FJRF003.0: Ignition Failures on FJRs

[SkooterG]

Well, another ignition switch is biting the dust, well not completely dead. <_< '06A with 30K miles. Turned the key to on and... nothing zilch, I think a dash light or two just went on for a split second and then absolutely nothing. Checked the battery, it was fully charged. Turned the key on then off again, still nothing, no sound, nothing. Now I remembered the I/switch problem that some of you fellers had, back to playing with the switch...on,off,on,off, now after doing this 4-5 times, wolla, the dash lit up and the bike fired right up.The bike is at the dealer now, and hopfully it will show up or show some evidence when they pull it apart. :angry:

Petey. It was a wasted trip to the dealer. All you had was a dirty switch. What happened to you has happened to my 04 FJR on 3 different occasions. Except for in my cases, I generally have to cycle the switch about 50 times before it lights up again. It's just dirt/grime. Barabus has an excellent post somewhere where he disected his swtich.

It happend to me at about 50,000 miles, 80,000 miles, and at 125,000 miles. Still have my original switch.

 

[kulwen]

Petey. It was a wasted trip to the dealer. All you had was a dirty switch. What happened to you has happened to my 04 FJR on 3 different occasions. Except for in my cases, I generally have to cycle the switch about 50 times before it lights up again. It's just dirt/grime. Barabus has an excellent post somewhere where he disected his swtich.
It happend to me at about 50,000 miles, 80,000 miles, and at 125,000 miles. Still have my original switch.

My failure was a lot like Petey's failure. After turning it on-of-on a few times I could get it to work. In my case the wires were loose. The on-off-on action was causeing the wire to move enough to give me connection. However, it could be a dirty switch also.

 

[Larry33319]

1) What year FJR? 2006

2) How many miles? 32,000

3) Failed while running? Or while turning ignition? Or whatever? Failed while turning switch on. Nothing happened.

4) Type of failure: Wires pulled out? Switch failure? Unknown? (pictures are useful) Unknown

5) Actual repair performed and by what dealer I replaced ignition switch assembly myself. About 2 1/2 hours work.

6) How many days was the bike at the dealer for service? N/A

7) Paid for by Yamaha or not? Not under warranty, paid for by myself, $85.25, I could have talked with a friend at the dealership and had it taken care of but he was not in that day and I did not want to wait.

8) What did you do about the other locks (gas, side bags, seat and top case) on the bike (do you have two keys or one)? I now have two keys

9) Briefly, how badly were you inconvenienced by this ignition failure. I was at Destination Daytona (Worlds Largest Harley Dealer) during Bike Week. It started to rain, we went back to the bikes, I got geared up and then no switch action. I cycled the switch about 50 times. It would come on at the halfway point if I moved the switch slowly but would not supply power to the starter. It died when fully switched on. Powerman, another member here, cycled the switch a few more times and the damn thing worked. I sprayed it with contact cleaner and lube after I returned from Daytona. It worked every time but once since then and I installed the new switch yesterday. It may have been just dirt or a bad contact but I do a lot of long distance trips each weekend and cannot afford to have the bike break 200 miles away from home. The new switch was the best thing for my own piece of mind.

 

[SkooterG]

It may have been just dirt or a bad contact but I do a lot of long distance trips each weekend and cannot afford to have the bike break 200 miles away from home. The new switch was the best thing for my own piece of mind.

I can totally empathize with that, but...........................(there's always that 'but')

If the root cause of your switch problems was only dirt, then it could easily happen again with the new switch eventually. I'm just sayin.......

 

[Larry33319]

I still have the old switch. When I get a bit of time I will slowly take it apart and try and figure out what went wrong.

 

[cartfj40]

Hi All

I have not responded to the forum on this issue up till now so here it is as i can remember

1) 2006

2) about 9.000 i think

3) failed when i went to startup

Did like all here disasembled the bike checking fuses/ basics etc.

4) internal failure

5) it's still not repaired after 8 month's / But I got a new switch from the dealer I bought the bike from For "FREE"

6) 0 days at dealer

7) Switch only

8) I am doing the key tumbler swap myself I don't want two different keys

9) I only lost one day on my vacation due to it. I think the biggest thing I am disapointed about is ALL the Yamaha dealers in the Bristol TN area wanted no part in helping me repair this bike. I came off a HARLEY because of repairing all the time to move to a bike that let me down on first long trip away from home THAT GIVES ME A WARM FUZZY FEELING now when i leave home. It was a good thing I was at at Christian Motorcyclist Rally as one of the CMA'S on his Harley helped work on it for about 3 hour's. P.S. I WILL NOT LEAVE HOME WITHOUT THE COBBED TOGGLE SWITCH AS A BACKUP in my now large tool kit that I took from my Harley. :yahoo:

 

[mr.dhart]

...and my dealer said he had never heard of this.

