Gen II ground spider discussion (bench racing)
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olsonm3915
Well-known member
Yamaha would have to really have their heads firmly stuck in... the sand in order for them not to notice all these harnesses being replaced. And if they have to make more because all the warehouse stock is used up, it's not a big deal to do an ECO to fix the problem by getting rid of the spiders entirely. Basically re-create the Gen I harness with the proper connections to the Gen II components.
road runner
Well-known member
I'm sure Yamaha is aware of it, and working on it.
I don't know, but they may have the harnesses made by a harness company. So if that is the case, then they have to tell that company of the problem, and have them come up with a new and improved harness. Whether it's Yamaha or a harness company, Yamaha has to do a ton of R&D to try to figure out the exact problem. It may be as simple as corrosion or overloaded or both, or maybe they will find something obscure like faulty fans or horns or lites or etc, that is causing the overload. When they come out with a fix they want it to be a true fix, and not a band-aid, so I think that may be why it seems like it takes a while. They just want to get it right the second time.
No one is perfect. I judge a company by the way they deal with issues, and any issues I've had have been taken care of.
Bashing Yamaha really wont help our cause. We don't want them to think we're a bunch of Internet squids. I'm not saying anyone is , I just don't want it to happen, because then they wont listen to us.
Art
I don't know, but they may have the harnesses made by a harness company. So if that is the case, then they have to tell that company of the problem, and have them come up with a new and improved harness. Whether it's Yamaha or a harness company, Yamaha has to do a ton of R&D to try to figure out the exact problem. It may be as simple as corrosion or overloaded or both, or maybe they will find something obscure like faulty fans or horns or lites or etc, that is causing the overload. When they come out with a fix they want it to be a true fix, and not a band-aid, so I think that may be why it seems like it takes a while. They just want to get it right the second time.
No one is perfect. I judge a company by the way they deal with issues, and any issues I've had have been taken care of.
Bashing Yamaha really wont help our cause. We don't want them to think we're a bunch of Internet squids. I'm not saying anyone is , I just don't want it to happen, because then they wont listen to us.
Art
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olsonm3915
Well-known member
Sorry if it sounded like I was bashing Yamaha. I wasn't.
RZ350 already showed what the problem was, which any minimally competent electrical engineer would see immediately upon getting a look at how the grounds are routed in the Gen II harness. It's all about routing large currents through connector pins that aren't rated for that much current. There is no functional reason for those connectors to even be present in the harness, they could just as easily be replaced with crimped connections. I can speculate as to why they might have been added to the harness, but getting it right the 2nd time isn't going to be hard. Simply ditch all the spider connectors, and increase the wire gauges of certain wires as necessary.
RZ350 already showed what the problem was, which any minimally competent electrical engineer would see immediately upon getting a look at how the grounds are routed in the Gen II harness. It's all about routing large currents through connector pins that aren't rated for that much current. There is no functional reason for those connectors to even be present in the harness, they could just as easily be replaced with crimped connections. I can speculate as to why they might have been added to the harness, but getting it right the 2nd time isn't going to be hard. Simply ditch all the spider connectors, and increase the wire gauges of certain wires as necessary.
road runner
Well-known member
I totally agree with you. I don't know why they used those connectors for that much (possible) current, but it's not up to us. All I'm saying is, they need to go threw the paces. I know it's frustrating, but I'm sure they'll fix this. So I guess we'll have to wait for Yamaha, or come up with our own fixes (which I did) until they do.
LAF
Well-known member
This is a very interesting discussion and I am happy I am going to be around to watch how it turns out.
I did order mine here and waiting for it to arrive. I will install it and forget about it.
I know this chaps some guys *** to no end but all bikes have issues that are resolved by the riding community first, and sometimes the only way it gets resolved.
I paid 22,000.00 for a 07 BMW K1200LT and I had to bring it home, pull all the Tupperware and replace the fuel hose connectors. They had a tendency to break and spew your tank of gas all over the right side of the bike including your boot. Now the fix was a set of metal quick disconnects for ease of removing the tank when servicing the bike. It is a well documented occurrence so BMW had to know about it. The did change them about 08 or so but still went with plastic.
