Grinding to a halt

[Foxy]

Tonight my 2004 Le Mans decided to quit on me with no apparent warning.

 

Was riding home from work. All seemed well, although the idle seemed a little high at first (around 1200-1300rpm) and before pulling away from another set of lights dropped as low as 500rpm, although picked back up fine.

 

I couldn't work out if the engine sounded a little rough or not, thanks to wearing a new helmet, but after ten miles or so I very quickly lost all power and then the engine cut out completely. Managed to coast to a halt safely but it will be tomorrow at the earliest before I get a chance to look the bike over. Unfortunately had naff all with me at the time so all I could do was verify that I had petrol and electrical power. When trying to start up the engine turns over freely but would not fire. A final attempt resulted in what sounded like one cylinder trying to fire.

 

So, wondering if this sounds familiar to anyone, or if there are any known vices that might have provoked this reaction? Otherwise I can see a future involving bits of Guzzi strewn around the house.

[docc]

It's probably not that bad.

 

Start with checking the voltage and making sure the battery connections are tight. Check the relays and all fuses and visible connections.

 

Open the run switch and clean it with contact cleaner.

 

After that you may have to pull the tank to get to some other connections.

 

Can you hear the pump whir when you turn the bike on?

[belfastguzzi]

Tonight my 2004 Le Mans decided to quit on me with no apparent warning.

 

Was riding home from work. All seemed well, although the idle seemed a little high at first (around 1200-1300rpm) and before pulling away from another set of lights dropped as low as 500rpm, although picked back up fine.

 

I couldn't work out if the engine sounded a little rough or not, thanks to wearing a new helmet, but after ten miles or so I very quickly lost all power and then the engine cut out completely. Managed to coast to a halt safely but it will be tomorrow at the earliest before I get a chance to look the bike over. Unfortunately had naff all with me at the time so all I could do was verify that I had petrol and electrical power. When trying to start up the engine turns over freely but would not fire. A final attempt resulted in what sounded like one cylinder trying to fire.

 

So, wondering if this sounds familiar to anyone, or if there are any known vices that might have provoked this reaction? Otherwise I can see a future involving bits of Guzzi strewn around the house.

Are you sure that petrol is ok? Is tank level low? I think 2004 works same as earlier bikes – whereby there can be petrol in the bottom right side of the tank, but it's no use because it can't get circulated. When I've had very low petrol, bike (2002) has behaved exactly as you described.

[Foxy]

Shouldn't be petrol, was filled up fifteen miles or so before, and tank is still almost full. Only got the bike home and out of the van this afternoon, so tomorrow will have a dig.

[Foxy]

Just been out to the garage to give it the once over before I started delving deeper. Had healthy voltage at the battery, hooked up some HT testers to check on the plugs and leads. Thumbed the starter to turn it over, and it started first time. Rough, but sounding running. Thinking I may have picked up a blockage or some dodgy petrol, so will be draining the tank tomorrow and having a peek. Possibly the van journey home that shook things up a bit. Might explain the rough running - I filled up just before getting to work after running fairly low and it was on the return journey that I started getting problems.

[Foxy]

Please don't get upset at this goofy suggestion, but could the tank be overfilled and gas (petrol) gotten into the evaporative control system? If it does, I think it's possible for uncontrolled raw fuel to get into the intakes, but at any rate, rough running, stalling, and rideability problems may ensue. Maybe the van ride sloshing a full tank of fuel around?

 

If that's it, you may have to open up, clean, purge the evap system, perhaps with compressed air?

 

Evaporative control system? Pretty sure UK spec bikes don't have them, and I hope I would have spotted it

 

Got to have a look tonight when I got in from work. Drained and flushed the fuel system, then put five litres of fresh unleaded in. Fired up with the odd hiccup, idled rough for a few seconds. Then settled down to an even tickover at the correct speed. A quick ride seems to show things are back to normal.

 

Didn't see any obvious contamination in the fuel, so suppose it could be a dodgy batch. Seeing as I've filled a jerry can with it I think I'll filter it and then be topping up the wife's car with it 5 litres or so at a time.

[Guzzi2Go]

... On the evap thing: do you have a rectangular black plastic box with hoses running to it under your exhaust collector under the gearbox? Or hoses coming out of the bottom underside of the petrol tank above the frame? If so, then you've got evap control stuff.

No, EU Guzzis don't sport the feature. If you have the parts manual, you can see that there is a different "tank page" for US market.

 

The EU exhaust regulations are now more stringent than those in the US, so I am surprised that fugitive fuel vapor is not part of the emissions control.

That may be, but there is no requirement to retrofit older vehicle according to new regulations. They are just taxed more.

[Marty]

I'm new to this forum and have been searching for discussions of problems similar to what my 01 V-11 Sport experiences.

