Alarm/Servo

Just back from 3 week hols in de Alps Swiss/French

One night heavy thunderstorm mit lightning resulted in my 1200 getting scared so it set its alarm off - the honda alongside did the same. It was pissing down so neither of us felt like getting up to quiten down the noisy sods but they both shut up after a while

The morning after I soon found that I had only residual braking - the 'ABS' text warning light was blinking like crazy The Honda owner (!) suggested riding a short distance - max 1 km - stop, new self check and see what happens - it worked - yippee

Halfway up the days first mountain pass it started again residual braking - who nicked my servo

We continued to the top - 2200m - stopped and wondered how the fekk to get 450kg down the other side

After an hour, several phone calls not mention coffee later I thought since I had nothing better to do, I'll try again and, you guessed it - IT WORKED

The trip down was a little interesting after all, it had'nt done it right for more than 30 mins at a time so far that day.....

It's been fine since

Did somebody say that they (BMW) don't use servo's any more - I wonder why

EMP effect from the lighting bolt discharge upset your ECU by the sounds of things. Can't be very well screened, unless the lighning bolt was very close to your bikes.

You didn't mention checking the hand-guards.... did you?

Al...

I hate servo brakes too ('cos of 12GS experience)

I wonder how successful I would be suing BMW under 'not fit for purpose’ legislation due to the fickleness of the servo system. I can't believe there hasn't been a recall over the issues. Why don’t the servo brakes on my car have the same issues? Would Ford think it OK that my Focus had only residual braking because I happened to have my foot on the brake pedal when I started the car? I wonder if BMW can retrofit the non servo ABS setup as used on the 07 model to an 06 model?

Spoils an otherwise great bike

araspitfire said:

You didn't mention checking the hand-guards.... did you?

Al...

Click to expand...

No I did'nt specifically check the guards but since the problem fixed and then reappeared itself I don't see that as a possible cause.

As a point of interest, my dealer wants to hook the bike up to the computer to check what if any fault codes are registered.......

In my experience, most intermittent problems with the 1200 servo brake system is caused by one of the brake levers being held in slightly when starting the bike... easy for this kind of thing to come and go.. just needs a slight tweak of the hand guard, or as the previous poster mentions, having your foot on the brake...

Not saying that's your case, but it's a very easy first thing to check for.. I never start mine without looking at the clearance of the hand-guard for both brake and clutch anymore...

And unlike the previous poster, I've found the system to be quite decent... I smashed the hand-brake micro-switch during my first drop last year, and managed to fix the system to full functionality (required rebuilding the little switch and then rigging it to the proper position) over the next couple hours... I ended up feeling I had a good handle on how it all works, and the fail-safe nature of the beast... All based on reading articles here and ADV with a positive "I want to be able to fix this system" attitude.

And though I agree that the difference between no servo and servo is extreme and unsettling when it happens, if you prepare for it, there is plenty of stopping power in my experience without them...

Al...

The missus just rang - she'd been to the dealer who hooked the bike up to their system and yepp - many different fault codes or whatever they call them in english.

The man did'nt go into detail about which ones - the missus would'nt understand nor me neither at a guess - he just said there were many.....

They have all been fixed, so.......