Keyless Ride RTw Completely Dead Battery In 6 Days...

After a very busy week, I was looking forward to taking a nice afternoon run to stretch the legs on my rtw. Wife and kids were settled in for a lazy afternoon nap and I was geared up for the ride only to lose the wind in my sails when i pushed the nifty black button that has now replaced my old trusty key....

Nothing.... Nada... Zip... Zero... Zilch. No lights on the display, no response with the alarm, no response with using the fob to unlock the cases.... and of course, no ride!!!

So... after trolling the net for the rest of the afternoon looking for any clues, I have found precious little info on the new central locking/keyless ride experiences of other riders. Perhaps I am the only RTw owner that has allowed their bike to sit six days between rides, but I find that hard to imagine. Apparently, the Keyless Ride receiver on the bike is constantly scanning for the presence of key fob which creates a larger demand on the battery. I should also mention that I left the Nav V in the cradle as well as I always keep my bike in my locked garage.

I have had it on a Battery Tender Jr. for almost 8 hours now and there is still not enough juice to get the bike to respond to the key fob in any manner, so maybe in the morning that will be different. Now I'm wondering if there is anything that could have "lost its programming" due to the drained battery that would prevent the bike and the fob doing their thing once the battery's charge has improved?

Anyone here have any experiences they can add/share?

Thanks,
Steve

Sorry to hear of your troubles and mist ride. You may just have a bad battery, I'd have a load test done. 6 days between rides isn't much time.

FYI, I keep my bikes and mowers on tenders when not in use, I get very long life out of my batteries (7 + years).

Jay

You don't really need to keep the battery on a tender for short periods of time. Also, the battery maintainer should be compatible with the can bus system on the new RTW. That could be your problem.

KyleTurner said:

You don't really need to keep the battery on a tender for short periods of time. Also, the battery maintainer should be compatible with the can bus system on the new RTW. That could be your problem.

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Would that matter if the Battery Tender is tied directly to the battery terminals?

pianomanla said:

Would that matter if the Battery Tender is tied directly to the battery terminals?

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You should be OK going direct to the battery.
Did you try a new battery in the fob?There's a slim chance that battery is dead.
Did you check the bike battery with a volt meter?

Check your battery pigtail...are the terminal nuts/bolts tight? Was battery tender going through proper light flashing sequences for the charge? Are you at least getting security (red) light flash when pushing start button without fob close by?

Motodan said:

Check your battery pigtail...are the terminal nuts/bolts tight? Was battery tender going through proper light flashing sequences for the charge? Are you at least getting security (red) light flash when pushing start button without fob close by?

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The RTw has now been on the tender for 27 hours and about an hour ago, the button press yielded a few seconds of the startup sequence and it came to an abrupt halt when the windshield tried to deploy back to the last previous position. This left what appear to be the small white bulbs near the turn signals still illuminated with no way to turn them off other than to let them turn off automatically (or was this the battery fully draining again?)

I borrowed the larger/more powerful Battery Tender model (as opposed to the Jr model that I own) and I now have it connected (since 1pm today) so... I wonder how much longer it will take to bring it to a full charge and then what condition the battery will be in after all of this. Time will tell I suppose.

-Steve

That all well and still not telling....so again....

Did you check your battery pigtail...are the terminal nuts/bolts tight? Was battery tender going through proper light flashing sequences for the charge? Are you at least getting security (red) light flash when pushing start button without fob close by?

Motodan said:

That all well and still not telling....so again....

Did you check your battery pigtail...are the terminal nuts/bolts tight? Was battery tender going through proper light flashing sequences for the charge? Are you at least getting security (red) light flash when pushing start button without fob close by?

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Sorry about that... Bolts are tight, tender has been solid red since I plugged it in, and the red security light has been active since I tried to power everything on a few hours ago.

Do you think I should wait to try it again for another 12-24 hours? or should I wait until the light turns green?

-Steve

Sure sounds like a possible defective battery. If you had that tender on there this long and no real power available you may well want to contact dealer. Short of that you need to test the battery...either at home or better yet the dealer or a battery store. I had my '15 sitting for better than two weeks and tender brings it to full charge in very little time.

