F650GS EWS - dodgy connection?

dippy

dippy

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Hi Folks,

Went for a ride the other day and after 300mtrs engine cut out, restarted OK, I didn't notice anything unusual on the dash although i didn't look :augie drove off and 100mtrs later engine died again and this time I noticed EWS and no gear showing.

tried a different key, no luck. tried a different antenna ring no luck but playing around with the antenna ring all of a sudden bike sparks into life for a second then dies again. closer inspection of cabling leaving the antenna ring showed what could be a loose connection.


So, replaced cable as far back as i dared to go but still the same although i only twisted the wires together. Checked that the right wire goes to the right colour about 1000 times.

any ideas folks before i send to the garage?

Thanks in advance :D
 

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Strange - mine wouldnt start today either. EWS came up on dash. Been fine for 8 years, after the first antenna was replaced under warranty. Only 18000 dry miles
In dealers at the moment - so hope its just replacement antenna.
dippy said:
Hi Folks,

Went for a ride the other day and after 300mtrs engine cut out, restarted OK, I didn't notice anything unusual on the dash although i didn't look :augie drove off and 100mtrs later engine died again and this time I noticed EWS and no gear showing.

tried a different key, no luck. tried a different antenna ring no luck but playing around with the antenna ring all of a sudden bike sparks into life for a second then dies again. closer inspection of cabling leaving the antenna ring showed what could be a loose connection.


So, replaced cable as far back as i dared to go but still the same although i only twisted the wires together. Checked that the right wire goes to the right colour about 1000 times.

any ideas folks before i send to the garage?

Thanks in advance :D
Click to expand...
 
Deano64 said:
Strange - mine wouldnt start today either. EWS came up on dash. Been fine for 8 years, after the first antenna was replaced under warranty. Only 18000 dry miles
In dealers at the moment - so hope its just replacement antenna.
Click to expand...

Deano Did the gear indicator show anything? mine is blank.

from this link

http://ukgser.com/forums/showthread.php/218664-EWS-EXPLAINED?highlight=EWS

he says that if the dipped comes on then its not the ring antenna but I dont know what else to check. no access to a gs911 although that is quickly moving up my list of things to get
 
Certainly sounds like an EWS antenna failure - see http://www.ukgser.com/forums/showthread.php/195475-►-QUICK-LINKS-TO-POPULAR-THREADS

You don't tell us year/mileage of the bike. Most early models will have had the antenna replaced under warranty, but I think a few have seen them fail yet again more recently. Water ingress into the key barrel & switch beneath have also been causing issues. Should be simple enough for your dealer to fix & maybe press for some 'goodwill' discount if you are out of warranty.
 
squibb34 said:
Certainly sounds like an EWS antenna failure - see http://www.ukgser.com/forums/showthread.php/195475-►-QUICK-LINKS-TO-POPULAR-THREADS

You don't tell us year/mileage of the bike. Most early models will have had the antenna replaced under warranty, but I think a few have seen them fail yet again more recently. Water ingress into the key barrel & switch beneath have also been causing issues. Should be simple enough for your dealer to fix & maybe press for some 'goodwill' discount if you are out of warranty.
Click to expand...

Dealer is picking the bike up tomorrow, I'll post the outcome when I get some feed back.

2009 with 29K miles on the clock.

As I've said ring antenna changed but still the same, seems a look connection but cant see where the cabling goes after it disappears beneath the battery compartment. I was wondering if there is another end to the cable or it amalgamates itself into the canbus?

Bike has been underwater and upside down :D so could be something
 

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Mine doesn't have a gear indicator, but there was no neutral green light. Been at dealers and started perfectly normally all day!
 
Deano64 said:
Mine doesn't have a gear indicator, but there was no neutral green light. Been at dealers and started perfectly normally all day!
Click to expand...

Update - Dealers have got it to fail now. They then replaced the Ring antennae and it still won't work. Have to take spare key in now to rule out key fault !
 
I would say that this is unfair but BMW seem to have me cornered.

Apparently its the main ECU that's gone although the technician cant be 100% sure.

This bits unfair. The ECU comes from Germany and is configured per bike and is somewhere near £640 plus fitting/coding etc. If this doesn't fix the issue and it may be the wiring after all then i still have to pay for the ECU. what choice do I have?

the fact that BMW dont have a generic unit that can be fitted to prove the case is a bit strange IMHO. as the bike sparked into life but died immediately that would suggest to me that there was a loose connection but apparently the wiring has been tested. I suppose the loose connection could be in the cable housing or somewhere on the ECU. we shall see.
 
