[FitFrank]

I dont think I shut it down that way since I last did the thing with the error codes clearing, but I shall try the cycle twice thing anyhow for good measure.

Sometimes when I hit the starter, its like its hit a wall - I have a new starter motor on there at the moment, I think that "hit a wall" thing started with that new part, I shall try tightening the connecter lead, I'd only had the motor a week, and I took it apart to check the magnets hadn't come off, as it was making strange noises. Its been on there 4 months or so and still bothers me - so many silly little problems I seem to be getting.

I do get over focused on the noises tho, I thought my LCV was making a loud ratchet noise, but this newer one is pretty much identical, just a bit less loud.

 

[arizonawarrior]

Was it a new factory Warrior starter, or a road star starter, or an aftermarket brand? Or was it used maybe? Also, is it known to be the Warrior starter (which has a bit more power)? Just wondering.

 

[FitFrank]

Its a brand new one, I got it from partzilla in a sale 5PX8189001 (replaces 5PX8189000)

Terrible experience this morning - started up, temps in the minus 1 sort of area, right from the start it was running badly, set off and only got 1/4 mile before first junction conked out! Had to really rev the engine to keep running - put into gear, conked out every time, so pulled over to warm engine, set off after about 5 mins of holding throttle open, got about another 1/2 mile, pulled over and re-routed some cables I'd pushed behind the coils in case there were pinched (as that had been a problem last year) set off again, seemed a little better, but probably only because engine was now warmer. Got near work, still concerned, but then time I'd done the next 1/2 mile or so, seemed to settle and run ok.

After work, still a cold day, started up, straight away problems, set off revving engine, time I'd got home, fine, ticking over nice!

Now I'm going to scrutinise the forum history some more, clearly I have still got some problem related to the LCV or its related sensors - luckily I'm not working tomorrow, so will be diving back in

journey to and from work is about 15-20 mins, seems to correlate pretty much exactly with time taken to warm engine - only other option (besides fixing it) at the moment, is for me to sit at idle for a good 10 mins before going anywhere when the weather is cold!

Just pulled my rear left plug, looks pretty grim!

 

[freeezzzz]

It seems to me that with this condition of the spark plugs, clearly visible black smoke should come out of the exhaust

 

[arizonawarrior]

Any chance you can post a couple pictures that are rock solid clear so can have a shot and 'reading' the plug.

 

[FitFrank]

It's night time here now, can do that tomorrow, I do get smoke in the mornings, but seems to run ok & nothing excessive once warmed up. I don't know for sure if that bit of muck came out with the plug, cos it dropped down the top of the head as I retrieved it, but it did appear to come out the head that way. Shall take another photo tomorrow - the bike pulls over 100 easy when warmed up, so hopefully not as bad as it seems

 

[arizonawarrior]

Just to take these off the table, look at the manual to identify location of the oil temperature sensor. See if the wires are okay, check for corrosion. Also inspect the ambient temperature sensor and connection (this sensor is easily damaged by simply over-tightening). After doing these checks, get into DIAG and see if the sensor readings reflect reality.

 

[FitFrank]

Thanks for all the help and advice, I may have solved the current problem - after diddling about with this and that, I noticed the rear right side spark plug lead was loose & barely on the plug, probably after I last lifted the silencer box and didn’t push it back down properly - if that turns out to be the cause, I’ll find out tomorrow I guess when I go for a fully cold start.

Today I checked the oil temperature sensor and the engine temperature sensor, they tested as 24.7 and 25.4, so since they are both giving similar reading, I assume they are ok (tested at x200 ohms)

I took the silencer box off, and ran the engine, the inlet pipe from the LCV - silencer box was sucking pretty hard, after 20 mins warming up, it had lessened dramatically, (tho still sucking very slightly) so I assume this means the LCV is doing its job. Tick over was still low despite the LCV so I pushed it up to about 900revs so it would idle ok, then after 10 mins or so had to drop is down from about 1500 revs back to about 900.

Normally I would expect that since the tick over is raised by the LCV, if you set it at 900rpm, it would drop as the LCV deactivates, dropping the tick over to about 600rpm, so you would have to then raise it back up for normal temperatures. Consequently I can only assume something is still not right!

I went for a test ride, all seemed well, but then it was when the engine was warm the other day.

Perhaps of interest - I found that the clamp between the air silencer box and throttle bodies has stripped threads, tightening and loosening has no effect, so could be a leak there, ordered a new one, but seriously I don’t think its too bad.

I did the double press while switching on, and the 2 second follow up press and got a 15 - so I thought hellfire, its a TPS error code, after much flapping around, I realised this is not an error code, the TPS reading is 15 - 92, not perfect, but ptobably not a real issue - I assume I’m right there?

