Interesting thread on the GS forum yesterday. Seems the canbus system on the 1200 is nearly a decade old now so a fairly good indication of reliability. The relevant highlights of the thread:
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Talk to me about Canbus...
As an 1150 owner thinking of making the jump to a 1200, so I am a canbus virgin. I'm genuninely interested..
- it is actually worth while on a bike. I can see on a 7 series car to save all the wiring that there would be a weight saving. Does a bike wiring loom weight that much?
- does it remain reliable in old age? I view anything less that 6 years old as a 'new' bike and not ready for me yet.
How much stress is wiring in stuff. I currently have:
- USB charging point
- Heated jacked
- running lights
- driving lights
- speed camera warning
- GPS take-off
- autocom
How difficult will it be connecting these all into an early 1200? Can I just put in a fuse pannel wired to the battery through a rely (activated from a feed from the accessory socket)? Electrics I understand - electronics I don't
To be clear, this isn't some 1150 owner mocking a newer bike - although there is part of me that wonders if its a solution to a problem that wasn't really a problem in the first place!
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Man you would not believe how few wires on these bikes compared to the 1150s
I reckon most of the weight savings came from the redundant wiring
If you have any extra power requirements make up a fuseboard and stick it in the doofer below the saddle
and you are sorted I think the Canbus controller will allow 5 amps (???) before it detects it as an overload and shuts down that circuit
The biggest bit of advice I can give is Always make sure your battery is decent using a schit battery WILL affect the canbus with current surges etc etc So much so I have had to replace 3 for friends even tho they were warned about the battery thing
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Maybe I worry unnecessarily, (and I'm guessing pretty much every new bike now days needs a computer to fix it somewhere along the line..) but whilst I'm feckin' useless at mechanics, I'd like to think that if I broke down in the middle of no where (and from time to time I do take it somewhere pretty remote) I'd have at least a fighting chance of limping it home.
That's the gamble with hi tech adventure bikes. Would you be better of in Mongolia on a DRZ400 ?? !!
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The fun starts with data buses when the contacts inevitably degrade. There's no current to overcome any resistance that builds up. Be interesting to see what happens to the 1200s in a few years. Sorting out industrial data comms earns me a lot if money and most of those work in a far cleaner environment than those bikes work in.
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When contacts degrade (increasing resistance) you get problems with any system, if the contacts are carrying the full current of the device, as in the old system, then things overheat and burn out - the heat being equal to the sqaure of the current times the resistance.
In a correctly designed can bus system the high current is all carried by electronic switches which don't corrode and the low current control circuits don't produce high voltage drops in the contacts - so reliability should be improved.
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Canbus......Buy a vehicle with it and become part of the experiment
I had a new 90K DAF tractor unit, that could not be fixed 3 Canbus systems that refused to communicate with each other...The lease company were in the hands of DAF, as it was still under warranty......Still not fixed last year!!!
I will never knowingly purchase a personal vehicle with it in the system.
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Sounds like a software problem (I've written CAN gateway code, but not for DAF so don't blame me). If the 1200 software works now, it'll still work when it's older.
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As an outside observer of the freakish 1200 clan, I have also not seen a single fault reported that's been down to the canbus system....certainly a good number about the bits that hang off it, but nary a one from the system itself.
I reckon that's pretty bloody impressive on a model that's had it since 2004, and I confess, I'd like a canbus wiring loom on my lebbenfiddy
Given that the biggest obstacle to getting to various bits 'n bobs under the tank of the lebbenfiddy is often the obstructive wiring, I reckon that it's a very positive step forwards, this canbus malarkey.......and anyone who has the wherewithal to go off RTW will probably have a couple of meters of wire, an in-line fuse holder and a spare switch in their spares, with which a device (Light, pump, controller, whatever) could be bypassed anyway
I wouldn't have the slightest worry about switching to a 1200 because of the canbus system jimbo.......your masculinity will be far more of a questionable issue than canbus
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Back when I used to develop automotive software for CAN network layers we got reliable communication over all sorts of terrible out-of-spec wiring (is there any scarier sight than a software engineer with a soldering iron?), so I wouldn't be worrying. Far fewer connections with a multiplex bus, which ought to improve reliability.
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Not disagreeing with you. I've written CAN gateway software, but more recently I've been working full-time in conservation. I want to leave this world a little better than it might have been without me, and rear view mirrors that tilt down when you select reverse and interior lights that dim gradually don't really do it for me.
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I would have agreed with you until I acquired a 330D which someone had ticked all the option boxes on -its a tight reverse turn onto my drive and I love the way the mirror tilts down - so thank you for making my world better
I also love the active cruise control, the auto headlight main/dip, the keyless entry and the way it welcomes me with warm light - thank you thank you
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