It's dying again Jim!

[ Monday - February 16, 2010 ]

The unfortunate news is, I have to drive my Subaru Forester once more.  Not that I mind the Forester, because it's a damned well built machine and extremely reliable.  However, it's not as much fun as the 8GS.  That is until it rains cats and dogs.  In that case, the Forester is just as much fun as the 8GS without the getting wet part.  The car only has 149HP so it's hard to get it to go out of control without the turbo charger.  I guess if I try really hard, I should be able to break traction.  As for a standard 25 MPH turn, forget breaking traction.  All I can manage is a little nudge before the AWD gains traction again (e.g. split second loss of traction).  One of these days I might just put a snorkel on the Forester and take it for a stream crossing, but I digress.

So what's the deal this time?  It's back to the same old symptoms again.  After a good heavy ride in the rain, while running with Seafoam to stabilize the fuel, the 8GS once more decided to give me the "hard to start" bit.  It got progressively worse over 3 days with the 3rd day being the worst of the problem.  It's not a case where the 8GS became a 500 lbs hunk of metal, aluminum, and plastic.  Instead it stutters just like me when I bite my tongue or try to talk too fast.  I had to resort to pushing the start button with the left hand while twisting the throttle with the right to get the bike to start.  Beautiful success after the third attempt.  So much for the fuel causing the ill start problem.  Sure enough I call Brown Motor Works and took the bike in the next morning.  This was last Thursday.  The bike has been in the shop since, but the Brown folks are treating me right.  I can't complain about them because damn they're fast.  As of Friday afternoon, they've already started working on my bike.

I'm also fortunate enough to also see the outer gas tank shell cracking.  It's a nice set of left and right side cracks.  Since this is purely cosmetic I didn't care too much about it.  I called Brown just to let them know I see the problem but know that it's cosmetic and I'm not in a real hurry to fix the problem.  They told me to go ahead and take the bike in for some pictures to see what BMW NA is willing to do.  I did.  This time around, the response is fast.  "Go ahead and replace the gas tank," was the instruction from BMW NA.

Between the stalling problem, the cracked gas tank, and my bike being at 11K miles, I went ahead and ask the service folks to go ahead and slap me with the 12K miles service.

So far so good.  The 12K service is done.  The gas tank and fuel injectors just came in today.  The gas tank change out is scheduled to happen tomorrow.  Now it's just a matter of seeing what BMW NA is willing to do related with the ill starting problem.  From the looks of last month's problem, it appears to be the fuel injector, but I wouldn't pretend to be any type of bike mechanic expert.  I'm hoping BMW NA is willing to change the fuel injector but I doesn't look that way.  At least not with a lot more tests.

In the meanwhile I'm starting to seriously consider going back to getting one of these.  I only have $1.8K left on the 8GS.  I should be able to plop some money down on one of these guy at the beginning or middle of summer.  Oh yeah!!!




[ Thursday - February 18, 2010 ]

Just as I suspected.  BMW NA doesn't want to do anything with the start problem other than put the bike on the diagnostic computer to run additional tests.  Of course the diagnostic is going to come back all 100% clean.  Why, because the problem is a mechanical one and not an electrical one.  Just because a sensor is reporting a false positive, it doesn't necessarily mean that there is nothing wrong with the mechanical part.  What does all this mean?  This means I have to pay for the warranty fix.  If I wait and let them perform another fuel injector cleaning, the problem will simply come back again.


[ Friday - February 19, 2010 ]

At long last!  Final resolution!  I guess it turns out good that I requested the fuel injectors be replaced under my $s.  Why, because when the Tech took the injectors out and looked at it, he noticed the coil on the fuel injector is discolored.  There is definitely something wrong with the FI.  As a result, Brown Motor Works contacted BMW NA to recommend that my fuel injector change out be under warranty.  Guess what, BMW NA agreed.  Way cool!  Thanks Brown for taking care of me.  Now all I have to pay for the the 12K service which comes in at about $340.  Rock on Brown Motor Works!  You people are awesome!


Written on:  February 16, 2010
Last modified:  February 19, 2010