Key in, turn on, hit start ... BANG .. electric smoke...

Yeah, well, that was a surprise. I've charged the GRiSO today. Its getting colder here now so i've put her on the charger today. I didn't want to have it charging all night, so ive disconnected it just now after a few hours. I figured, as one does, lets see if she starts. Put the key in. Turn it on. Nothing wrong, lights came on, dail went to max .. all good. Hit the start button ... BANG! .... heavy electric smoke, made me couch. Now the bike does weird stuff. If i turn the key to ignition, i can hear relays ratteling. The dash lights are flashing randomly. It says ECU with the two plugs. Fuck. Weird thing is. When i turn the ignition off, but leave the key in. i've seen the dail go all the way up to max. here some weird sound from a small relays and i get APMG 0022 on the dash .... I do think the battery is bad. gave me 9 volts going though the menu.

Any ideas? Don't have the time now to have a look, but we can speculate .. as we like to do

No knowledge of MG specific issues but would check all earth and battery connections.
Somebody will be along shortly with greater knowledge.

yeah, guess i'll have to replace the battery and find out what doesn't work afterwards. May have blown up the starter relay. All the fuses where still ok.

Um, what charger are you using and does it have a desulphurising circuit. If all was good before I would look at the charger - sounds like it may have been providing AC instead of DC to your bike. THIS WILL KILL LOTS OF THINGS on your bike, IF it's the problem. The charger was connected correctly, wasn't it?

Very un-MG-like...

Where did the smoke come from? 'ECU Disconnected' icon is bad, it usually means it's been spiked, (But not always.) the APMG thing on the dash is just showing it is rebooting, or trying to.

AN event like this immediately points me towards a sudden, large, short to earth. Almost certainly from one of the major feeds. The main feed to the ignition is protected by a 30A fuse. The big feed to the starter motor is not. I suggest you pull the seat and look for signs of it shorting to the frame or check it hasn't fallen off the back of the solenoid and touched the starter or gearbox, maybe the footpeg plate or gear linkage rod.

Disconnect the battery earth before you start poking around!

Charger is fine.

I did have starter problems before, during my trip to the Alps. The little fuse kept blowing up. Sightly bigger fuse saved my holiday. i do think it is in the starter circuit somewhere. It happend when i hit the starter button. I didn't see where the smoke came from as i jumped up and screamed like a little girl and at the same time the lights in the garage went off as they are on a timer. I'll go have a look this weekend to see what the hell is going on. Just hope the ECU is still fine

I did have starter problems before, during my trip to the Alps. The little fuse kept blowing up. Sightly bigger fuse saved my holiday.

Check and see if the battery is good.  No sense replacing until you know.  Then find why you were blowing the stock fuse, and I bet you'll find where the smoke escaped.

Perhaps it was just lead oxide on the battery terminals, they can sometime make a pop when they disconnect under load.
Disconnect the negative then the positive, scrape the metal clean then bolt them back Positive first then Negative.

On the fuse blowing, that can also happen if the lead is not connected tightly, The solenoid draws a lot more current for the first few milliseconds, longer if the cable connection is bad.

Aaaah, once you let the smoke out, you can't put it back in. Whale Oil! Beef Hooked!

That's why i tell people electronics is working on smoke. One the smoke is out, it stops working


I did check the babttery leads when in the Alps. Made sure they were nice and snug. Guess i'll have to do that again, and then check the rest. I'll find it.

"Screamed like a girl?"

I'd have screamed like a chorus of them.  

I once lit up the nighttime sky in Atlanta when, in over my head in electrical workings -- anything past thumbing the starter button usually is   -- I messed with my Ballabio's battery connections.

Wayne Orwig, who was watching (and telling me to be careful) was awestruck, a rare state for him.

Anyway, condolences on your present predicament; looking forward to learning what you find is the root cause.  Might save many of us a few of us at least me from repeating your experience.

Bill

I recently discovered during a periodic look over that the crimped on terminal connector at the battery was loose on the wire.

