• Welcome, Guest! We hope you enjoy the excellent technical knowledge, event information and discussions that the BMW MOA forum provides. Some forum content will be hidden from you if you remain logged out. If you want to view all content, please click the 'Log in' button above and enter your BMW MOA username and password.

    If you are not an MOA member, why not take the time to join the club, so you can enjoy posting on the forum, the BMW Owners News magazine, and all of the discounts and benefits the BMW MOA offers?

Running on idle for long time

temesvar

New member
This may sound as strange as strange can be, but it did happen to me.
On a cloudy afternoon, with not much to do, figured would start up the
bike and let it run on idle for some 20 min. with the Hi beam on, to see
how hot the new LED bulb that i just installed, will get. To make the story
short, after a phone call i left home and completely forgot that the bike
was left running...Came home about 5 hours later, and i freaked out,
remembering that i just started up the bike before i left!! The engine was
very hot, and was some oil under it, the battery drained, (new this
spring!) almost out of gas, but still running. I have cleaned the oil under,
charged the battery, and started the bike next day. All seams fine, with
a little hesitation when accelerating. No warning lights on!!
Am wondering if this situation did or could have cause some damage to
the engine?
It is a 2008 RT, with 16 000 miles.
 
Ooops!!!

i would for sure look for the oil leak...pay particular attention to the sight glass area.....and change the oil/filter for good measure...
 
Ooops!!!

i would for sure look for the oil leak...pay particular attention to the sight glass area.....and change the oil/filter for good measure...

The oil on the floor was what worried me the most. I think it came from the oil filter, as i never tighten it to specs.
The area around the oil sight glass is dry, so that is a relief. Just changed the oil, and all seam to be good. Didn't have
the nerve to go for a ride with the old oil, so tomorrow will try it out.
 
Dude...:eek

That is a long time for a non water cooled bike to sit idling, but you know that.

Dunno,many an older Oilhead melted sight glasses or caught the lower fairing on fire along with a garage or two.
Guess it could have been worse. The cat converter got really hot, I would think about tranny lube change as well,though the 1200's are not directly under the case as much as the 11xx models.
 
Change your oil now. It has been cooked.

Oh yeah.
Toast.

Idling is a very low stress condition where the oil doesn't have to work very hard.
Riding is another story.
Sure would be a shame to destroy the engine that just survived that ordeal.
Oil's cheap.
 
temesvar, I was going through my subscribed threads and came across this one, how did this ever turn out for you? I remember when I first read it, I thought ouch, this engine is toast. I hope it all worked out for you with no major expenses.
 
It might be interesting to save a sample of that oil and have it analyzed. It's condition might tell you what actually happened during that exercise.
 
temesvar, I was going through my subscribed threads and came across this one, how did this ever turn out for you? I remember when I first read it, I thought ouch, this engine is toast. I hope it all worked out for you with no major expenses.

Thankfully, nothing happened. I have changed the oil and filter, and had to tighten some bolts. Rest all seamed unharmed.
This was last year. Have some 15k miles on since, bike runs like a charm. Had a nice trip cross USA, from East to West, no
issues whatsoever. Thanks for asking.
 
Thankfully, nothing happened. I have changed the oil and filter, and had to tighten some bolts. Rest all seamed unharmed.
This was last year. Have some 15k miles on since, bike runs like a charm. Had a nice trip cross USA, from East to West, no
issues whatsoever. Thanks for asking.

Now that is impressive, to say the least. I'm glad to hear things worked to your benefit. :thumb
 
Nice! I think I’ll leave my wethead idling tomorrow at work and see what happens...
 
Impressive and glad to know one or two extra bars of oil temperature is a non event.

Sometimes being stuck in traffic big cities (hate big cities!!) mid Summer, a few extra bars did come on, was a bit less worried since I have seen it at worst.
I guess it's been "hardened", so to say, although am not sure if that is a good thing. But so far, all is good!:thumb
 
Nice! I think I’ll leave my wethead idling tomorrow at work and see what happens...
Being Irish, you will run out of gas in 1/2 hour!!:rofl Sorry, but I just had to throw this in...;)
You do as you like. Many things could have gone wrong, and that is why I posted this, shortly after I got home,
asking for what I can expect. But as time has proved it, I got away with this!:bow
 
I vaguely recall an early Oilhead service manual containing advice that maybe 30 minutes was the max for idling.

Of course the Police need more than that (and perhaps a fast idle) and those bikes have electric fans for the oil cooler.

Thing is, the amount of heat your motor generates is directly proportional to the amount of fuel burned, and it isn't burning much at idle. Diesels are even better in this regards as they vary the fuel-to-air ratio and at idle it's maybe 1-150 as opposed to the 1-15 (stoichiometric) gasoline engines usually run at. Some diesels come with software to boost idle speed should they overcool during extended idling.

So, when you're sitting at road construction, nervous throttle blipping only serves to put more heat in your engine.

Many are confused by old time American cars with water pump mounted radiator fans that did tend to overheat at idle. That's not applicable to aircooled engines and it doesn't happen.
 
Yesterday the dealer told me that have had multiple cases as described by the OP. When they lose oil the bike shuts down. This ecplains why the OP had to charge the battery because even though the engine is protected the key stays on. They told me the bikes run normally after new oil etc.

See my post in the Wedge K bike section (safety switch) regarding my loss of oil and oil pressure. The bike is okay thanks to this protection. The mechanics think this protection was added after the 1100s or 1150s era.
 
Yesterday the dealer told me that have had multiple cases as described by the OP. When they lose oil the bike shuts down. This ecplains why the OP had to charge the battery because even though the engine is protected the key stays on. They told me the bikes run normally after new oil etc.

See my post in the Wedge K bike section (safety switch) regarding my loss of oil and oil pressure. The bike is okay thanks to this protection. The mechanics think this protection was added after the 1100s or 1150s era.
Am not sure what safety feature are you talking about. My bike never shut off until I did after about 5 hours.
 
I see that now. I guess some lose all their oil and shutdown. Why did you need to charge your battery if it was still running? Or did the heat cause it to discharge?

Anyways I learnt these things shutdown with a loss of oil pressure. My K bike certainly shut down and started right back up after adding fresh oil. It should have been toast with no oil and the dealer told me of other examples of complete oil loss from forgotten idling R bikes. One where the valve cover was warped even.
According to them they have seen bikes that were left idling more than once.
 
Last edited:
I see that now. I guess some lose all their oil and shutdown. Why did you need to charge your battery if it was still running? Or did the heat cause it to discharge?

The alternator produces minimal power at idle and can lead to a small battery discharge. You need get the revs up a bit to produce sufficient power to charge.
 
Back
Top