping far too soon when I first bought it using the same braking points as my VFR800

Mine failed at 4500 miles though. It was repaired within 3 working days by AJ's under warranty, but I was worried once the warranty ran out that I had a £1200 timebomb whirring away beneath the bodywork

If you refer to my comment, you've answered your own question twice there, in Paragraph 1 & 2 about the reasons for not having ServoABS

 

[sven]

If you refer to my comment, you've answered your own question twice there, in Paragraph 1 & 2 about the reasons for not having ServoABS

Not exactly - you adjust to the sensitivity and the failure didn't result in a hazardous situation.

The ability to stop much faster when fully loaded was a significant improvement and probably outweighed the disadvantages

 

[Davy F]

Have to say I loved the servos on my GS. But if the servo had failed (and I did have a scare once, but it was only the rear brake switch which had taken a knock during 'spirited' cornering), I'd just have had the unit ripped out and the pipework re-jigged to suit. OK, you lose the ABS function, but that wouldn't bother me as much as spending serious money on getting it replaced.

 

[Pauly S]

i Had servo abs

on an 1150rt once, never again , i absolutely hated it, whirring away, no brakes with the engine off, nah stuff that,non abs, non servo, suits me fine.
learn to ride properly, who needs brakes...

 

[haydw]

Problem now diagnosed. The old FD has been put back on and it works fine.

On investigation it seems like there are two part number for a pre 08/06 fd. One for the standard 1200 and another for the adv. My replacement is from a standard 1200. From 08/06 both part numbers are the same. Seems a bit daft as the internal share the same part numbers. the difference is in the casing somewhere.

New fd now been sourced from motorworks . The perfectly good 1200 standard fd will shortly be listed in fsw.

Hopefully this should be an end to it.

 

[Demongroover]

Problem now diagnosed. The old FD has been put back on and it works fine.

On investigation it seems like there are two part number for a pre 08/06 fd. One for the standard 1200 and another for the adv. My replacement is from a standard 1200. From 08/06 both part numbers are the same. Seems a bit daft as the internal share the same part numbers. the difference is in the casing somewhere.

New fd now been sourced from motorworks . The perfectly good 1200 standard fd will shortly be listed in fsw.

Hopefully this should be an end to it.

That's exactly the same deal as mine.
Roy from RGM sourced a replacement for me and fitted the disc and posted it down to me. Problem solved.

 

[(RIP) Kaister]

Problem now diagnosed. The old FD has been put back on and it works fine.

On investigation it seems like there are two part number for a pre 08/06 fd. One for the standard 1200 and another for the adv. My replacement is from a standard 1200. From 08/06 both part numbers are the same. Seems a bit daft as the internal share the same part numbers. the difference is in the casing somewhere.

New fd now been sourced from motorworks . The perfectly good 1200 standard fd will shortly be listed in fsw.

Hopefully this should be an end to it.

so is roy giving you your 1700 quid back

 

[Pukmeister]

Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but perhaps owners of 'changeover' models around 2006 would be better off getting a dealer (EG Bahnstormer Motorrad) to strip and repair their existing final drives rather than taking an expensive chance with another FD unit.

 

[haydw]

Brake pressure was going on the rear anyway. had trouble stopping the bike using the rear brake at junctions before all this happened It does seem a bit of a coincidence though but have been told categorically that the servo was knackered.