Red Triangle - Brake Switch Defective

[RicoSys]

Hi All,

Riding to work this morning in the rain. All was well

Until, after a while of filtering, a red warning triangle lit up.

There was no other text on the display. Nor did the bike seem to operate strangely. Brakes fine, Engine same as always, lights all working.

I checked the manual and it said this meant 'Brake Switch Defective'

After turning the ignition off and then starting her again the fault cleared.

Caould this simply be caused by me not fully releasing the a brake lever / pedal while filtering through traffic?

Cheers All

Alex.

 

[andyclift]

Whether this is related I don't know. I had a problem in Germany on my 55 GS. Intitially it was slow completing the brake check (100yds or so), then it stopped completing the check so went into residual braking mode (no bloody brakes). This produced a red triangle but with the words "brake failure".A stop and restart seemed to fix the problem for a week or so, then that would not work.

A dealer checked it over and found the front brake switch was very slow in turning off and it was this tht caused the barke test to fail. A new switch solved it.

I note on my 09 bike the warnings are different (and no servos) but it could be a similar problem.

Incidentally the incentive to get it checked was a drive back to our hotel in Frankfurt late one night. I had got used to the "residual braking" which required a lot of pressure on the front lever and rear pedal to stop a fully loaded bike, then traffic lights changed to red right in front of me. I grabbed handfuls of brake but had not noticed that the warning light had gone out. The fault had corrected itself and the bike had gone back to the super powerful servo brakes. The result was my wife very nearly climbed from the pillion seat to the tank via my head !! Fault fixed the next day.

 

[RicoSys]

Yike that sounds like a telling off situation from the Mrs

I had no other warning lights just the triangle and the servo brakes were still deadly strong....just the light that cleared after an off then on.

I just need to find out if dragging the brake for a while could cause this to put my mind at ease

 

[stu650]

We were touring Norway on our 1150RT, and the day after riding in torrential rain we had the same warning light but the brakes worked perfectly.

We rode back to the UK with the light on, and on the way to the dealers to get it checked the light went out. There was a fault code left in the computer though that indicated that the brake light switch on the the front brake had had a problem. The dealer said that it was probably caused by water ingress during the heavy rain. I had the switch replaced, but it would probably have been OK since it dried out.


Stu

 

[RicoSys]

Cool cheers guys

Bike is new to me so i'm a little nervous about reliability as moving from the VFR it has big boots to fill in this area.

BTW how much is a new switch should it be needed?

 

[stu650]

New switch on the RT was 70.00 plus VAT,

BUT that includes the cost of removing all the tupperware on the old RT


Stu

 

[RicoSys]

Tuppeware haha

Cheers, I'll not panic too much about it then

 

[motoreiter]

I had a similar problem after taking my GS in some deep mud--after that the light would stay off until I pressed the rear brake, at which point it would stay on until I turned off the bike. Anyway, it looks like the brake switch got tweaked during the mud bath, and after a scrubbing and tweaking the brake switch itself the problem went away.

 

[RicoSys]

Hi Peeps,

Just to let you all know that after a further 24 miles the problem has not come back.

I think it must have been either the rain or me accidently dragging the back brake while a long filtering session.

Cheers for all the advice and info.

Keep the rubber side down

Alex.

 

[karnevil]

Hi Peeps,

Just to let you all know that after a further 24 miles the problem has not come back.

I think it must have been either the rain or me accidently dragging the back brake while a long filtering session.

Cheers for all the advice and info.

Keep the rubber side down

Alex.

I always drag the back brake when filtering or moving very slowly and have never had the red triangle of death come on.Maybe was just water or dirt.