Crap Clocks Crocked? - No Mode

[cyclobutch]

Had my bike standing in the dry since June time with the battery pulled out and on an Optimate. Had occasion to wizz over into Belgium on it at the weekend. Reconnected the battery and all fired up OK. Heading out I figured I'd reset the clock (time). The Mode screen is blank. I have Trip 1 and 2 screens but nothing in Mode. Did notice that the clock that sits top left on the trip screens did not advance from zero the whole weekend.

I know we've talked occasionally of water ingress on these clocks, but my bike had not been in rain before I owned it, and has seen very little in my possession, has always been parked under cover and has the MG small screen which I presumed would provide some protection when in motion too. Admittedly I have seen condensation in the clocks very occasionally, and I did have some appear when parked in the sun on Saturday.

Questions:
- Is this definately going to be the clocks and not the h/bar switch?
- How much for new clocks?
- Anyone sent theirs for repair anywhere?
- Anything else?

 

[GuzziMoto]

Mine did the same thing and was like that for a while. Then the battery died and when I replaced it the mode screen came back. Don't know why or if it was an issue with the old battery or maybe pulling the battery rebooted the instrument cluster, all I know is that it came back. I did not take it any further.
If I was you I would pull the battery again (just disconnect it) and give it 10 or 15 minutes before hooking it back up. If that fails, try testing your current battery.

 

[cyclobutch]

Hmmmm - mines a new battery this year. Sounds like one to try. The bikes due to be scrubbed up and parked away for the Winter so the battery would be coming back out anyway.

 

[john zibell]

I know all these fancy chargers say you can leave them on a battery continuously, but experience tells me that isn't so. A battery not in use shouldn't be on a charger for more than 24 hours each month. I know there is all that wiz bank circuitry, but as a battery ages (only takes a few months) it never reaches the "optimal" voltage so the chargers keep pumping. There was a problem with this on an Army robotics system. It was finally solved when a thermistor was added to the battery. When the battery reached a certain temp, the charger was cut off.

 

[Drew]

A good Battery Tender will not overcharge the battery and will operate on "Float" once the battery is at its ideal voltage. Other brands may not have this same feature.
Mine stays hooked up all year when not riding.

-Drew

 

[john zibell]

A good Battery Tender will not overcharge the battery and will operate on "Float" once the battery is at its ideal voltage. Other brands may not have this same feature.
Mine stays hooked up all year when not riding.

-Drew

I'd hate to tell you how many batteries I've had to replace for people that have left them on battery tenders all the time.

 

[wetcoast_griso]

Over the winter I combine the trickle charge and a cheap mechanical 7 day timer and set it to run two days a week for two hours. Been doing this with many batteries for many years and haven't lost one yet.

FYI normally this is from Nov. to Apr.

 

[Drew]

"Knock on wood", but in the over 12 years I've used battery tenders, I've never had a battery crap out. Which type do you use? There are different models, with corresponding features...

-Drew

 

[robfran]

Wonder if you can swap these analogue/digital clocks for 2 standard analogue without all the extra bits.

I love my Griso but the digital side has locked and frozen intermittently from day one. :huh:

 

[Mi_ka]

I suppose that this involves much more fiddling with parts than just curing the digital and electrical faults.
Most probably it would also need some machining work to make custom spacers etc and that makes it too much in my eyes.

 

[tmag907]

Today I had the same problem. No clock and nothing on the mode screen. I had just returned to Florida after being in NY since May.
Disconnected the battery for 10 minutes and all seems fine. Thanks for the tip.
As an added note, I have 3 motorcycle using the Deltran battery tender and have never had a problem.

Now if I could only find a good shop and get rid of the surging.......

 

[Mi_ka]

One of common mistakes done in microcontroller design is the behavior of the chip in brown out conditions.
On a vehicle this may happen when connecting the battery when the brake-make-brake contact condition happens upon touching the battery poles with the cables as the battery is the sole source of electric power when the engine is not running.

An erratic running microcontroler because of the brown out conditions can do a lot of unpredictable code jumps messing up values stored in eeprom memory like odometer or wheel circumreference values or available user buttons, as programmed during construction at the factory.

Reading of all the dashboard troubles in the forum I believe the dashboard programming or electronic design of the unit is not fully optimized against power and electromagentic interference (as shown by faulty spark plug cables crashing the dashboard in other threads).
Maybe, a low dropout diode in series and then a 100-470 microFarad capacitor in parallel to the dashboard power connection could provide enough power for proper brown out behavior by the main chip alleviating any power brown out troubles.

IF ANYONE HAS A high resolution CLOSEUP PHOTO OF THE DASHBOARD PCB PLEASE SEND IT TO ME.
I want to try read whatever I can on it and maybe diagnose problems said on forum.