1) 2007 FJR 1300 AE

2) 10,000

3) Failed while running, during rush hour, in Los Angeles, stuck on a 3 foot wide traffic island

4) "Open circuit within main switch" as stated by dealer.

5) "Install new main switch assembly" as stated by dealer

6) Five days from problem to pick-up (In Friday, out Wednesday

7) Paid for by Yamaha (under warranty)

8) Stuck with two keys.

9) Briefly, how badly were you inconvenienced by this ignition failure.

My wife had to cart me around for a bit because I had sold my car two days earlier.

 

[petey]

...and my dealer said he had never heard of this.
1) 2007 FJR 1300 AE

2) 10,000

3) Failed while running, during rush hour, in Los Angeles, stuck on a 3 foot wide traffic island

4) "Open circuit within main switch" as stated by dealer.

5) "Install new main switch assembly" as stated by dealer

6) Five days from problem to pick-up (In Friday, out Wednesday

7) Paid for by Yamaha (under warranty)

8) Stuck with two keys.

9) Briefly, how badly were you inconvenienced by this ignition failure.

My wife had to cart me around for a bit because I had sold my car two days earlier.

There is NO reason that you should put up with two keys...make the dealer or a locksmith match the new switch tumbler to your old key...your warranty has to cover that as well.

 

[Barabus]

...and my dealer said he had never heard of this.
1) 2007 FJR 1300 AE

2) 10,000

3) Failed while running, during rush hour, in Los Angeles, stuck on a 3 foot wide traffic island

4) "Open circuit within main switch" as stated by dealer.

5) "Install new main switch assembly" as stated by dealer

6) Five days from problem to pick-up (In Friday, out Wednesday

7) Paid for by Yamaha (under warranty)

8) Stuck with two keys.

9) Briefly, how badly were you inconvenienced by this ignition failure.

My wife had to cart me around for a bit because I had sold my car two days earlier.

There is NO reason that you should put up with two keys...make the dealer or a locksmith match the new switch tumbler to your old key...your warranty has to cover that as well.

Petey, you are right in the hypothectical, but my dealer stuck me with two keys and there was nothing I could do about it.

 

[Thumperbike]

Going with Skooters recomendation, I have not replaced the switch, rather tried to restore the faulty contact.

2006, 21,500 mi.

Intermittent at key on.

Contact cleaner followed by Lock Ease down key hole.

Problem has not repeated since second application.

 

[kulwen]

There is NO reason that you should put up with two keys...make the dealer or a locksmith match the new switch tumbler to your old key...your warranty has to cover that as well.

Petey, you are right in the hypothectical, but my dealer stuck me with two keys and there was nothing I could do about it.

My dealer talked with Yamaha about it and Yammaha picked up the tab for a locksmith to rekey the ignition. I have one key.

 

[cota95]

There is NO reason that you should put up with two keys...make the dealer or a locksmith match the new switch tumbler to your old key...your warranty has to cover that as well.

Petey, you are right in the hypothectical, but my dealer stuck me with two keys and there was nothing I could do about it.

My dealer talked with Yamaha about it and Yammaha picked up the tab for a locksmith to rekey the ignition. I have one key.

Same here...

 

[OlyFJR]

I just dropped my 06 off at the dealer this morning with the same problem. I called Yamaha to see what they would say about this ongoing problem and they were less than helpful. I referenced this forum and all the problems and their reply was 'just because it's on a forum doesn't mean it actually happened'.

I've decided that if the dealer diagnoses the problem to be the same problem as listed here I'm going to insist they hit Yamaha up to cover the repairs and the cost to have the tumblers changed. I was very surprised at their ambiguity and total lack of support. My warranty has expired and I didn't get Y.E.S. but I am thinking about pushing this and hope to get them to cover this. Hopefully there have been enough calls from dealers to the tech support to work in my favor.

Anyone have any experience dealing with Yamaha on this to get them to cover it would really be appreciated.

 

[kulwen]

I just dropped my 06 off at the dealer this morning with the same problem. I called Yamaha to see what they would say about this ongoing problem and they were less than helpful. I referenced this forum and all the problems and their reply was 'just because it's on a forum doesn't mean it actually happened'.
I've decided that if the dealer diagnoses the problem to be the same problem as listed here I'm going to insist they hit Yamaha up to cover the repairs and the cost to have the tumblers changed. I was very surprised at their ambiguity and total lack of support. My warranty has expired and I didn't get Y.E.S. but I am thinking about pushing this and hope to get them to cover this. Hopefully there have been enough calls from dealers to the tech support to work in my favor.

