Using Power Sockets on an 07 GSA

[Dave Williamson]

Dear All,
When I bought the 1200 GSA I asked for an extra power socket to be fitted so that my wife and I could run our Widder heated waistcoats. When I conect one of the waistcoasts, let alone 2, it trips the electronic fuse on the bike. Turn the ignition on and off and it is reset, so no harm done. However, the standard power points that are wired through the bikes computer are obviously no use for powering the waistcoats.

I have therefore wired in two new power sockest directly to the battery with in line fuses in the wiring.

The question is will this upset the bikes computer and does it make any difference if the electronic drain is in place with or without the engine running?

If using the power points that I have wired directly to the battery does upset the bikes computer is ther anyway around it?

Thanks for your help, but why do BMW make these bikes so complicated?

Dave W

 

[cookie]

The question is will this upset the bikes computer and does it make any difference if the electronic drain is in place with or without the engine running?

the computer doesn't know or care about anything connected to the battery. it will drain the battery if the engine's not running.

Thanks for your help, but why do BMW make these bikes so complicated?

Dave W

pass.

 

[Wizard]

Just watch your power consumption with the engine off, but apart from that you'll be fine.

The one thing that does bear checking out is the power consumption/bike current rating. Obviously you're sucking too much current through the canbus system, causing it to shut down. IIRC the canbus sockets are rated at 5A each, that means that you're sucking somewhat over 60W per jacket.... which is a heck of a lot of current.

I could easily be wrong, by the way, but unless someone has a more definitive answer, I'd get it checked if I were you.

HTH

 

[GSmonkey]

Gerbing jackets draw 77W which is about 6.5A so its quite likely that the Widder jackets will do the same. These will therefore trip the sockets on full output.

You will have no problem wiring direct to the battery assuming you don't leave connected whilst the bike isn't running for too long, but there's no reason why you should.

 

[Dave Williamson]

Dear All,
Thank you for your replies. Thank you also for your concern about me running the battery down. I do not envisage running the heated waistacoast without the engine running except for those brief moments when you plug in ready to go before starting the bike. We do try and get on the bike, get the engine started and then switch on the waistcoasts, but you know how it is. In the excitement of getting going sometimes the waistcoast are already switched on. Hence my question regarding whether this drain would upset the bikes computer. However, I will now relax following your replies.

Interesting to hear what the cambus sockest are rated at only 5 amps each. The in line fuses I have in the 2 power sockest that are wired directly to the battery have 10 amp fuses in them and these have operated sucessfully on all previous bikes K 1100 and K1200 and also run without problem on our F650 Funduro.

Thanks for your help.

Dave W

 

[mike]

Dave; tried to PM you but can't for some reason, welcome to this site. Yep, same advice as above, as long as it's straight to the battery with an inline fuse then no worries apart from the chance of running it down if you did eave yourself plugged in without engine running. Another forester on a big trailie ! Say hello to Nick H for me & tell him to take his bike test! Cheers, Mike.