I'm going to resurrect this thread rather than start a new one.
For two years, my SRS had no problem in rain. And I rode in rain... A LOT. Probably as much or more than any one else, because of where I live. Recently, and shortly after warranty expired, after a heavy rain it had the Isolation Fault until it dried out, and I couldn't charge the battery. Then it happened again in very light rain. As a simple exploration as to what could be done, I stuffed grocery bags around the chargers power connections and particularly at the front behind the plastic cover that has the horn facing out of it, in case water thrown by the front wheel was going in where the chargers are, or perhaps down into where the BMS board is. This did not help so I took them back out. Last week it happened again and I was left at work with just barely enough to get home, and unable to charge there due to the pack being ineligible due to the faults. I had to ride all the way home at 40mph in heavy rain on a high speed highway to get back, ducking off into the emergency lane when cars went by to try to be safer. At home I aimed an electric leaf blower into the front of the bike where the horn is, and let it run for 30 minutes. Then I could clear the faults and charge. The way the faults manifested was I could clear them, and they might come back, but sometimes they didn't. Then when I tried to charge, after about two seconds of charging the fault would re-occur. Also curiously if I turned on the right blinker it worked fine, but the left blinker would set a code that a light was out or something, even though it worked fine. The light housing were dry inside and I also blew out the handlebar control with compressed air but it didnt help. I also made sure the fuses and wiring around the 12v battery were dry, and disconnected my accessories in case they were in issue. None of that was the problem.
So I'm thinking... what changed? What degraded? Looking at the exploded diagram of the battery pack I see there is a potential entry point where the cabling goes in to the BMS at the top front of the pack. At the back of the pack, there is a cable assy that enters the pack from the top too, I suppose connecting to the chargers as it goes out the top, and that brings charger power into the pack and out to the motor controller at the bottom of the bike. The part number for this cabling assy is 12-08163 "Power Bus Hardware Service Assembly".
Now... where it goes in from the top it passes through an aperture with foam as a seal, in the manner of weather-stripping. Foam degrades. Except for the drying potentially of some waterproofing grease that may or may not have been applied when the bike was assembled, nothing has changed or could have changed. But foam definitely degrades over time.
My theory is the water is entering from the top, at the back. The front I already tried stuffing that full of bags and it didn't work. I even set the code with a gentle rinse with a hose while washing the bike and didnt squirt water in that area at all.
If you have any ideas or input feel free to chime in. What Im going to do to test this is stuff as many plastic grocery bags as possible into this area at the back where the charger wires go down, so no water spray can get in there, and see what happens. If that works, I will probably follow up with a heavy application of silicon sealer all over the top seam of the battery at the rear.
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Topic: SR/F Water Fail (Read 4756 times)