Motodan said:

Sure sounds like a possible defective battery. If you had that tender on there this long and no real power available you may well want to contact dealer. Short of that you need to test the battery...either at home or better yet the dealer or a battery store. I had my '15 sitting for better than two weeks and tender brings it to full charge in very little time.

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Looking like that to me as well. My experience is that when these batteries go bad suddenly, they can't be jumped. Is it under the 2 year battery warranty window? If it is, it's off to the dealer- I would say.
The next real test would be to try a start from another 12V battery, doesn't matter what it is, but you will have to remove the suspect battery from the line.
Let us know how you make out.
Gary

Well... I decided to try to crank her up again... and after 31 hours on the tender, the light on the tender was still red (not blinking green indicating "toping off" but still less than 80%. Even so, she started up! The first thing I did was go the menu and display the Battery Voltage: 14.1v.
View attachment 47429

After letting her idle for a bit, I decided to see what the impact of adding the demand load on the electrical system as it was the last time I rode. That included the following:
Heated Grips:ON
Heated Seat (front):ON
Gerbings Jacket:ON
High Beams:ON
Radio:ON
Phone Charing through USB Port

With each additional item engaged, I would see a drop in the overall voltage in the display. I decided to push it to the max and turned all heating on high and added the rear seat heater on high as well as turning on my hazard lights and briefly saw the following as a dip:


This was a dip, I assume as most of the heating devices were reaching their peak temperatures.

I then began turning each power hog off individually, and with each load removed, you could see the voltage increase to where it finally "stabilized" at 14v.


Immediately after turning the engine off, the voltage began to dip to where it held for a good while at 12.6v


I subsequently started the bike three times before reconnecting the Tender again. What all of this means is a mystery to me, but I lack the comfort level of a reliable start, especially if I am using the heated gear... Thoughts... Comments...?

If you look at the start of your tread you'll see I suggested a load test, take it to the dealer. The bikes charging system looks fine. It seems to me you have a bad battery. The bikes charging system looks fine.

Jay

The 14.0 - 14.1 volts is because your bike is charging. Charging voltage has to be higher than battery voltage otherwise the current is going the wrong way! A fully charged AGM battery should have a resting (engine off) voltage of about 12.7V and yours seems in line with that. I do think a load test/dealer visit is in line though. My bike sat for 6 days once (big deal, I've only had it 4 weeks ) but it fired up right away.

K16 Key fob recall

http://www.k1600forum.com/forum/bmw-k1600-tech-performance-chat/66945-exclusive-recall.html

Any updates Steve?

Hi Lee,

After 2 days on the tender, the bike finally powered up and started, albeit with hesitation. By the following morning, the tenders "charged" light turned green. I let the bike sit for two days and the battery voltage seemed to hold at 12.7v. I went for a ride thursday morning that lasted several hours and 180 miles. I intentionally left the GPS unit in the mount and did not reconnect the battery tender lead. This morning, the voltage indicated by in the dash topped out at 11.8v, but the bike did start.

I think that the GPS unit (nav V) is leaching power, even though everything is powered off. That is my best guess anyway.

-Steve

pianomanla said:

Hi Lee,

After 2 days on the tender, the bike finally powered up and started, albeit with hesitation. By the following morning, the tenders "charged" light turned green. I let the bike sit for two days and the battery voltage seemed to hold at 12.7v. I went for a ride thursday morning that lasted several hours and 180 miles. I intentionally left the GPS unit in the mount and did not reconnect the battery tender lead. This morning, the voltage indicated by in the dash topped out at 11.8v, but the bike did start.

I think that the GPS unit (nav V) is leaching power, even though everything is powered off. That is my best guess anyway.

-Steve

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When you turn the bike off watch the Nav V it will ask you if you want it to use battery power or shut off, this only happen because a lost of power from the bike, it loses it's connection. I don't think it your Nav V you must have another parasitic device or like I've been saying a bad battery. Have you had the dealer do a load test? You can even take it to Wally World (it's a no charge service)...

Jay

I am heading to the dealership for my next service in a in about 10 days and will have them load test it then. The only other thing attached to the battery is my Gerbings heated gear lead. I can't imagine it leaching juice from the battery, but who knows.

-Steve