I did not like doing the labor and spending 80.00 on jiffy tight QD's but I did it for safety and peace of mind. It was trial by fire as getting a LT nakid is doing something. I see this as the same type of thing. I know it seems Yamaha dropped the ball on this but every manufacturer has it's quirks. And I don't see them ripping out an entire harness and putting in the exact same thing, not in my bike. What is the sense?
Like I said before, being proactive on this using either persons method, or your own if inclined, makes this a non issue. To me it is a safety issue so it needs addressed so I ordered what was needed before I officially owned the bike.
I know very little about electric except it can bite, but I showed the documents on calculated current to a person who I call Sparky and he was impressed to say the least. He also said the variances that may be there are a non issue in the application we are talking about. He also said it was very cool for hobbyist to recognize and come up with these fixes before manufacturers recognize, admit, and fix the problem.
I guess because I am new, and still high on smelling that Liquid Silver out in the carport when I go out and stare at her, I accept this a bit easier then you guys that have been riding Yamaha for a lot longer.
I did order mine here and waiting for it to arrive. I will install it and forget about it.
I know this chaps some guys *** to no end but all bikes have issues that are resolved by the riding community first, and sometimes the only way it gets resolved.
I paid 22,000.00 for a 07 BMW K1200LT and I had to bring it home, pull all the Tupperware and replace the fuel hose connectors. They had a tendency to break and spew your tank of gas all over the right side of the bike including your boot. Now the fix was a set of metal quick disconnects for ease of removing the tank when servicing the bike. It is a well documented occurrence so BMW had to know about it. The did change them about 08 or so but still went with plastic.
I did not like doing the labor and spending 80.00 on jiffy tight QD's but I did it for safety and peace of mind. It was trial by fire as getting a LT nakid is doing something. I see this as the same type of thing. I know it seems Yamaha dropped the ball on this but every manufacturer has it's quirks. And I don't see them ripping out an entire harness and putting in the exact same thing, not in my bike. What is the sense?
Like I said before, being proactive on this using either persons method, or your own if inclined, makes this a non issue. To me it is a safety issue so it needs addressed so I ordered what was needed before I officially owned the bike.
I know very little about electric except it can bite, but I showed the documents on calculated current to a person who I call Sparky and he was impressed to say the least. He also said the variances that may be there are a non issue in the application we are talking about. He also said it was very cool for hobbyist to recognize and come up with these fixes before manufacturers recognize, admit, and fix the problem.
I guess because I am new, and still high on smelling that Liquid Silver out in the carport when I go out and stare at her, I accept this a bit easier then you guys that have been riding Yamaha for a lot longer.
JamesK
Got to ride
Very well put LAF, couldn't agree more!
I got bitten by the S4 spider (despite preventative dielectric grease measures and checks) before the Brodie or RoadRunner harnesses were available. I was lucky that my S4 was just starting to "go" and didn't nuke the harness so improved my own version of the Brodie harness, except that mine is also soldered in place, with zipties to remove stress and vibration from the joints and shrink-wrap and electrical tape to keep out moisture. So this is one headache i do not expect to get again.
MartyA
Well-known member
More on mine:
I called the dealer today and he said it was all reassembled with the road runner harnesses and ready to ride. I asked if there were any charges. I figured they would be reluctant to just let the bike go - they must have 4-5 hours of labor already in it and with an "indefinite" back-order on the replacement OEM harnesses I know they cannot recoup any labor or parts money until they submit the replaced parts to Yamaha under the YES. That could be into 2011.
The Service guy got a little quiet and I said I would pay up to $50 in good faith assuming I can call Yamaha and get that money back. He was relieved that I offered that, they had figured the same amount. I am out of town tomorrow so I can pick it up Friday!!!!
Now, does anyone have the phone number or web site or email for Yamaha's customer service? I would like to politely b*tch a little.
