!!!!Update on shutdown problem!!!
After having put over a 1,000 miles on my bulldog and the shut down problem hadn't resolved itself with more mileage on the bike I decided to find out what the real problem was. The most recent event that prompted me to look at the problem real hard was when it shut down and left me in total darkness traveling 70 mph, on a pretty narrow road in the country. I got pretty disoriented and panicked a little while fumbling to find the key to do a quick re-boot, so to speak. But I got the power back up and I was still on the road when the headlight came back on, so I cruised home and and reflected a lot. Honestly it scared me a little, and not much scares me on a bike after riding and racing for over 40 years.
So anyway, the more I rode it the more I realized that it wasn't an rpm or rev limiter situation. Sometimes it would shut down on hard acceleration even when I hadn't reached the rev limiter. It seemed like it had to be under hard acceleration for a few seconds before it shut down. I referred to the "bank angle sensor" or "tip over sensor" in an earlier post and it seemed like that could have something to do with my problem. Here is what the service manual says about the Tip Over Switch in chapter 7 , fuel systems.
QUOTE "The tip over switch (bank angle sensor), built into the EHC , shuts off the ignition and fuel pump if the motorcycle exceed a tilt angle of 57 degrees for approximately 2seconds. If there is an accident, or if the bike should fall over, the EHC shuts off power to the ECU and EFI systems."
With that small bit of information I started doing some research online, but could find very little additional info about the bank angle sensor on Bigdogs so I decide to educate my self on how they work. After looking at my EHC and pondering for a long time I noticed it was set in the bike at a rearward facing angle. I measured the angle it was installed at and it was 30 degrees, so I thought maybe under acceleration it was tripping the sensor. But still that didn't make sense because at hard breaking it could also trip the sensor. Did Bigdog not take into account the angle that the EHC would be sitting in the bike? Keep in mind at this point I didn't know completely how the bank angle sensor works. I decided to take out the EHC get slack in the harnesses and wiring and see how it really operates when subjected to different angles. So here is what I did....
With the EHC out in free air, still hooked up, bike all powered up, I rotated the EHC rearward until the electronics shut down. Conclusion: Shutdown angle about 75 degrees. (5 seconds for shutdown to occur)
Rotated the EHC forward untill electronics shut down. Conclusion: Shutdown angle about 50 degrees. (5 second for shutdown to occur)
Rotated the EHC to the left.....no shut down
Rotated the EHC to the right.....no shut down
WTF is going on here......so if i get this bike up on the rear wheel at a good enough angle for 5 seconds its going to shut down, but if it falls over it will never shut down????? Not how the Tip Sensor is supposed to work.
I did the tests in my garage for several hours, and several repetitions, just in case you think I'm jumping to conclusions. So just to verify my findings in the real operational world, i put my EHC back on the bike in an orientation 90 degrees from where it was originally, i.e. long side front to rear, rather than long side left to right.
Guess what....no more shutdown under acceleration:2thumbs: (several test ran on this situation also)
Final conclusion: My bike either had the wrong orientated EHC put in it or Bigdog didn't know or care that the EHC had to be installed in a certain way.
If I was a betting man, I would say I just have the wrong EHC in my bike, but without tech support from Bigdog, I will never know. Now I will fabricate a bracket to hold the EHC on the correct way.