Sounds like yet another PIAGGIO/Moto Guzzi electronic nightmare. If I can get enough money saved up, I’m going to rid my GRiSO of all the junk electronics. Moto Guzzi use to be a great bike but when PIAGGIO bought them quality in my eyes have really diminished & completely vanished. Technology has hurt the motorcycle industry. Sure it’s great when it works right but anything that has a computer onboard is going to be expensive to repair where shops only might be able to repair it. It seems the only bikes with far less problems are the Japanese brands. Told to me by a Guzzi tech. His words “buy Japanese if you want a reliable motorcycle”. However I like Guzzi or use to really like Guzzi now it’s just like. It’s a real shame I feel this way. Sorry to unload folks. Keep the rubber to the road.

If it is the main power feed it could happen to any motorbike. Old or new.

The only thing that is different with 'New Tech' bike's is they need a different suite of tools to diagnose and fix them. How far back would you want to go? Acetylene lighting? Heated vapour fueling where the exhaust pipe runs through a tank and fuel is dripped on it before being pushed into the cylinder through a demand valve? (That was real fun! Especially if you weren't fond of your pubic hair!) Leather belt drives? Manual advance and retard for the spark?

The only good thing about the 'Good old days' is they're gone! Thank fuck! Lots of people thought they could work on the old tech. They couldn't. They were useless at that as well. Most people don't understand carburettors. They might think they do but they don't. That's why main jets always sold well, needles, atomisers and slides? Not so much.

Pete

PS. If this 'Tech' can't keep a Guzzi reliable I suggest you find a better 'Tech'.

dlpannebakker wrote:

I’m going to rid my GRiSO of all the junk electronics.

Do tell. Which bits?

Seriously. I want to know.

ok ... never seen this before. Must have been one hell of a short

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This weekend i'll have a look what else is damaged. I think there might be a short in the starter circuit somewhere to cause this.

All the times I have seen the plug disconnect symbol on dash it has been the ECU ground to frame up under steering head. The round terminal for a screw is not crimped that well and may be loose on wire.
Have never seen it cause flash of lightning.

Only time I seen a battery crack is dead and then frozen. Hope the acid didn't go on the bike.

You didn't put charger on reversed? That will reverse the polarity of battery, then who knows.

Nah, it went wrong when i hit the starter button. the bike "powered up" just fine after turning the key on.

Well, looks like you know the state of the battery ;-)

How old was the battery? I had a battery blow up under similar conditions on one of my cars. Draw of starter caused something to arc then boom... Old battery, low acid/fluid level arcing of plates and flash bang poof and smoke accompanied by a blown out side. Thankfully there wasn't much acid to blow all over the engine bay.

Did it also blow any fuses?

Take the opportunity of a new battery to check over all grounds, fuses, etc. I bet (hope) when you throw in a new battery, all will be well.

I once had a battery on a bike blow up like that too with the split case. The battery maintainer that I was using was bad and overcharged the battery.

Well, the battery may not have been the best anymore indeed. Maybe in combination with the charger it produced a little more gas then normal and indeed arced during the request for current from the starter. The battery came with the bike so i don't know how old it is. I just hope nothing else is broken. The ECU thing worries me a little. I will know more on sunday

So, today i had a look. Measured all the fuses. All good. Put in the KTM battery, same mounting lugs but 2/3 the dimensions. Turned the key on. everything started up they way it should, no funny noises. ok. next step, hit start. And she ran

So, just an exploded battery. I do have diagcables for the bike so next step is having a look at error messages if any.

Lucky me just a 100 euro repair and not a 500 or more euro for an ECU

For what it's worth...I have seen two batteries exploding in my lifetime.
Once in my old 1970 Cougar and in my friend's 1969 Mach1.
Both times when trying to start the car.
Scared the fuck out of me! You turn the key on and Boom! Talk about being stunned...
So seeing a cracked battery, even on a motorcycle is not surprising to me.

It would be interesting to see if it came apart inside but dont investigate further unless you are wearing some protection equipment.
I'm sure it will be fine with a new battery.

yeah, nahhhh