I called the dealer today and he said it was all reassembled with the road runner harnesses and ready to ride. I asked if there were any charges. I figured they would be reluctant to just let the bike go - they must have 4-5 hours of labor already in it and with an "indefinite" back-order on the replacement OEM harnesses I know they cannot recoup any labor or parts money until they submit the replaced parts to Yamaha under the YES. That could be into 2011.
The Service guy got a little quiet and I said I would pay up to $50 in good faith assuming I can call Yamaha and get that money back. He was relieved that I offered that, they had figured the same amount. I am out of town tomorrow so I can pick it up Friday!!!!
Now, does anyone have the phone number or web site or email for Yamaha's customer service? I would like to politely b*tch a little.
road runner
Well-known member
Marty
I believe the #'s you're looking for are in your owners manual.
I'm trying to be a glass half full kind of guy with this. So if the harnesses are back ordered for a while maybe that means they are coming out with a new one. When they do I hope they do a safety recall to fix all bikes, and not just a running change of the part which would only fix bikes affected. I think they will have to do a safety recall to legally cover they're ars.
Speaking of covering they're ars. You're lucky they let you take it. Although once you put in an after market part that may have taken them off the hook. Oh no !! (a light just came on). :huh:
I believe the #'s you're looking for are in your owners manual.
I'm trying to be a glass half full kind of guy with this. So if the harnesses are back ordered for a while maybe that means they are coming out with a new one. When they do I hope they do a safety recall to fix all bikes, and not just a running change of the part which would only fix bikes affected. I think they will have to do a safety recall to legally cover they're ars.
Speaking of covering they're ars. You're lucky they let you take it. Although once you put in an after market part that may have taken them off the hook. Oh no !! (a light just came on). :huh:
I think in the case of adding spider protection a dealer wouldn't blink if a recall was issued on the harness. I could understand them making a stink on a fully farkled bike possibly since that could add to the grounding stress - although most are run to the battery or other ground block (but you know how dealers like to point to a farkle as a problem even when it isn't part of the loop.) In my mind I have already resigned myself to telling the dealer to KEEP your harness plugged in if a harness recall ever happens. My service manager is cool enough they would do it. Heck they added my MC riser for only $25 when they did the ignition switch recall yesterday! Better to be safe than sorry.
MartyA
Well-known member
Yeah, I thought of that already, but since the jaw-dropping episode, I think I convinced them that we can control the situation in this case. I think Scrib is correct, again in this case, if and when the replacement OEM harnesses show up they know they will be able to send the bill to Yamaha, and I think they are cool with that. Besides I think they understand that either Yamaha sends a replacement harness that will eventually fail and the road runner harnesses will be in place, or they send a "new and improved" model and the road runner harnesses are [hopefully] redundant, and immaterial to the repair.
I wonder if they left that ground wire I shoved into S4 when I started the bike the other day??
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64Y80
Well-known member
Oh what the heck, let me add my 2 cents and be shot down. I am not an expert in electrical engineering but I do have a long a defective memory. In the 60's they started putting aluminum wiring in houses. Soon thereafter, said houses started burning down because of the aluminum wiring. Now I haven't looked at the spyders in person yet to know for sure, but from the pictures, they appear to be made of aluminum. If that is the case they whatever solution you decide on should include removing the spyder. Google the words "aluminum wiring", there are sites that show the problem in houses and corrective measures. Basically they say that anything short of replacing the aluminum with copper (removing the aluminum) is iffy. They show some pictures of failed connections and they look alot like the pictures of failed spyder on the forum. They also mention using a corrosion preventative grease on the connections (dielectric grease), but to be effective, they recommend applying the grease then ruffing up the surface of the aluminum with fine grit sand paper, the wiping off the excess grease.
JamesK
Got to ride
I've handled the spiders, and roughed them up with sandpaper prior to soldering them to the pins (having removed the pins out of the plastic connectors), also soldering on a heavy gauge ground wire to the top (physically wrapped through the hole in the center of the spider). From what I can remember the spiders did NOT appear to be made of Aluminum, but rather some kind of steel with maybe tin plating.
