Sounds like the mixture adjusting screw- careful it is very sensitive and can make your bike run like a pig if it is maladjusted.
Taking it to Baldrick sounds like aplan
If I abandon Occam’s Razor and start to explore coincidental failure elsewhere, who would bet on the TPS? Would a knackered unit give the symptoms I have described?
To be honest buddy you are clutching at straws, IF you altered anything it should be obvious. In cases like these you could go on forever swapping and changing only for it to be something completely different. Once the obvious has been done it will save money and time in the long run taking it to someone who really can fix it mate.
Summers Comming
Learned a bit about your motorcycle by now I’ll warrant. Also possibly gained enhanced forum feedback filtration skills.
I know you are both right! Allow me to clutch for a few more days!
Thanks for all the support and advice.
Richard
If you think the TPS might be at fault, spray some electrical contact cleaner into it and wind the throttle open a few times (engine off of course).But usually if somthing goes wrong just after you have done something, what you did is connected with it.
Ok this might sound stupid but have you got the fuel lines the right way round,i only say as a mate of mine did this on his beemer 1150,swaped the lines bingo,also are the throttle cable,or fast idle cable seated propley.I tend to find its the cheapest things that go wrong,also pull out the crank sensor and give it a cleangonk2014-02-04 14:01:47
Don’t forget to drill a hole in it first
Since I am in straw clutching mode I will spray the TPS this weekend. Fuel lines do not have enough slack to allow connection the wrong way around unless the pump were turned around in which case the electrical connectors would not work so no Gonk but I will give the crank sensor a clean.
Thanks everyone.
I hope you are not being serious.
Well, how do you like these bananas. I had another frustrating day on Sunday and eventually put the bike back under its cover and came in to sit at the computer to do some research and hard thinking. Started off by reading the electronic ignition and fuel system section of the workshop manual very closely.
Lawries had first mentioned the TPS wiring “Make sure wiring to and from the TPS is sound” and other ECU sensors had also been flagged up. I was struck by the following phrase in the manual “in the event of a sensor failure the ECU will substitute the average reading for this sensor”. I also looked up the symptoms of TPS failure online and they seemed to exactly match what I was seeing.
Thinking through the average value phrase, this would mean that at idle the mixture was too rich with the ignition too far advanced at higher revs the reverse would be true but of course there would be one throttle opening for which the average value would be the correct value. Again, this seemed to match what I was seeing and I had noticed how sooty the exhaust was whilst idling during my many diagnostic sessions.
But this put me back in coincidental failure mode or did it? Late at night came an epiphany. The TPS is powered from the ECU and I had let my ECU dangle by its wiring. If this had broken a power or signal line to/from the TPS then I would have apparent TPS failure which was related to something I had touched. Easy enough to test with a voltmeter but now I was in wait another week mode.
Then, today, I managed to finish earlier than usual and got home by about ten past five. The sky was still light. I dashed in and changed my clothes and dashed out clutching my multimeter and a section of old carpet to lay down on next to the bike. By now the street lights were coming on but I had a torch. First job was to disconnect the cable from the TPS. It came away surprisingly easy. By now I had convinced myself the TPS would be unpowered. However, a quick probe with the voltmeter revealed exactly the specified 5V across the power connections. It could still be the signal line but I would need to reconnect and back probe the connector to check this and I was out of light.
Disappointed I reconnected the TPS. It seemed to push much more fully home than I had found it with the clip on the casing making a secure connection. Could it be? I set the fast idle twisted the throttle and thumbed the ignition. It took a few turns but when it thundered into life it was almost immediately obvious this was problem solved.
So a bit of a sorry tale albeit with a happy ending. Of course, if I had followed through on Lawries’ advice I might have found this fault weeks ago. I am sure I never went anywhere near the TPS but who knows? When you have lost the feeling in your hands you are pretty clumsy. I now have a spare fuel pump and, as Farqhar commented, a much greater understanding of how my bike works. Thanks everyone,
Richard
Well done on finding the fault, we have all done similar in the past!
It’s a learning game
There ya go, bad connector, just needed disturbing
Just proves the point that you can’t cure all by just throwing money at it. Pleased to hear you found it at last.