Satisfaction of a job completed.

[onearmedbandit]

Last Saturday morning I woke to the gift of a flashing Fi light on my bike, along with a refusal to drop off from cold start. I had never struck this before but after confirming it was a fault with the Secondary Throttle Valve Actuator (STVA) via the 'paperclip in the dealer inspection plug' trick I knew where to look. And sure enough, upon inspection the secondary butterflies only had around 5 degrees of movement, instead of their normal 40'ish. So despite not having pulled an STVA off before I dived on in. Removing it returned the full range of movement, but putting it back on took that all away again. I dismantled the STVA to inspect it (using YT vid's and my service manual) but all looked normal in there, the action was smooth and as it should be.

I checked its operation off of the bike, and sure enough it did as it was supposed to. But only when the STVA's sensor was removed. Put the sensor back on, and back to 5 degrees of movement from the actuator. I was beginning to wonder if I had an ECU issue, but as there was something still physically restricting the butterflies movement I hoped addressing that would solve the sensor issue. I have another GSXR1000 so I grabbed the STVA off that bike hoping it would resolve the issue (I checked its operation before removing it), alas the same problem was still there. But at least that confirmed it was me doing something wrong now.

I searched and searched online looking for a fix, I had now worked out it was the sensor itself restricting the movement. But as the sensor was still in its factory position and nothing else on the bike had changed, it just didn't make sense. The service manual shed no light on the issue either, I was beginning to lose hope and was now considering getting the bike to a shop. But it's not a complicated system, there was nothing obvious that was fitted incorrectly by me, so it was now a challenge I didn't want to give up on.

Then I found it. Well at least I hoped. A random video in the depths of YT gave me 5 seconds of info that I had not found anywhere else. According to the video there is a hidden internal spring in the sensor that needs to be wound around before fitting the sensor back on. This was very late last night, it was cold in the garage, so I decided to revisit it this morning. And what do you know, he was right. I had not seen this mentioned in any other video I had watched, nor in the service manual. I now have everything put back in place, fastened, inspected and working 100%. Watching the butterflies do their dance upon start up was a glorious thing to behold.

90% of the battle with my injury is the pain. The other 10% is only having one arm to use. But that 10% can have quite an effect, in fact the complete loss of use of an upper limb is considered to be 65% bodily impairment. And a lot of things are quite challenging. Interestingly, the big jobs are the ones that challenge me less in a way as for someone with two arms it would still be a hard work. It's the little jobs that are sometimes the most frustrating. Zip ties. Electrical connector blocks. All jobs that take 20 seconds with both arms. With one, it can turn into a 20 minute exercise of cursing, deep breaths and patience. For little reward. Or in my case on Sunday night, walking away from the bike after spending an hour trying to disconnect one electrical connection.

So there was huge satisfaction in completing this job. For one I fixed the issue. I also learnt how the STVA system works from scratch. I learnt how to fix it and install it correctly. And I did it almost literally with one hand tied behind my back (well in my pocket).

[Bonez]

Nice to hear you got it sorted OAB. Yip there sure it satisfaction doing stuff on the bike yourself.

[caseye]

On Ya Mate, you just can't keep a good man down, I say!
:bleh::bleh:

[caspernz]

Perseverance brings perverse pleasure in a tricky job. I salute you! :2thumbsup

[onearmedbandit]

Cheers guys, despite there being some jobs that are physically impossible I'll give everything I can until I've proven it's out of my depth. Sometimes a ziptie or connector takes me 20 seconds, but when it's tricky and three hands would make it easy doing it with one can be an interesting experience. Live and learn.

[SaferRides]

There is always a reason.

[F5 Dave]

Thank heavens for YTb. On ya for being persistent. :niceone:

[OddDuck]

+1, good on ya!

[Paul in NZ]

That's amazing... Perseverance is the best skill for any home mechanic no matter how experienced.

[Katman]

So how did the spring get 'unwound' in the first place?

[onearmedbandit]

So how did the spring get 'unwound' in the first place?

There are two possible answers to that. Firstly, there is sufficient wear on the plastic ridges in the sensor that allowed the sensor to slip past its normal position, causing the initial fault. But from my understanding that should've signaled a C29 fault code (sensor reading incorrectly) rather than the original C28 code. More likely is that when I removed the STVA the spring naturally unwound (as it did on my other bike when I removed the working STVA). While I think that is the more likely explanation it does leave an unanswered question as to what caused the initial fault. I did do a service on the air filter the night before but that should have no bearing on the fault, that was simply lifting the top of the airbox off and removing the filter.

I don't like the idea of it being a random fault, that means it could happen again without warning. It won't leave the bike stranded if it does which is good. If it does fail again I'll replace the STVA with the one from my other bike and try that. I don't think it's an ECU issue, and I hope it isn't as the other ECU I have is from the K1 which has a manual choke so may not have the coding for autochoke that the K2 has.

[Katman]

There are two possible answers to that. Firstly, there is sufficient wear on the plastic ridges in the sensor that allowed the sensor to slip past its normal position, causing the initial fault.

That's the option that I'd consider to be most likely.

If the butterflies weren't opening the full way when the problem first arose then it can't just be a case of incorrect assembly when you put the sensor back on.

