Experienced an unrequested electrical "reset"

[jimsnorton]

Late last week I was heading to a local hangout & my fuel light came on unexpectedly. I checked & I had only traveled 60+ miles since my last fill-up. That wasn't correct! I fueled up & noticed that my clock had reset at some point. In fact it was only showing the two "minutes" digits, no hours were present. Blank display for the "hours" digits. I reset the clock & everything looks normal. At one point before this happened, I had washed my bike, like I have a hundred times before. That is the only thing I can think of that was different than just riding. No codes, there was no fiddling with anything electrical that week.

[gilly]

Might just check your battery cables for the heck of it.

[68ramair]

When I start my bike with a weak battery the clock will reset although I'm not sure I remember the hours digit being blank or not. We do have the 02 which only has 24 hour clock, so it will reset to 0 not 12.

I also don't think I've ever seen the fuel light coming on upon reset. How much fuel did it take when you refilled? I've had the light come on around 70-80 when I was riding hard. Maybe hard riding combined with not completely topping off last fill? There's my $.02 for you. My not even be worth that much.

[jimsnorton]

When the low fuel light comes on it is a result of the main tank being empty, & its feeding off the under seat unit. It took a "normal" 3+ gal. of the stuff, so that was normal. That implied to me, that it did it's reset thingy a few days prior to me noticing that my light came on with low mileage. I have an '02, but I've never noticed that the clock display can be fully blank. Can it be totally blank after you disconnect the battery for any reason? I just don't recall. Still, it freaks me out that "something" happened, since I ride virtually all year, sometimes I'll leave it in the garage if its particularly "ugly" out there, but my point is that after 105k miles, a spook has come & paid me a "timely" visit, (read Halloween). BTW, I typically don't "hammer" it all the time, I did that the first few years I had it, but now I'm older & don't go WFO very often. Not more than once a day, generally speaking, so my mileage is pretty consistent, typically 115-135, before light, depending on my freeway miles vs. street. All highway, mileage is typically 40+.

[LeaderDuece]

When my battery was dying it would reset every time I started it because there wasn't enough juice left to feed the tach and the starter. I had the same problem when my battery cable was loose.

[arizonawarrior]

Best I ever did while going WOT like a madman was 70 miles from full to light. 60-miles would be a real achievement! But since you mention you were not being crazy at the time, its possible a dry break wasn't fully clicked together, or that one came loose from a hard rattling while riding on rough road. That would explain the most common reason for the fuel light to illuminate before ~100 un-crazy miles. If you squirt a little WD40 into the dry break halves each year before riding season it will keep the o-rings lubed and as a side effect it'll click together better and stay clicked better too.

Its possible, even likely, the clock reset is a separate issue that you noticed because you were looking at the first issue. I'm in the 'camp' that agrees its good to inspect both ends of both battery cables for corrosion and loose connections, and also to suspect the battery itself may be failing if the cables are in good shape and tight. Weird things happen on a MC with ECU-control when the battery starts to fail: the voltage can and does eventually drop below what is needed to power the sensor array and the ECU doesn't like losing contact with certain sensors.

Originally Posted by jimsnorton

Late last week I was heading to a local hangout & my fuel light came on unexpectedly. I checked & I had only traveled 60+ miles since my last fill-up. That wasn't correct! I fueled up & noticed that my clock had reset at some point. In fact it was only showing the two "minutes" digits, no hours were present. Blank display for the "hours" digits. I reset the clock & everything looks normal. At one point before this happened, I had washed my bike, like I have a hundred times before. That is the only thing I can think of that was different than just riding. No codes, there was no fiddling with anything electrical that week.

[iowawarrior]

congrats on the 100k +
i'm thinking dry-break and battery also. my battery will reset the clock and the mileage to 12:00 and 0 if the temp makes it turn over too slowly. after it starts, they both start from that point and move on. if you have the 24hr clock, maybe it was reading 0 hours and 42 minutes . hence nothing in the hours column.

[LeaderDuece]

Oh yeah- also check the cables on the starter

Sent from my DROID RAZR

[jimsnorton]

Thanks for all the input. I will check my battery connections. To reiterate, when I filled it up it took the correct amount of go juice, ~ 3.2 Gal. so the failure wasn't that I used too much fuel. My battery is fairly (really) old now, I replaced it @ ~ 40k miles in Dec. '06. It still cranks like always, never been an issue, but it is 6 years old. I think I will replace it. ...Just 'cause at this point.
Ah, now the fun begins... When I replaced it all those years ago I went with a stock batt. Now I'm 'open' to your suggestions as to what you would replace your battery with, if you were me?

[arizonawarrior]

Yep I caught that it took the right amount of go juice. What's interesting to think about, even tho a worst-case is nearly impossible to imagine, is that if you are nearly empty in the aux tank too, and you fill the main tank with 3.2G and it doesn't move into the aux tank quick enough (like due to pump delivery speed) then all you have is 3.2G (again worst case is not likely but want to illustrate the point). Then you ride away and as you ride the main tank fills the aux tank, meaning you now have maybe a bit more than 2.4G in the main tank (plus 0.8 aux makes up the 3.2G filled). Still more than needed when riding sane but a lot less than expected if you play with WOT awhile. I can see 60 miles to the fuel light in these conditions because I got only 70 on what I knew was a full aux and main tank (4.0G) but the bike can sip fuel or slam it like a sailor depending on the rider's right wrist. I mention this because as far as this part goes I'm not so sure you have any trouble at all, maybe only a combination of less-powerful winter blend fuel and a trapped air bubble in the aux tank.

But a new battery for the other thing might solve it or might not (odds are it will) and a six year old battery will eventually give you grief on a dark night anyway, right when you least need the hassles!