I ran diagnostics on both the cold engine and the hot

Thanks for all the help and patience!


Diag
D1.01 13
D1:02. 99
D1:03. 0
D1:04. 0
D1:05. 37
D1:07. 0
D1:08. 0.6
D109. 11.3
D1:10. 48
D1:11. 46
D1:20. On
D1:21. On
D1:30. 00
D1:31. 00
D1:36. 00
D1:37. 00
D1:50. 00
D1:52. 00
D1:54. 00
D1:55. 3.4
D1:60. 00
D1:61. 23
D1:62. 2
D1:70. 0

Hot engine. (suspect I got out of sync with records below) [EDIT] think I just corrected that sequence

D1.01 15
D1.02. 99
D1.03. 0
D1.04. 0
D1.05. 64
D1.07 0
D1.08. 0.6
D1.09. 11.6
D1.10 120
D1.11 162
D1.20. On
D1.21 On
D1.30. 0
D1.31. 0
D1.36. 0
D1.37. 0
D1.50. 0
D1.52. 0
D1.54. 0
D1.60. 1.9
D1.61. 0
D1.62. 22
D1.70 2




Hoping I can report back tomorrow to say the bike ran no problems cold in the morning, but I shall be (pleasantly) surprised if it does - here's hoping!

 

[arizonawarrior]

Run at least hot again. I think you slipped DI.07 and also shuffled things a bit whole proceeding.

From DI.01 you could be right about TPS adjustment. Depends. 6-14 shown value 15~20 so 13 is out of range. Warm 15 is barely in range. So pn yours, cold starts happen at 13 throttle angle then increases to 16 when warm. Was it completely totally overnight absolutely cold?

If it were me I would run both again unless totally cold. Any comparo would benefit from running both cold and hot again in sequence. But the numbers would still be reflective enough of conditions. Dunno. Your decision could differ. It's all good.

Check you throttle cables at both ends for debris or damage. Lube the cable ends. Verify WOT to IDLE action is free. When the bike is FULLY WARM AFTER A RIDE readjust warm idle to ~900rpm. Warm spec is 850~950 which some of us take to mean the Vtwin motor's by-nature-erratic warm idle never bounces lower than 850 even if it sometimes bumps higher than 950.

These things will set you up to be better able to understand why your cold start rpm is lower than warm idle. I'm guessing it's a leaking intake gasket. But let's get these other things off the table first.

BTW the air seal between the silencer airbox and venturi is not relevant here. Any air leaking there bypasses the air filtration but still goes into the jugs. It's the same air volume. Of course there is no mass airflow sensor.

 

[FitFrank]

So do I move the TPS into range by shifting it around - it had paint marks on it, I assume from the shop recall years ago, but I have moved it a couple of times since, I just tried to match the position as best I could after I ended up with replacement throttle bodies.

It was stone cold when I did the first diag, it had stood overnight, the temps were around 0 celsius, or 32F.

I shall run the tests again at the weekend, as I’m going to be at work tomorrow.

I do have a very definite leak from the very top head gasket cover, it spits out and is getting worse, was gonna leave it till spring, didn’t want to over torque so I plan to get a new gasket, it’s getting really out of hand now. I don’t suppose that could be effecting things?

I shall check my coffin air box and make sure the filter is seated properly, not sure where else to look, no holes have been drilled or anything like that

 

[arizonawarrior]

TPS Adjustment is tricky and needs accuracy. It's done with an electrical meter. Process is in the manual. If you have Ivan's ECU upgrade then check with Ivan if your set-up needs a slight tweak in the electrical TPS value.

An oil leak in the gasket of the head's CHROME VALVE COVER probably would not cause a vacuum issue that would cause the trouble you are observing.

Later, after these things are looked into, if not fixed, then NEXT would be the intake and throttle body gaskets for air leaks. But not yet.

 

[FitFrank]

Now you got me thinking - the base gaskets under the throttle bodies, (the metal ones that go under the rubber boot into the heads) when I fitted them I wondered if I'd swopped the 2 round and got them on upside down - that way they would align and match the hole, but the tabs would be up instead of down, I think that may be how I fitted them. I shall probably want to look into that if I can see them without actually going all the way into it. Could just be that things there are not right.

I see from part numbers, the air pressure sensors and the atmospheric pressure sensor are identical part numbers, maybe I could swop things around and get a clue if anything changes from that. Also could test and compare results as that looks easy to do.