 

[NeroGuzzi]

Mi_ka, Sounds like you are on to something that is baffling many of us. On my B11, the LCD portion of my instrument panel goes out when engine RPM hits 3,500. It will not reset until I shut the engine off. And sometimes, even after shutting down, the LCD portion stays out. The speedometer, tachometer, and fuel gauge work fine all of the time. I have replaced all 4 plugs, wires, and resistor caps to no avail. Mike C may have a pic. He had his dash completely apart at one time. I hope you or someone on this forum can crack the code on this issue.

 

[Mi_ka]

Try adding some capacitors in parallel to the power feed cables directly on dashboard connector in parallel: One 220pF and one 100nF and 1microFarad (all polyester or ceramic type - none electrolytic) and see if situation improves.
Reason for different values in parallel : each one resonates at different frequencies canceling different noise parts of the EMI spectrum.

 

[NeroGuzzi]

Try adding some capacitors in parallel to the power feed cables directly on dashboard connector in parallel: One 220pF and one 100nF and 1microFarad (all polyester or ceramic type - none electrolytic) and see if situation improves.
Reason for different values in parallel : each one resonates at different frequencies canceling different noise parts of the EMI spectrum.

Michail, this would be beyond my comfort zone. If someone else can pull this off with procedures, I would give it a try. Thanks, though.

 

[hugzy]

Had my bike standing in the dry since June time with the battery pulled out and on an Optimate. Had occasion to wizz over into Belgium on it at the weekend. Reconnected the battery and all fired up OK. Heading out I figured I'd reset the clock (time). The Mode screen is blank. I have Trip 1 and 2 screens but nothing in Mode. Did notice that the clock that sits top left on the trip screens did not advance from zero the whole weekend.

I know we've talked occasionally of water ingress on these clocks, but my bike had not been in rain before I owned it, and has seen very little in my possession, has always been parked under cover and has the MG small screen which I presumed would provide some protection when in motion too. Admittedly I have seen condensation in the clocks very occasionally, and I did have some appear when parked in the sun on Saturday.

Questions:
- Is this definately going to be the clocks and not the h/bar switch?
- How much for new clocks?
- Anyone sent theirs for repair anywhere?
- Anything else?

I had the same thing when I bought my Griso, no mode screen or should I say incomplete mode screen, and it just turned out to be a multi plug under one of the side panels, cant remember which side, think it was the left but not sure, just have a look, it was quite obvious which plug , just follow the cable up to the clock. Just pull it out and plug it in a few times, fixed mine ! I phoned Corsa Italiana in London and the mechanic there said "oh yeah it's the plug under the side pannel " and he was right !

Not got the damp problem solved yet though, I did read somewhere about grinding holes in the casing but I've not tried it yet, don't drill holes in case you shoot through too far. Does anyone know whether the clock comes off easy ?

 

[Mi_ka]

Try adding some capacitors in parallel to the power feed cables directly on dashboard connector in parallel: One 220pF and one 100nF and 1microFarad (all polyester or ceramic type - none electrolytic) and see if situation improves.
Reason for different values in parallel : each one resonates at different frequencies canceling different noise parts of the EMI spectrum.

Michail, this would be beyond my comfort zone. If someone else can pull this off with procedures, I would give it a try. Thanks, though.

This goes for the 3500 rpm black out problem you have. I think it should help as it seems to be an interference problem.
You can add the capacitors on the cable side of the connector without opening the dashboard enclosure.
You can test and see if it helps or not by soldering the capacitors one upon another and slip the leads of the base capacitor in the plug connector or so making sure they make good contact and then do some makeshift insulation to test the cure.

To make it permanent just strip the copper without cutting the power cables (find the proper cable colors on the schematics - no polarity for these capacitors) and solder the capacitors directly on the cables and then insulate the whole thing tightly. Just be careful not to overheat and melt the plug.

 

[cyclobutch]

Well I was scrubbing up the bike for the Winter lay up at the weekend - tax disc went in for 'cash back' on Friday. Tried disconnecting and reconnecting the battery a couple of times but still no Mode. Then tried reconnecting the battery with the ign switched on. Not sure that would ordinarily be recommended, it seemed to produce a different set of noises and lights through the start up sequence, ending up with some kind of error code on the screen. Then switched off and on the ign and all was working great. Weird.

Battery is now out and will be run up on the Optimate every couple of weeks.

I've gotta say, all this fun with fuel injection and electronic clocks; if this was all we knew and then someone invented carbs and a set of chronometrics we'd think they were brilliant.

 

[robfran]

hugzy, that was a good tip.
I reconnected the multiplug several times on the right side and haven't had it drop out since. Well worth trying if the digital side is glitchy.

 

[Mi_ka]

It is always fun looking at modern smart technology going down the drain because of old school sh%t like under spec plugs.... :cheer: