...and then the engine died

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pdoege
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...and then the engine died

Post by pdoege »

Right -

I was on my way home from work on Thursday when the low fuel light came on. About 4 miles later the bike gave 4 big surges and then died.

I tried to coast to the nearest exit, no joy.

It had juice, about a gallon of gas, plenty of compression. That is the limit of my troubleshooting skills at 8PM on the side of the highway.

So, with much frustration I called in a wrecker and had the bloody bike towed to the dealer.

Turns out that the TPS had completely failed. The dealer replaced it (ouch!) and the bike is back to running quite nicely.

I need to redo the TB sync. The mirrors are all buzzy again. I had just done a really good job balancing them too. Sigh.

I need a new master cylinder as well. That can wait a few days.

Peter
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Post by Silverr »

Wow, what year is ur bike and how many miles!!!! Sounds like a drag for sure, but at least they can rebuild her, Better, Stronger, Faster 8)
pdoege
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Year, etc.

Post by pdoege »

This is a 1996 R1100R.

It is new to me, and I am in the typical process of finding out what needs fixing/adjusting.

The failure of the TPS was unexpected. I had expected the previous owner's kludge of the Hall sensors to go first.

Peter
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Post by scottybooj »

i would think that a dealer would re-sync them after installing a new one. check to see how many hours of labor he charged. if not, ya gotta do it.
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pdoege
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Well,

Post by pdoege »

Well, here's the thing.

I spent about an hour doing a really good sync about a week before this happened. No buzzing, vibes, or surging. Really great stuff.

Now I am getting occasional surging at 3500 and vibrations.

So I'm going to redo the sync regardless.

I am tempted to check the TPS voltages too and see if the tech 0/0'd the sensor correctly. I'm lazy, so if a good TB sync fixes it I'll be happy.

I have very little faith in BMW mechanics. Too many bad experiences with the cager ones....

Peter
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Re: Year, etc.

Post by GeoffJ »

pdoege wrote:This is a 1996 R1100R.

It is new to me, and I am in the typical process of finding out what needs fixing/adjusting.

The failure of the TPS was unexpected. I had expected the previous owner's kludge of the Hall sensors to go first. Peter
How many miles does the bike have on it?
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Post by boxermania »

pdoege, actually replacement of the TPS doesn't affect the sync of the throttle bodies.

The TPS just mates to the TB shaft to tell the ECU the amount of opening of the buterfly, hence the amount of load on the engine.

The only thing that might have changed between the old and the new TPS would have been the "idle position voltage" which is normally set between .370 vdc and .410 vdc.

The BMW Techs will set the TPS (by rotating slightly on it's axis) to a higher value, within the range, if the owner has complained about surging. The extra voltage has the effect of adding a slight mount of fuel to the whole range of the TPS operation.

BTW, if you want to see what the TPS was set at get a sewing needle and stab the first wire in the conector (that would be the wire to the ar right while facing the connector) and measure on a 3 volt dc scale from there to ground......if you are not mechanically inclined, call your BMW Tech and ask him what he set it at.

You might also find out if they did something else to your bike that might have induced the "rough running"

Hope this helps....... :roll: :roll:
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pdoege
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I agree

Post by pdoege »

I understand that nothing should have changed, but since I don't know what the wrench actually changed I have to do the full investigation.

Time to pull out the trusty voltmeter and have a look.

The bike has 25k miles on it.

It runs rather nicely except for a nasty surge/stumble at 3500rpm. Nasty enough to kill the engine if I I chop the throttle from 3500rpm. Yikes!

Peter
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Post by baltm604 »

did you pull the fuse for the montronic and reset the tps?

any difference in the alignment/voltage would cause this problem, I think.

I would pull the fuse, wait a few minutes, re-install, turn on the ingnition and twist the throttle fully open to reset the computer. Either way this has to be done before a tb sync.

Bill
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Post by NoRRmad »

I think you have to twist the throttle fully open twice to reset the motronic. It's in the manual, somewhere.
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pdoege
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Well, I checked the bike...

Post by pdoege »

I checked the bike out this morning.

The plugs were fouled, so I replaced them with nicely gapped Autolite 3923s.