Here's a close up of a spider:
According to this poster the spider is made from Carbon Steel
olsonm3915
Well-known member
Actually all he said was "and I do believe it's just carbon steel, the spider that is.."
I've just put a magnet to one and it's not attracted to the magnet. So it's definitely not normal carbon steel. I also tried a grinding wheel on it- zero sparks. Another vote against carbon steel. So, for all I know it could be aluminum. Maybe I'll try some lye on it and see what that does.
But- it doesn't really matter what the spiders are made of. The problem is the harness is designed to pass too much current through a single pin of the connector, more than the connector is rated for. The spider could be hard gold plated and still overheat due to the excessive current in the mating connector's socket.
JamesK
Got to ride
Please note though I sanded the contacts before soldering them and under the tin looked like copper, and the solder stuck to it very well.
olsonm3915
Well-known member
Like I said, what the spiders are made of, or whether the contacts in the connector are BeCu or whatever, is not the root cause of the problem. The problem is too much current going through a connector not designed for it, which is further compounded by the connectors corroding due to lack of proper weather sealing.
Keeping the spiders from corroding will no doubt help. That's what I've done to S5 (?), along with soldering a ground wire to the back of it. I completely cut off the S4 connector, and crimped all those ground wires together with a larger gauge ground going directly to the battery negative post.
64Y80
Well-known member
You're right, I was just worried that in addition to a basic design flaw, there was an issue with mat'l.
MartyA
Well-known member
JamesK's second photo shows corrosion starting on the one corner pin.
In plating, tin does not stick well to aluminum or steel or most other production metals, so sometimes for better life the plating process includes a flash of copper on the part first, the the tin plating goes over that. "Flash is .0001" thick copper, and depending upon the spec .0002" to .0004" of tin. A tin coating will prevent corrosion for a long time. In a past life I worked for a company that produced all of the GM light truck and car fuel pumps; in the electric pump sub-assembly they had tin plating over a copper flash for European use, due to the many varied fuels and additives in the different countries.
BUT, here is a known failure mode - using one metal part, scratch the surface to expose the substrate under the tin, then maintain the contact between the two metals, then add moisture - oxygen - and then add electron flow and heat, and corrosion is guaranteed to begin. The problem is the corroded salt material that builds up between the two metal contact patch and is completely non-conductive. The correct amount of tin plating and one assembly of the spiders into their respective terminals may not scratch deep enough to expose the metal, and thus not corrode, but if the tin is a bit thin, and / or the terminals are more sharp or their gaps are a more closed, a deep enough scratch from the initial insertion may occur and corrosion is inevitable. Some may take 3 years, or 30 years. If the two parts are different metals, the corrosion is usually accelerated.
In assembled parts that may corrode in the application, this plating and subsequent small amount of corrosion is actually planned. The plating contains the corrosion to the local contact patch of the two metals. This is good for structural needs like retaining springs, but really bad for electrical contact needs.....
Hope this isn't a hijack. This is about all I know about plating.
But what the heck, mine is fixed and we did a 300 mile loop today and Sally is VERY happy!!!
In plating, tin does not stick well to aluminum or steel or most other production metals, so sometimes for better life the plating process includes a flash of copper on the part first, the the tin plating goes over that. "Flash is .0001" thick copper, and depending upon the spec .0002" to .0004" of tin. A tin coating will prevent corrosion for a long time. In a past life I worked for a company that produced all of the GM light truck and car fuel pumps; in the electric pump sub-assembly they had tin plating over a copper flash for European use, due to the many varied fuels and additives in the different countries.
BUT, here is a known failure mode - using one metal part, scratch the surface to expose the substrate under the tin, then maintain the contact between the two metals, then add moisture - oxygen - and then add electron flow and heat, and corrosion is guaranteed to begin. The problem is the corroded salt material that builds up between the two metal contact patch and is completely non-conductive. The correct amount of tin plating and one assembly of the spiders into their respective terminals may not scratch deep enough to expose the metal, and thus not corrode, but if the tin is a bit thin, and / or the terminals are more sharp or their gaps are a more closed, a deep enough scratch from the initial insertion may occur and corrosion is inevitable. Some may take 3 years, or 30 years. If the two parts are different metals, the corrosion is usually accelerated.
