Canbus Gremlins ....

[Lofty]

Canbus Gremlins ... or are they?

I’ve encountered a problem that is now simply driving me mad and I could do with the collective advice of the community.

I recently upgraded from a 2610 and old style Autocom to a Zumo 550 and an Autocom Pro-Duo Kit 200 with Intaride headsets all linked to my Nokia E71 using Bluetooth. On paper it all works just fine.

The Zumo is powered from the BMW connector next to the headstock, the Atocom is located at the back of the tank as usual with a part 1299 to connect to the Zumo and this is all powered from a Centech auxiliary fuse panel which is located in the tool recess under the saddle. Additionally I have some Wunderlich lights powered off the fuse panel which is itself taken powered from the BMW auxiliary socket supply under the saddle. Still with me?

Anyway to cut a long story short I’ve had the Centech with lights and old 2610 (which was powered from the Centech) for some 18 months and all worked well over quite a few thousand miles. Shortly before I changed systems I suffered a power failure with lights / 2610 shutting down and then powering up again after some 15 minutes but I could not establish anything that could be linked.

With all the new gear in place it works well when stationary. The long and short of it is that I get power failures regularly which shuts everything down including the ZUMO which you recall comes directly from a headstock power supply. I have spent days disconnecting various items to try to establish a common cause but I am now at my wits end. All wiring is sound and connections are tight. The saddle is not connecting with the auxiliary panel even over bumps and I can’t see how that would shut down the BMW auxiliary sockets anyway.

I read a thread in my early days relating to earth loops and wondered if anyone else has similar issues. I only get to play with the bike every 4 weeks or so when I get home and I want to try to resolve this before I head off to Europe in the spring.

Any advice gratefully accepted – as an engineer I think I have covered all bases but I’m always willing to learn! Apologies if the answer is embedded in previous threads.

Cheers.

Mark

 

[John Armstrong]

Possibly need a software update as there's been many threads on the accessory sockets shutting down and then repowering up. In the good old days you'd have blown a fuse and then had to work out why it's gone. Now there's resetable trips, all it's doing is tripping and then resetting.

BTW the accessory socket and headstock socket draw are considered as one and will shut down both if over 5 amps is from one / either / both combined. So if you're pulling more than 5 amps, then no softwrae upgrade is needed.

IIWY I'd look at powering the centech from the battery, but having it switched on by a relay that gets its power from the accessory socket. So the accessory socket will be taking little power and that might sort out your problem. Then if you want to power a heated jacket, you could take it off the centech panel and keep the autocom / gps etc all happy. Assuming the total power draw doesn't exceed the centech panels capability

 

[Lofty]

As ever the devil is in the detail, my auxiliary fuse panel is powered from the battery directly with only the relay in circuit coming off the Aux socket. Strikes me I'll need to find a way of monitoring and logging the current draw under various conditions.

Its due a service shortly so I'll check the software status at that point....