Anyone have any experience dealing with Yamaha on this to get them to cover it would really be appreciated.

You may also consider going to the NHTSA website and looking at the complaints related to the 06 and 07 (A & AE) models.

Link

The info you find there might help when talking with Yamaha.

I hope everyone who has had these problem has posted complaints. With any luck NHTSA might help Yamaha to decide to make a recall.

 

[Ignacio]

Whoa! Hold on Hoss! I had to read this thing twice, but there's several key points that are in serious conflict with your statement!

My warranty has expired and I didn't get Y.E.S. but I am thinking about pushing this and hope to get them to cover this.

I've decided that if the dealer diagnoses the problem to be the same problem as listed here I'm going to insist they hit Yamaha up to cover the repairs and the cost to have the tumblers changed.

You either should have bought Y.E.S. that is so highly recommended by everybody...or live with your choice of the basic 1 year warranty. Why would you think you're justified to have Yamaha cover this? I can understand them doing out of good will, but you should have bought Y.E.S. like the VAST majority of folks on this forum and in this thread did.

Don't be invoking this forum when you talk to Yamaha without making that distinction. Hopefully, they'll cover it under good will, but tread lightly. Too many people on this thread with valid warranites have put in too much work on this issue to have one interloper try and weasel in. :angry2:

You should be happy the issue has been diagnosed for you, and if Yamaha denies you, know you can have an ignition installed at your expense to resolve the problem.

 

[OlyFJR]

My initial post might have come off wrong. I was somewhat torqued as I just got off the phone with Customer Service at Yamaha. They didn't seem to helpful.

I don't plan on dragging this forum into it and I'm not trying to weasel in. My hope is to try to persuade them to take a serious look into making this a bulletin/recall issue. I understand that not getting the Y.E.S. is my choice/mistake. However this shouldn't just be a Y.E.S. covered problem.

I don't know what it takes to make something a recall but this looks like it would make the grade from my standpoint. After I read about these problems I figured I'd get a notification from Yamaha about this...and that was before I started having this problem.

 

[DocFJR]

Over the past week or two, my 2006A (16,000 miles) ignition switch has on several occasions not worked in the normal "on" position. Moving the key back slightly brings the power on. I took it in and, of course, it worked perfectly at the dealer. The service manager said that unless they can get it to fail, they can't replace it under warranty. I mentioned that this was obviously a safety-related concern and that they might want to get ahead of it, given that the bike might fail under a critical situation, but they were adamant and suggested I contact Yamaha Customer Support. I did, and I got the same answer. They maintained that they knew nothing of this issue; never heard of it. I reported this site, and that many other owners reported the same problem, and that it was always the wiring harness pulling on the switch. I also brought up the safety issue. It seems to me they would want to avoid the obvious repercussions of someone going down because of this, particularly if they had already reported the issue and been refused by the dealer. No luck. Oh well, they better hope I don't have an accident. I'm sending a registered letter establishing my complaint, in case I have a problem.

I understand that they can't issue a recall or service advisory until complaints reach a certain level, but their refusal to acknowledge that they'd ever heard of this failure is maddening.

 

[kulwen]

Try gentle moving the wires at the bottom of the ignition switch with the key in the on position to see if you can duplicate the problem.

 

[Barabus]

Over the past week or two, my 2006A (16,000 miles) ignition switch has on several occasions not worked in the normal "on" position. Moving the key back slightly brings the power on. I took it in and, of course, it worked perfectly at the dealer. The service manager said that unless they can get it to fail, they can't replace it under warranty. I mentioned that this was obviously a safety-related concern and that they might want to get ahead of it, given that the bike might fail under a critical situation, but they were adamant and suggested I contact Yamaha Customer Support. I did, and I got the same answer. They maintained that they knew nothing of this issue; never heard of it. I reported this site, and that many other owners reported the same problem, and that it was always the wiring harness pulling on the switch. I also brought up the safety issue. It seems to me they would want to avoid the obvious repercussions of someone going down because of this, particularly if they had already reported the issue and been refused by the dealer. No luck. Oh well, they better hope I don't have an accident. I'm sending a registered letter establishing my complaint, in case I have a problem.
I understand that they can't issue a recall or service advisory until complaints reach a certain level, but their refusal to acknowledge that they'd ever heard of this failure is maddening.

I would use some contact cleaner thru the bottom of the switch (see my linked reverse engineering report first post), YRMV.

 

[DailyCommuter]

2007, AE Model. 10,625 miles never loosened the factory wire ties. while running. Wire Pulled out of ignition switch. Was able to disassemble the switch and repair it.