I have known Yamaha provide a 'test' ECU just to check first, so this seems a right stitch up, without certainty. We seem to hear this type of solution more & more from BMW - surely it is an abuse of your consumer rights. If some back street trader replaced parts on say your car, that wwere later found to be perfectly OK, just a money making exercise, what would we all do?

Is it worth a second opinion from an indy? Talk to Sherlocks?
 
dippy said:
I would say that this is unfair but BMW seem to have me cornered.

Apparently its the main ECU that's gone although the technician cant be 100% sure.

This bits unfair. The ECU comes from Germany and is configured per bike and is somewhere near £640 plus fitting/coding etc. If this doesn't fix the issue and it may be the wiring after all then i still have to pay for the ECU. what choice do I have?


the fact that BMW dont have a generic unit that can be fitted to prove the case is a bit strange IMHO. as the bike sparked into life but died immediately that would suggest to me that there was a loose connection but apparently the wiring has been tested. I suppose the loose connection could be in the cable housing or somewhere on the ECU. we shall see.
Click to expand...

Exactly the same for me, except ecu is over £700 at Jefferies . No choice. Apparently all my wiring OK as well!!
 
Deano64 said:
Exactly the same for me, except ecu is over £700 at Jefferies . No choice. Apparently all my wiring OK as well!!
Click to expand...
Forgot to mention, mine didn't spark into life when I had it, but worked when it got to dealers, then stopped working 2 days later. I'm getting suspicious
 
squibb34 said:
Is it worth a second opinion from an indy? Talk to Sherlocks?
Click to expand...

Bath Road Motorcycles had it first and had to send it up to Cotswolds. I trust the bath road crew, been using them since before they went independent. Gave them a call to chat about this and they said unfortunately that's how it is.

I'm surprised that BMW dont offer the service of sending the ECU back to Germany to be tested. i mean if they have to program the new ECU then surely there's the abilbity to plug in a used ECU to check functioning? seems a daft way to go
 
It`ll be all down to costs [BMWs not yours] the lab probably isnt set up to test external equipment as it would be a prohibitive outlay for them for the relative low number of failures worldwide.Maybe the ring failure has caused componenets bult into the ECU or one of its security features to randomly fail .The encryption software might be recieving a spurious signal from the key thus failing the start up sequence.
 
It seems like the failure is intermittent in nature and unless there's something like a dry joint on the ecu board I'd have thought that it wouldn't fail in this way. A failed circuit board component generally stays failed.

I wonder if BMW have a different model ecu for each bike in any given year? I'd guess they use all the same units and load firmware to characterise the bike.

Could you get an ecu from a breakers to try?
 
dippy said:
the fact that BMW dont have a generic unit that can be fitted to prove the case is a bit strange IMHO. as the bike sparked into life but died immediately that would suggest to me that there was a loose connection but apparently the wiring has been tested. I suppose the loose connection could be in the cable housing or somewhere on the ECU. we shall see.
Click to expand...

You would have thought it possible to "borrow" a known working ecu from another bike to use as a test. If the non working bike starts then the original ecu is faulty, if the bike still wont start the issue is elsewhere.
 
ShakeyBMW said:
It seems like the failure is intermittent in nature and unless there's something like a dry joint on the ecu board I'd have thought that it wouldn't fail in this way. A failed circuit board component generally stays failed.

I wonder if BMW have a different model ecu for each bike in any given year? I'd guess they use all the same units and load firmware to characterise the bike.

Could you get an ecu from a breakers to try?
Click to expand...

I've been told that a second hand one wouldn't work, since it need coding to the bike. From that I infer that they can only be coded once, unless of course it's B*****. Dealer have been good though over the last 9 years so ???
 
Its likely given its Canbus that each piece of kit on the bike has a serial number akin to an I.P. address, that would need coding into the ecu so that it can communicate over the bus system.Hence the complexity and pitfalls of the design.
 
Andi_archer said:
Its likely given its Canbus that each piece of kit on the bike has a serial number akin to an I.P. address, that would need coding into the ecu so that it can communicate over the bus system.Hence the complexity and pitfalls of the design.
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Mmmmm. It seems there is little other option than a new ECU. Will see if the new one lasts 9 years ... although for some reason , I might have changed the bike by then ????? Quite like the look of the SR1000s but they cost a lot of money !!!

XR 1000's I meant
 
Nippy Normans supply Touratech, Wunderlich, Desert Fox and many other makes of accessories.
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