[onearmedbandit]

That's the option that I'd consider to be most likely.

If the butterflies weren't opening the full way when the problem first arose then it can't just be a case of incorrect assembly when you put the sensor back on.

Agreed. I do wish I had taken a little longer to see exactly what was restricting them but I didn't so I lost the opportunity to properly identify it. Annoyingly while I 'fixed' the issue I can't be 100% what was the root cause. I'm kind of hoping it happens again soon so with my new found knowledge I can identify where the fault is. Thanks for making me think about it a little more.

[pritch]

Serious question. Do you own a lot of Vise Grips, clamps or various other holding devices?

Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor, famously said, "You can't be too rich, too thin, or have too many friends".

Boat builders apparently have an equivalent of which all is now lost to memory but the last part, "Or have too many clamps'.

[onearmedbandit]

Serious question. Do you own a lot of Vise Grips, clamps or various other holding devices?

Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor, famously said, "You can't be too rich, too thin, or have too many friends".

Boat builders apparently have an equivalent of which all is now lost to memory but the last part, "Or have too many clamps'.

I have a small vice that I use on occasion but I do need to invest in some more mobile clamps. I was admiring a friends soldering station which has three flexible clamps, even for him with both hands it was near on a necessity for some of the work we were doing.

[Laava]

I have a few pairs of forceps of different sizes that come in useful for many things. Soldering being one of them.

[F5 Dave]

Soldering clamps available aliexpress etc. Have some medical forceps somewhere. Not sure where I got them.

[pritch]

Soldering clamps available aliexpress etc. Have some medical forceps somewhere. Not sure where I got them.

I use(d) artery forceps for removing flies from the mouths of trout. I just got them from chemist shops. Needle holders for suturing are similar but may have a V and tooth arrangement at the tip which may limit their usefulness.

[Swoop]

Good on ya OAB. I can only imagine the frustration of dealing with a wound spring with 1 hand.
Glad it is sorted out now and YT vids are the first port of call nowadays for info.


Boat builders apparently have an equivalent of which all is now lost to memory but the last part, "Or have too many clamps'.
Quite correct.
The quantity of clamps used on some jobs is astounding. Wooden aircraft restorers will say the same thing.

[actungbaby]

Last Saturday morning I woke to the gift of a flashing Fi light on my bike, along with a refusal to drop off from cold start. I had never struck this before but after confirming it was a fault with the Secondary Throttle Valve Actuator (STVA) via the 'paperclip in the dealer inspection plug' trick I knew where to look. And sure enough, upon inspection the secondary butterflies only had around 5 degrees of movement, instead of their normal 40'ish. So despite not having pulled an STVA off before I dived on in. Removing it returned the full range of movement, but putting it back on took that all away again. I dismantled the STVA to inspect it (using YT vid's and my service manual) but all looked normal in there, the action was smooth and as it should be.

I checked its operation off of the bike, and sure enough it did as it was supposed to. But only when the STVA's sensor was removed. Put the sensor back on, and back to 5 degrees of movement from the actuator. I was beginning to wonder if I had an ECU issue, but as there was something still physically restricting the butterflies movement I hoped addressing that would solve the sensor issue. I have another GSXR1000 so I grabbed the STVA off that bike hoping it would resolve the issue (I checked its operation before removing it), alas the same problem was still there. But at least that confirmed it was me doing something wrong now.

I searched and searched online looking for a fix, I had now worked out it was the sensor itself restricting the movement. But as the sensor was still in its factory position and nothing else on the bike had changed, it just didn't make sense. The service manual shed no light on the issue either, I was beginning to lose hope and was now considering getting the bike to a shop. But it's not a complicated system, there was nothing obvious that was fitted incorrectly by me, so it was now a challenge I didn't want to give up on.

Then I found it. Well at least I hoped. A random video in the depths of YT gave me 5 seconds of info that I had not found anywhere else. According to the video there is a hidden internal spring in the sensor that needs to be wound around before fitting the sensor back on. This was very late last night, it was cold in the garage, so I decided to revisit it this morning. And what do you know, he was right. I had not seen this mentioned in any other video I had watched, nor in the service manual. I now have everything put back in place, fastened, inspected and working 100%. Watching the butterflies do their dance upon start up was a glorious thing to behold.

90% of the battle with my injury is the pain. The other 10% is only having one arm to use. But that 10% can have quite an effect, in fact the complete loss of use of an upper limb is considered to be 65% bodily impairment. And a lot of things are quite challenging. Interestingly, the big jobs are the ones that challenge me less in a way as for someone with two arms it would still be a hard work. It's the little jobs that are sometimes the most frustrating. Zip ties. Electrical connector blocks. All jobs that take 20 seconds with both arms. With one, it can turn into a 20 minute exercise of cursing, deep breaths and patience. For little reward. Or in my case on Sunday night, walking away from the bike after spending an hour trying to disconnect one electrical connection.

So there was huge satisfaction in completing this job. For one I fixed the issue. I also learnt how the STVA system works from scratch. I learnt how to fix it and install it correctly. And I did it almost literally with one hand tied behind my back (well in my pocket).Can't beat good man brain still good one

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