[alstrickland55]

The fuel gauge quit working on my 2009 GS with 18200 miles on it. It reads no fuel. Any one had this problem and know what will have to be done to fix it? I'm taking it to BMW Motorcycles of Atlanta on Wednesday. Since it only had 200 miles over warranty when it quit working I hope they will fix it under warranty anyway.

 

[katnapinn]

Not sure about the GS but there have been a number of R1200RT & R1200R with bad fuel strips. All have been replaced under warranty as far as I know.

 

[Patric]

There is an interesting read on fuel strips on Adventure Rider http://advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=758453 Post # 48 & 56 are good.

 

[drmajor]

Sad,,,, join the club. This ia my 2nd failure. On the UK-GS sight, there are many.

 

[kellenbenz]

The fuel gauge quit working on my 2009 GS with 18200 miles on it. It reads no fuel. Any one had this problem and know what will have to be done to fix it? I'm taking it to BMW Motorcycles of Atlanta on Wednesday. Since it only had 200 miles over warranty when it quit working I hope they will fix it under warranty anyway.

There have been a lot of fuel sensor strip failures on the RT's. A local dealer told me that BMW claims it has to do with ethanol in the fuel. I believe they changed the fuel quantity sensors on the 2010 models.

 

[goose512]

As stated before, join the club. Since I've heard before of so many people being on their third, fourth, FIFTH fuel strip, I've been reluctant to replace mine. I know I can go about 230 miles on a tank so I just reset my odometer and fill up around 200, just to be safe. The amber warning triangle is getting rather annoying though.

 

[Texas42]

yep a fuel strip, both my GS and R have had to have it replaced. It is the only thing that I have had to have fixed on the GS in 50K miles. I don't think it has anything to do with fuel, the first failure on the GS and R were before the 600 mile check, in fact on the R it was bad when I picked up the bike from the dealer. On the GS is was bad on the second tank and then again at about 12K, and now it doesn't read empty but it reads full then drops to a quarter of a tank then down to empty, very unreliable just use the GPS.

 

[drmajor]

Some think it is a failure of the resistance wires in the strip. One guy applied enough voltage to short them back together....

Some think it is the ethanol is the culprit... I can't seem to find evidence to support that. Guys run non-E fuel and have issues too.

Issue, we were the test bench for BMW's "new" way to do it and it failed and we've been doing the BETA testing.

Love my GSA. Hate the issues. The issues I've had would make me reluctant to consider this a long range touring bike.... at least not w/o knowing where every dealer was along the way.

Any ideas on how we can apply pressure to BMW to fix this?

 

[Borderbeemer]

I had fuel gauge failure on my '06 GSA with only 1100 miles on it. When I took it to the stealership, it was a matter of clipping the fuel strip back into it's socket. Either the vibration from off-roading knocked it loose, or it wasn't seated properly during assembly. In either case, it was an easy fix and covered under warranty.

 

[artk50]

I have an 09 GSA and have had 3 strips replaced. Still from time to time at about1/4 the drive to empty starts heading south rapidly and eventually triggers a low fuel warning. This latest strip seems to reset after I turn bike off and back on. Like stated in a previous post I know how far I can go and reset my trip meter at fill up. I don't feel like taking bike back in unless I get a full failure that won't reset. good luck.

 

[JPSpen]

As far as I know, The warranty on a BMW is 3 years or 36K...

You should hopefully still be under warranty.. AND this is a known bad part...

They should replace it under warranty regardless...Don't take no for an answer...

Good Luck

John

 

[racer7]

Al, where've you been? These strip failures are commonplace. Some have had 5 or 6. More likely it will cost you $300 out of warranty but at least you get a two year warranty on the replacement.

As far as getting German car companies to stop using customers as beta testers you can about forget it. Its a cultural arrogance thing much of which is shared by Americam manufacturers. If you want reliable and not to be the first guy in town to be playing with new technology, buy Japanese or Korean. In Japan one still sees excs apolgizing to customers for quality goofs- the last time a German car firm even came close to that was when Mercedes owned up to some lousy computers (their equivalent of your bikes ZFE) that causedl the rash of electronics failure problems on their 2002-03 models and that was only a partial explanation given only in Europe.

BMWs cages from the mid 90s have mostly disappeared from the roads here while there are plenty of Hondas of that vintage still kicking around. I suspect owners junk them when looking at their repair costs....I've got a curent VW turbodiesel but don't plan on keepng it over 20 years like my 92 Lexus S300 it sits next to- I figure its a 5 yr vehicle and its a lot simpler than current BMWs. German quality peaked in the late 90s and has not matched that level since..the decline coincides with outsoucing of much work to other firms and Asian suppliers without the necessary oversight to keep quality the same.

 

[drmajor]

MAX BMW sells the strips @$141 I think.

 

[racer7]

True but they can't be calibrated without a dealer computer. But it ought to turn off the warning light anyway...

 

[jzeiler]

There is an interesting read on fuel strips on Adventure Rider http://advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=758453 Post # 48 & 56 are good.

The best one is post #231 (mine). I just fixed my bad strip with a $3.50 lighter. Al and David I will be happy to show you how to do it.

 

[drmajor]

John, I would love to know the fix!!!!!!

 

[mtrevelino]

Two weeks ago I brought my RT in for the fuel strip replacement. For the heck of it I asked the service manager if bmw would pick up any of the cost since my RT is a 2008 and only has 16k miles on it. My RT ran out of warranty during May 2011. To my surprise, he said that he would contact bmw as he has been doing on other bikes and they have been agreeing to replacing the strips at no costs. Even though my bike was ready before he heard back from bmw, he was confident that they would cover it and did not charge me for it. Again, it has been two weeks and I have not heard from anyone that it was NOT covered.

Before the mechanic could program the new fuel strip, he had to perform many software updates to my bike before their computer recognized the new fuel strip.

I just got renewed faith in my bmw dealer, especially the service manager.

 

[jzeiler]

John, I would love to know the fix!!!!!!

Go read post # 233. I describe how it can be done on the bike. Recommend a full tank before you try it.

 

[jzeiler]

Two weeks ago I brought my RT in for the fuel strip replacement. For the heck of it I asked the service manager if bmw would pick up any of the cost since my RT is a 2008 and only has 16k miles on it. My RT ran out of warranty during May 2011. To my surprise, he said that he would contact bmw as he has been doing on other bikes and they have been agreeing to replacing the strips at no costs. Even though my bike was ready before he heard back from bmw, he was confident that they would cover it and did not charge me for it. Again, it has been two weeks and I have not heard from anyone that it was NOT covered.

Before the mechanic could program the new fuel strip, he had to perform many software updates to my bike before their computer recognized the new fuel strip.

I just got renewed faith in my bmw dealer, especially the service manager.

That is great news Mike. I will call my dealer(s) and see what the latest poop is on the strips. If they really have come up with a new design for the GS 's it might be worth while. But no amount of software will fix the old design's weakness to flexing and I don't see a superceded # in the parts listings. Not holding my breath.

 

[mtrevelino]

If they really have come up with a new design for the GS 's it might be worth while. But no amount of software will fix the old design's weakness to flexing and I don't see a superceded # in the parts listings. Not holding my breath.

I received the old style fuel strip. They did hear about the redesigned strip but did not know when it would be released. The service manager did tell me that it had a two year warranty regardless if it was replaced under warranty or not.