In assembled parts that may corrode in the application, this plating and subsequent small amount of corrosion is actually planned. The plating contains the corrosion to the local contact patch of the two metals. This is good for structural needs like retaining springs, but really bad for electrical contact needs.....
Hope this isn't a hijack. This is about all I know about plating.
But what the heck, mine is fixed and we did a 300 mile loop today and Sally is VERY happy!!!
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Hello everyone,
Since I want to avoid opening topic number '1000' about Spider Grounding issue, I will write about my recently faced problem in this topic, hoping that I'll get all the info and advice.
So yesterday I was just returning from a 3000miles tour through the Austrian and Italian Alps and my '06 FJR starts having the following symptoms while riding:
1. Trembling and hickups especially under 3000revs;
2. Gradually the problem started appearing also at 4-5000;
3. When a pulled the clutch in order to rev it up a little the engine stalled;
4. Than the ABS light started lighting from time to time and the speedometer indicated wrong speed;
5. During a calm braking I felt a light 'reverse' pressure in both the lever and the pedal (probably the ABS engine re-intialized?!);
6. Than, for a few times, both the speedometer and the tacho fell to zero, than came back;
7. The yellow 'engine trouble light' flashed quickly several times;
8. Also the whole display (temp, gas, odo, gear) went on and off a few times;
9. If I used the turn signal (specially the right one) it flashed quickly, as if one of the bulbs was damaged.
This happened for about 20 miles but than it suddenly dissapeared although I was planning to stop at the next gas station in order to remove the headlights fuse and decrease the load on the ground harness (suspecting the issue is related to the famous spiders and decreasing the load might help temporarily). Anyway all this happened on the way back home at less than 100miles from home, so our FJR didn't want to ruine our vacation and started 'being spoiled' very close to our house.
Now my question is related to the above symptoms; although I've read a lot of pages on this forum, I haven't found all the symptoms put together in one topic and, anyway, the other 2 or 3 categories of symptoms described by other bikers are not very related to the ones above. So I'm asking the more experienced guys to bring some advice - I'm planning next week to start working on the harness but a confirmation that the above are caused by the spiders would be a relief for me.
Thanks a lot.
Since I want to avoid opening topic number '1000' about Spider Grounding issue, I will write about my recently faced problem in this topic, hoping that I'll get all the info and advice.
So yesterday I was just returning from a 3000miles tour through the Austrian and Italian Alps and my '06 FJR starts having the following symptoms while riding:
1. Trembling and hickups especially under 3000revs;
2. Gradually the problem started appearing also at 4-5000;
3. When a pulled the clutch in order to rev it up a little the engine stalled;
4. Than the ABS light started lighting from time to time and the speedometer indicated wrong speed;
5. During a calm braking I felt a light 'reverse' pressure in both the lever and the pedal (probably the ABS engine re-intialized?!);
6. Than, for a few times, both the speedometer and the tacho fell to zero, than came back;
7. The yellow 'engine trouble light' flashed quickly several times;
8. Also the whole display (temp, gas, odo, gear) went on and off a few times;
9. If I used the turn signal (specially the right one) it flashed quickly, as if one of the bulbs was damaged.
This happened for about 20 miles but than it suddenly dissapeared although I was planning to stop at the next gas station in order to remove the headlights fuse and decrease the load on the ground harness (suspecting the issue is related to the famous spiders and decreasing the load might help temporarily). Anyway all this happened on the way back home at less than 100miles from home, so our FJR didn't want to ruine our vacation and started 'being spoiled' very close to our house.
Now my question is related to the above symptoms; although I've read a lot of pages on this forum, I haven't found all the symptoms put together in one topic and, anyway, the other 2 or 3 categories of symptoms described by other bikers are not very related to the ones above. So I'm asking the more experienced guys to bring some advice - I'm planning next week to start working on the harness but a confirmation that the above are caused by the spiders would be a relief for me.
Thanks a lot.
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