What's this red thing!

[SBD]

I guess it’s necessary to repeat the experiment with the tracker unplugged, but your results entirely support my view that the battery itself is woefully undersized for a bloody great big bike with a high compression twin cylinder engine. I guess the only engine more difficult to start would be a single cylinder diesel…

I’ve no idea where the tracker is connected, I understand that they’re somewhere under the pillion seat.

Now whilst they’re putting a properly-sized battery in it, perhaps they’d put an audible horn on there, and fit some kind of shield to stop the road noise, rain & wind coming up the hole where the forks are. Then it really would be a fabulous bike.

 

[stever1]

Now whilst they’re putting a properly-sized battery in it, perhaps they’d put an audible horn on there, and fit some kind of shield to stop the road noise, rain & wind coming up the hole where the forks are. Then it really would be a fabulous bike.

Why would they bother when they can sell every one they build. Whilst the lemmings keep buying shoddily built bikes, BMW will keep selling them

 

[We Make Life A Ride]

Perhaps one day someone will build the perfect bike to end all bikes that's stops everyone complaining about BMW bikes on a BMW bike lovers forum

Thanks for all the help with the red thing btw. Much appreciated.

As an aside, I have the Datatool tracker fitted and a factory fit battery on a 70 plate 1250 GSA that's just tipped 18k miles and I've never had a problem with it.

 

[SBD]

I refer you to post 14.

If the bloody thing worked properly, there wouldn’t be anything to complain about, would there?

If the design team think that fitting an easy-to-use recharge point is a substitute for a properly-specified battery, they’re either living in cloud cuckoo land, or simply cutting corners. Having worked as an engineer in the auto industry for most of my professional life, my guess is the latter.

 

[Engineer]

I guess it’s necessary to repeat the experiment with the tracker unplugged, but your results entirely support my view that the battery itself is woefully undersized for a bloody great big bike with a high compression twin cylinder engine. I guess the only engine more difficult to start would be a single cylinder diesel…

I’ve no idea where the tracker is connected, I understand that they’re somewhere under the pillion seat.

Now whilst they’re putting a properly-sized battery in it, perhaps they’d put an audible horn on there, and fit some kind of shield to stop the road noise, rain & wind coming up the hole where the forks are. Then it really would be a fabulous bike.

I might try delving under the rear carrier and unplugging it - it will probably create an alert but I can cancel that. The only problem is that the rear carrier and cover have to be removed to get to the thing. I have asked Datatool what the quiescent current is, hopefully they will get back to me soon. If for example it takes 25mA then that would mean the battery would last 20 days, which would be kind of acceptable.

A 'properly' sized batter would take up more space and there is little available from what I can see - they need to get the quiescent current drain down, but this isn't easy either - as processor geometry becomes smaller and they become faster static leakage current goes up so this is also tricky - too much electronics on bikes these days, but we like comms, traction control, reduced emissions, etc etc.

 

[Engineer]

Perhaps one day someone will build the perfect bike to end all bikes that's stops everyone complaining about BMW bikes on a BMW bike lovers forum

Thanks for all the help with the red thing btw. Much appreciated.

As an aside, I have the Datatool tracker fitted and a factory fit battery on a 70 plate 1250 GSA that's just tipped 18k miles and I've never had a problem with it.

I had no problem with the battery drain for the first year of my 21 1250GS. There is something strange going on and I havent got to the bottom of it yet, but I will

 

[Wilde]

Obviously bought the wrong motorcycle. Never an issue in 14 years of ownership. Am obviously doing something wrong


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[SBD]

lucky you. I reckon you might be doing something right.

As I said in post #14 " It seems ok in the summer but if you do short rides in the winter with the heated bars on, sooner or later it won’t start. Put it on the charger overnight and it’ll work for another two or three weeks."

I guess Spain is warm enough, mostly, not to need the heated grips.

 

[Engineer]

Datatool have just come back to me and stated the following:

"The tracker draws <1mA when it’s ‘Sleep’ state. When it’s in ‘Alert’ like in the situation of a potential theft, this will be more around 40 mA."

So if the Tracker is working correctly it should have no significant (<1mA) current drain on the motorcycle battery.

This tells me that the almost all of the 50mA I measured is going into the bikes electronics - so if you are not going to use your bike for a week without a maintenance charger connected you could have trouble with the bike starting, especially in Winter - this is my experience. A larger capacity battery than the 12HA one fitted as standard would be a good idea - does such a thing exist that will fir into the same space????