This thread sounds similar, because my bike would go for miles and miles and then just start to either lose power, and eventually quit, or, would have what appeared to be electrical shut down where the tach needle would drop to zero as the bike cut out, but cut in and out, and finally die completely. The first time this occurred was on the freeway and none too safe. There were some indications that the bike had to get fairly hot before this would happen so I'm thinking about the threads on fuel vapor lock. In any case, after these symptoms shut down the bike, with some waiting, like maybe 10-15 minutes, normalcy would return. The first time this happened, I suspected the relays. Switching these around seemed to help, though I am not sure if it was that or just waiting a bit that allowed me to ride home. After that I replaced all the mini-relays with ones from Omron purchased from Digikey, a big electronics supply house. These were only about $4 each. Omron shows 2 types of these relays, which correspond to the two types used on the bike, but in fact have discontinued supplying one of the two, however, the one type they still supply can substitute because the extra internal contacts are just not used. Nevertheless, the problem recurs, though I THINK the electrical aspect has gone away. I also messed with the rpm sensor and reset the gap. It has been suggested to me by various people, including the helpful techs at Moto International in Seattle, that the causes might be: bad electric fuel petcock, failing rpm sensor, vapor lock, tank suck, tip over valve, and more. I prefer to diagnose the actual cause rather than to just start replacing parts, though I did replace the relays having heard so much about their problems.

This bike also exhibits the problem mentioned in some threads of stalling at idle after a longish run. I'm starting to think that may be TPS related.

Any ideas would be appreciated!

[Foxy]

This is where I admit that the original problem hasn't gone away.

 

Having got the bike running again (eek! Was it really nearly three months ago!) I took it out to refill with fresh petrol. It was sounding a little rough, but seemed to improve. I got about a mile down the road before I noticed that power was dropping off. Before I could turn around and head for home the bike coughed and died. I rolled to a halt and tried restarting. It would turn over but nothing more. Called for recovery and with a healthy battery on hand the bike was turned over again. Rough as you like, really rough, so we killed the ignition and I got taken home on the back of a truck. Bike got put in the garage while I concentrated on work and my other bikes, one of which was in the midst of a rebuild. First time I looked some more was today.

 

Gave the bike the once over. Exhaust valve clearance had tightened up a little, but that has been remedied. Have whipped the tank off and had a go at all the connectors I could find. Relays have been replaced. Have checked the coils, cold of course. Resistance between primary and ground is 0.7ohms. Between secondary and ground it is just over 3000ohms. I can't find the specs for these in my manual so can anyone tell me what they should be? Don't think though that the coils are the problem as both are giving the same readings.

 

Which leaves me at a loss at to what might be wrong? I see the TPS have been mentioned. How do I check these? I'm starting to rather miss riding my Le Mans!

[Guzzi2Go]

I'd check the head temperature sensor. Can you smell petrol/see smoke from the exhaust?

 

Temp sensor is a NTC and should measure 200-400 ohm between 100 and 80°C. At 20°C it measures 3750 ohm. Drop it into a pot of boiling water and see how low does it go.

 

Also check cable connecting the temp sensor to the ECU. If it is broken, your ECU believes the engine is dead cold. It may be that the cable is simply not connected properly.

 

http://home.planet.nl/~world.traveller/pics/wts05%20v4.pdf

[Velf 2003]

Hello all,

 

Let me introduce myself. I`m riding my second V11 at the time being, though for wintery conditions I ride an Aprilia Pegaso 650. Still riding Italian style, is that okay with everyone?

My former V11 was an beloved an evenso hated motorcycle. The times I was proudly riding where sometimes changed to severe hatred to anything Italian.

 

Here`s why. On a 7.000 km summer holliday trip I had to calculate with extra traveling time due to the fact that everytime I stopped or had to travel trough heavy traffic the bike ran crappy, stalled and wouldn`t start. Had to wait 20 to 60, minutes (depending if there was water to cool available) and could start easily and ride again.

 

Can anyone imagine what it`s like to have to travel with a minimum of 40 kilometers an hour to cool the engine enough through the stillstanding trafic of the long an winding up-hill road from France to Andorra?

 

This had me thinking it was a heat related problem.

 

Eventually I found out that the leads connected to the electrical fuel petcock where almost broken whithin the protective hose. Every time the bike heated up the air filter housing grew in size and put strain on the leads thus disconnecting the electrical fuel pump.

 

Letting the bike cool off releaved the strain from the leads and made it possible to start the bike normally and ride on.

 

It`s not a vage story, believe me. The only fague thing about the story is that while being in the neihgbourhood of Lourdes, France I collected myself some Holy Water to cool the engine and...... It didn`t do nothing!!!

 

But to put this to an happy end: I resolderd the leads back to the electrical fuel petcock and never suffered from it again. My guess is that during maintenance, when the fuel tank is off, the fuel tank is put on the (work bench/floor) surface it rests on two points, one of them being the leads of the electrical fuel petcock. When the tank is full, this could easily do dammage to the connection of the leads to the fuel petcock.

 

To check if this could be the solution to your problem: when the engine stalls, relieve the fuel return line from the right side of the fuel tank. Put the ignition on. The fuel pumped out must be a firm jet. If its weak: try to mess with the leads of the electrical fuel petcock and see what happens.

Don`t forget that fuel is flammable and be carefull:> aim the fuel to a container wich can resist fuel. (old oilcontainer eg.)

 

 

I sincerely hope that I`ve made a positive contribution to your problem.

 

Good luck!!

 

Velf 2003

[Marty]

Thankyou Velf,

that really really sounds a lot like my exact problem, except for me it took less time to return to functioning condition.

But I'll try that, in fact, it was recommended to me to just get rid of the electric petcock and put in a manual one.

In any case I really enjoyed your post, you cracked me up talking about how Holy Water from Lourdes didn't do nothing!!!!

Thanks for putting your note in the other thread to direct me to this one.

[Foxy]

My investigations continue...

 

...and not in a good way. I've just dropped the sump and was of course rather horrified to find several large flakes of metal in the oil.

 

Oh goody