Bike ran rough again today, same as it was, didn't actually conk out, but was rough till warmed. Here's the thing, I was going down this steep hill, throttle off using engine braking, the engine was "jerky" it was so bad I pulled in the clutch and rolled using the brakes alone - now this reminded me of the behaviour in the very hot weather last summer, (only about 4 or 5 days a year) it would jerk around like that in heavy traffic - fine if blasting along, but otherwise it would just die, I'd pull over and have to wait 10mins - but then because it was already hot, it would happen again inside of 15 mins riding, very similar to this cold weather. It seems to me the bike only likes average temperatures! Ok, not very profound, but there has to be a clue, presumably some sensor in the chain has "gone up the creek" as they say? Another aspect of this I notice, it's related to low revs, when at high revs, for the most part you can just forget about the problems.

Shall be doing more tests etc tomorrow, thanks again

 

[freeezzzz]

All atmospheric pressure sensors in warrior are the same. Different is in hoses from TB plugged in it. Atmospheric one without it.

 

[arizonawarrior]

+1 with freeezzzz. So yes you can test sensors by swapping between the 3 and seeing if the symptom swaps, except it's still really hard to know which is causing it so testing the sensor (see the free service manual) is best.

Most often, it's not the air sensor but it's the hose. Or it's a case where the vacuum hose goes to the wrong intake nipple. For the two sensors with hoses, the electrical plug is wired for the proper jug, and its hose needs to go to the same jug. There is a help file in Documentation forum (see table of contents) with a title something like 'if you have problems after doing a vak or vbak'. Download the pdf and the picture file.

 

[FitFrank]

I attempted to test the sensors today, but I don't think I'm doing it right - I shoved the pins of the tester onto the connector with the engine running and got the 4.9v on each, so within range, however, the connector was not connected to the sensor at the time, so all I have done is test what the battery is sending to the sensor, not the sensor output - so I figure to test the sensor output, I need to bare some wire and test there? It didn't seem like a good idea to go ahead that way, It seems impossible to get a reading from the back of the block as it is entirely insulated. Do I need a better tool or something? I'm confused -

I tired swopping sensors around but no joy there. I wonder if I replaced a dud LCV with another dud, I notice it didn't seem to be sucking much air even when cold.

Bike still bothers me, I swopped my TPS for one I have, it now reads 15 - 92, so that's not too bad I guess.

This all started recently, so I can probably discount my other ideas about maybe its this or that I did 6 months or years ago.

Started bike up today, after all that messing about, still too low tick over at idle, went for a ride 25 miles, (bloody freezing fog out there) no real problems other than having to hold throttle open to maintain tick over for first few miles. Bike ran good, the direction I went in is open roads, so no having to slow for traffic etc, quite acceptable really, but just not quite right. Time she was warmed up properly, tick over had returned to around 900 as previously set. What I don't get, is why all this agro with tick over what I never had before I started this thread a few weeks ago - it all began with low idle, high idle, no idle at all - change LCV, now low idle when cold. Its so bizarre.

When I started the bike this aft, there were screams from my Starter Relay, I only replaced it new about 9 months ago - my battery is quite old, so maybe that's a problem, or bad wires in there? Shall look into that

New definitive Diag - first column cold, 2nd hot

D1 - 15 / 15

D2 - 101 / 102

D3 - 0 / 0

D4 - 0. / 0

D5 - 36 / 64

D7 - 0 / 0

D8 - 0.6 / 0.6

D9 - 11.3 / 11.9

D10 - 46 / 151

D11 - 45 / 212

D20 - on / on

D21 - on / on

D30 - 0. / 0

D31 - 0 / 0

D36 - 0. / 0

D37 - 0 / 0

D50 - 0 / 0

D52 - 0 / 0

D54 - 0 / 0

D55 - 3.4 / 2.0

D60 - 0 / 0

D61 - 0 / 13

D62 - 0 / 4

D70-0 / 70

 

[freeezzzz]

D5 - 36 / 64
D10 - 46 / 151
D11 - 45 / 212

I have a dataset from observing my bike temperature readings from 2019. There are 330 lines in each of which have 4 values: ambient temperature, readings of the intake temperature sensor, oil temperature sensor in the tank and engine temperature.

I specifically took an excerpt from the range of the last major change to the bike's configuration - after installing the firmware, which I use to this day. And at 64 degrees of intake temperature, I found 9 data at which the ambient temperature fluctuated in the range of 41-57, the oil temperature in the tank was 176-199, and the engine temperature was 223-244.

If we conduct observations regarding the ambient temperature, then I have 14 observations with readings below 46. So, the ambient temperature range turned out to be 39-46, intake 46-75, oil 158-199, engine 208-251.

Your motorcycle engine seems to me too cold Check hoses to/from LCV.

 

[FitFrank]

It was extremely cold out on the road - so I'm not surprised the engine is cool.

I shall have to take the LCV off and check the pipes etc for debris, it arrived packed polystyrene, much of which was broken down and dusty, its possible some was lodged inside, I was lazy and just fitted it without even taking the pipes off