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Erratic temperature reading 6th Gen

4 posts Started 6 Oct 2012 Last recovered post 8 Oct 2012 Wayback Machine snapshot 31 Oct 2013

#1
A weird one for yous...
The other day, after getting the 929 shoc in and the new fork internals (thanks JD) I went out for a ride to test things out.
The ride was vastly improved, although I still need to tune the shock and forks, but couldn't do that on my own.
Now to the weird thing.
On the way back from the Sydney Royal National Park I looked at my dash and my engine temp was showing 35C!!! (usually hover around the 100C), so I stopped immediately.
The cooling fan was spinning so I thought it must be electrical gremlins. Turned ignition off, then back on and now my temp was showing nothing (--). I started the bike up again and rode back home. On the way I could hear the fan spinning at times so that led me to the believe the thermostat is fine. After a while the temp came up to 35C again and then, randomly, it was showing the right temp(99C, 100C, 102C, 105C, etc) but it was also randomly dropping down to 35C.
It's been doing that for the last couple of days and I haven't had time to dig into the cause but I'm guessing it's wiring related as the fan kicks in when it's getting hot.
Anyone experienced anything similar??
#2

Anyone experienced anything similar??


Most likely this would be caused by a bad connection from the ECT sensor plug. The ECT sensor has two outputs - one goes to the dash and the other goes to the ECU. If it's just the dash wire which is dodgy the bike will run fine, but if the ECU is reading low temperature it will run excessively rich. It's not too hard to check - the wiring plugs for the ECT are under the left-side fairing and come out just above the coolant bottle.

Check those, and then check the blue connector plug to the sub-harness, also on that side of the bike. That connector block is notorious!
#3

Most likely this would be caused by a bad connection from the ECT sensor plug. The ECT sensor has two outputs - one goes to the dash and the other goes to the ECU. If it's just the dash wire which is dodgy the bike will run fine, but if the ECU is reading low temperature it will run excessively rich. It's not too hard to check - the wiring plugs for the ECT are under the left-side fairing and come out just above the coolant bottle.

Check those, and then check the blue connector plug to the sub-harness, also on that side of the bike. That connector block is notorious!

I think you are on the right path here.
The ECU/dash system makes sense.
Will check those connectors tomorrow and see how it goes.
Come to think of it, I did move the connectors around a bit since I took the opportunity while I had the bike on the stand to change the oil and filter and also programmed a new key in using the "el cheapo" homemade cable as suggested by zRoYz.
#4
Kaldek, I must thank you.
Yesterday I took the left fairing off, unplug the connectors, blow some air on them to clean them, plug them back in and put it all back together.
Then I turned the bike on and after a couple of minutes it started reporting the right temperature.
I waited until today for my usual commute to fully tested and it worked 100%, showing the right temperature and the fan coming on at over 100C.
Thanks for the tips guys, really appreciated.
End of thread · 4 posts recovered Wayback Machine snapshot 31 Oct 2013