The only thing that I'll add to this is that I believe the bikes electronics can get themselves into a state that causes a much higher current drain that the 50mA - if this happens then the battery will discharge far more quickly that the expected 10 days. This situation may require a 'reset' by removing the battery completely and shorting the wires to discharge any capacitors a force a complete reset?? This still needs to be verified.

 

[SBD]

when he says "shorting the wires", he means the two big ones attached to the bike, not anything attached to the battery...

I have not yet tried this approach to reset because my mighty steed is not playing the goat at the moment, because the weather's warmed up a bit and I don't have the grips turned on.

in terms of batteries that will fit, there is not a fat lot of variation is specs for YTX14 batteries unless you want to go Lithium.

https://www.tayna.co.uk/motorcycle-batteries/types/ytx14-bs/

this claims to be 16Ah and to give 250A CCA

https://www.tayna.co.uk/motorcycle-batteries/motobatt/mbyz16h/

 

[steadysteve]

Weird how some bikes suffer in this way. My 2013 GS LC once went nearly 4 months without being on a charger and still started okay. The starter sounded a bit lazy but it did start.

 

[Barnoe]

Had my GS 3 years and never had a flat battery.

i have a NOCO GB40 in the panniers all the time, this makes the battery realise there is no point in being a dick, cos he will just get a massive shock!
the tyres are the same, carry a puncture repair kit and pump, this makes the tyres realise there is no fun in getting punctures, they will just get stabbed, gouged, glued and pumped up again.

You have to be the Alpha male and let em know who's boss

 

[Engineer]

Weird how some bikes suffer in this way. My 2013 GS LC once went nearly 4 months without being on a charger and still started okay. The starter sounded a bit lazy but it did start.

Non of my earlier bikes had a problem, it is just my 1250GS that has done this.

 

[Hann]

Have you seen the weedy starter motor on the 12/1250`s?
They make the one on my CX500 seem positively industrial by comparison.
I suppose the LC`s have an auto decompressor mechanism on each cylinder but the whole starting system seems to be a bit borderline performance-wise.
I have on occasion stalled my 1250 when pulling away with pillion on the rough track at the back of my house when starting out for the day and the bike has displayed lethargic cranking on immediate attempts at a re-start as though the battery is flat. This is sometimes accompanied by random fault messages on the TFT such as lighting or indicater faults (due to the momentaryily low battery voltage i assume).
It also did it once when i went to start it outside the dealers showroom after collecting it after it was serviced!
It does always start instantly after being left for a week or three, though.
Full of `character` these BMW`s, arn`t they?

 

[Engineer]

Have you seen the weedy starter motor on the 12/1250`s?
They make the one on my CX500 seem positively industrial by comparison.
I suppose the LC`s have an auto decompressor mechanism on each cylinder but the whole starting system seems to be a bit borderline performance-wise.
I have on occasion stalled my 1250 when pulling away with pillion on the rough track at the back of my house when starting out for the day and the bike has displayed lethargic cranking on immediate attempts at a re-start as though the battery is flat. This is sometimes accompanied by random fault messages on the TFT such as lighting or indicater faults (due to the momentaryily low battery voltage i assume).
It also did it once when i went to start it outside the dealers showroom after collecting it after it was serviced!
It does always start instantly after being left for a week or three, though.
Full of `character` these BMW`s, arn`t they?

This re-starting after stalling, especially when cold is an issue I have experienced, it is sometimes accompanied with something like a backfire with a horrible mechanical noise, almost like hydraulic lock. It's almost as if the engine has stopped in just the wrong position and the auto decompressor doesn't work and the starter is overloaded on the re-start. However the problem doesn't appear to happen when it is property warm.

It is most likely to happen when you start from cold, stop the bike within a short distance and then try to re-start - it is a new feature on the 1250, it wasn't on earlier bikes

 

[Hann]

like a backfire with a horrible mechanical noise, almost like hydraulic lock. It's almost as if the engine has stopped in just the wrong position

That sounds entirely plausible.
The `backfire` and horrible mechanical noise could be from the starter clutch being forced backwards against it`s normal one-way direction of rotation.
What happens is the compromised starter system - whether it is caused by a weak battery/starter motor/whatever - tries to crank the engine over but at reduced speed and power.
When the four stroke cycle reaches the point of the plugs firing the rotational speed of the crank is not high enough to get it completely over compression against the rising cyclinder pressure and instead of the power stroke powering the crank in the normal direction of rotation forces it backwards. The starter sprag clutch is caught in the middle - starter motor trying to turn it one direction and the crank in the opposite causing a horrific mechanical noise, usually.
I hope this is not yet another `quirk` to add to the seemingly never-ending list of irksome traits on the BMW`s as it`s something i`ve seen on other bikes and it can get very messy and expensive to fix...