I then went to look at the TPS to see what work had been performed. It was disconnected. The connector was hanging all forlorn! WTF, over?

I connected the TPS and read the voltage. .870. Yikes, so I adjusted it to .385 per Lentini's instructions.

I am going to drive it around in a bit and see what is up.

I called the dealer and bitched out the service manager when I found the TPS disconnected. I guess I need to bitch him out again about the voltage being way wrong.

Sigh.

Peter
pdoege
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Well...

Post by pdoege »

The dealer service manager has fresh bite marks. Not too deep, I need him to make things right....

The bike is idling, if it can be called that, at 800rpm. I have to manually goose it to keep it running. Turning on the fast idle makes the bike idle at 2000rpm, but at least it doesn't stall.

Lots of surging from 3200 till about 4500.

I am going to dig into it some more tomorrow.

Peter
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Good Thread

Post by MikeCam »

PD,

I am enjoying your adventures getting the revs under control and discovering parameters on the TPS. Keep us posted as you learn your way through this.

My question: Is the Motronic version and TPS device on your 1996 model significantly different from our 2001-2004 models? If so, how much does that difference affect the settings and such?

M
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Post by boxermania »

pdoege......good show, you are an example of someone that does not mind doing a little troubleshooting to chase after a problem. The .385 vdc on the TPS is a good base reading, remember you can adjust by rotating the TPS.

BTW, who is the dealer? at the very least they should give you a free oil change......I have no tolerance for incompetent dealers.....sic

Don't panic, you are almost out off the woods....the low rpm is not a problem.....look at the brass screws on the TB, turning CW slows the idle CCW speeds the idle.

Here is my sugestion, turn the the brass screws on the TB's CW, one at a time, counting the turns until they stop. Insure that you don't overtighten when they stop turning. If everything is a OK they should be somewhere between 1 1/2 turns to 2 turns.

Then remove each screw all the way out and you will notice how dirty they are, specially if they hadn't been cleaned before, take a rag and some WD 40 and clean the brass screw, make shure you don't use sharp objets or sand paper as you don't want to scratch the screw or damage the taper.

Spray a touch WD 40 on the brass screw hole and clean the debris with a paper towel, lubricate the o-ring on the brass screw and re-install. Bring it all the way home and back out to 1 1/2 turns.

Start and ride the bike for 10 to 15 minutes. Upon return from the ride put bike on the center stand and allow it to run, note the idle rpm. Notice where the screwdrider slot on the brass screws is in reference to the TB, place a mark, magic marker, etc, on both TB's at this location (at the top). Then turn the screws 1/4 turn in the CW direction, twist the throttle once and see where the idle is, if its lower, you need to go in the CCW direction adjust equal amounts until you get 1000 rpm to 1100 rpm. This should take less than 5 minutes, don't let the bike idle for too long.

Ride the bike for another 15 minutes, to allow it to reach constant temperature and return home. At this time you might want to do a full idle and throttle body check to see how things are......if you have to adjust the idle just a bit, do it on the non TPS side.............


In response to MikeCam we have the Motronic 2.4, the pre 2001 bikes have the Motronic 2.2....slightly less compliant than ours.

Let us know how you make out............ :roll: :roll:
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pdoege
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Seems to be working

Post by pdoege »

I checked the plugs and TPS voltage this morning. To get a baseline for doing a TB sync this afternoon.

The plugs looked great. The TPS voltage was high, around 404mV. Drift from yesterday, maybe?

My multimeter was all over the place on the voltages too. I couldn't tell what was going on. This happened after I had loosen the TPS and lost position. Sigh.

I pulled out a backup meter, set the mV to .378 (maybe the computer didn't like the .385 from yesterday...), tighted the sensor down and then double checked the voltage.

Still good.

So, time to warm up the bike for the TB Sync. Man it ran great! I hate riding poorly running bikes, but a good one I can ride forever. 5 hours and 434 miles later I pulled back into the garage.

Screw the TB sync, I'm a gonna ride 'er just like she is for a while!

:)

Peter
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Post by NoRRmad »

Congratulations! :smt023
One more thing you can do yourself.
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