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Post your "my bike left me stranded..." story

Joined
Sep 25, 2007
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Location
Cibolo, Texas
First Name
Bob
Has something on your bike failed and left you stranded on the side of the road? Fuse? Fuel Pump? Tire? Battery? Something odd? How long were you stranded?

A brief education from your experience could inspire us to do some preventive maintenance beforehand OR help the rest of us learn how to keep going if the same thing happens to us on a trip.

What happened and what did/do you do to fix it and get on your way (or not!).
 
Only has happened to me once and I was able to make a repair on the side of the road.

I was on my TL1000R on my way to work one morning when I was riding on this big flyover (it's the 290 to Mopac flyover by Best Buy for you south Austin folks) getting near the top of it when power just cuts out on me. I'm coasting along trying to figure out what is wrong. Lights are still on but the starter won't crank over. So I coast to the bottom of the flyover and stop on the shoulder and got off to inspect. Turns out the 2 bolts holding the sidestand sensor fell out so the sensor is just hanging there by its wires. By sheer luck one of the bolts must've held on long enough to only finally fall out when I came to a stop because I found it sitting under the bike on the ground. I got the tool kit out and bolted up the sensor with the single bolt and was on my way.

That night I hunted down some replacement bolts and used locktite on them. No problems since then and now I regularly check various bolts to make sure none are loose.
 
Ajax - PERFECT! These are the stories I was hoping for! This will inspire me to do a side-stand bypass on the KLR soon...

Keep these stories coming!
 
My Honda Shadow almost left me stranded on the way back from Sturgis. It developed a problem with one of it's coils about 100 miles from home. Lucky for me, it made it the rest of the way in.

I know of another member on here who suffered a coil failure but he wasn't so lucky. He was quite a few hundred miles away from home and had to call in the rescue wagon.
 
Bought a used R1200GSA only to find out through a search of the original owner's post on ADVRider, it had major repairs probably as a result of DIY maintenance. It left me stranded twice, but BMW Roadside Assistance arrived within 30 minutes each time.

I've never been stranded otherwise.
 
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Not long after I got back into bikes after a 15 year hiatus, the starter on my Virago failed to stir. Had the bike towed home (a few blocks) and then found out that it was the solenoid that failed and I could have started the bike by shorting across its terminals. :doh:
 
I took a lucky lady out for our first date on my V-max that I had recently purchased. Little did I know that it was spitting gas out thru the carb (never smelled it so didn't notice it). I had over half a tank when I started the date and maybe rode a total of 40 miles throughout the date. Of course, I ran out of gas! Couldn't believe it. Fortunately I was at the top of a hill and rolled into a gas station at the bottom. I may have forgotten to mention this earlier in the post, but I had forgotten my wallet as well so my date not only paid for dinner but to refuel my ride. :doh:
 
Which time?

I'll have to think about this one, but come to think of it, the two or three times were all (one way or another) my fault (I think).
 
I hate to admit this but its happened to me three times.
1) I hadn't checked the alternator brushes like I should have, and on a trip to Austin, I had to be rescued. The bike died without warning and in a bad place. In another 20 yards it would have been a horrible place. I sure felt foolish when I called home had to say "bring the brushes that are on the shelf in the garage with you". I had the parts, just hadn't done the maintenance.
2) Alternator rotor failed. Not much I could do about that, but if the bike had a volt meter it would have given me more warning for both of these incidents.
3)I had water intrude into my Ignition unit. I was not thinking and blaming the coils or I could have fixed it, because I had a spare with me, but It was raining buckets and I was close to home so I just called. This isn't as likely to happen on a newer bike.
Various kickstand switch failures etc. None of those have left me stranded. If you understand what your bike needs to start you can usually find a trick or two.
 
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The first time I filled up my Suzuki S40, it wouldn't start. Kickstand switch. I managed to push start it (after falling the first time - what fun!) Then I jumpered around the wire and never suffered that fate again.

I'm ready if the Shadow does that . . .
 
Once upon a time, my Burgman stranded me in my driveway with a dead battery when I wanted to leave town.

I hear bike batteries won't make much past three years so I will not start a long trip with a 3 year old battery.

I also ran out of gas at the top of a hill. There was a station at the bottom.

I have read several stories on BUSA (BurgmanUSA) about owners who pull off the road during trips and can't restart their scooters. They get towed to a dealership only to learn about the engine kill switch. :mrgreen:
 
Three times in the first twenty miles of ownership the well used KLR had issues. The first was a failure to start due to a faulty clutch safety switch. By wiggling the lever around I was able to find a sweet spot and crank it over. Did not shut off until I was home. The switch has been replaced.

Next ride the bike just died going through an intersection. It would not crank, nor fire up from a push start. Troubleshooting road side showed no spark. Hauled it home in the back of a truck and discovered the side stand safety switch had failed. It is spliced out of the circuit now.

On the very next ride the mighty KLR sputtered and died as I turned into a side street on the way to buy groceries. I pushed it into a parking lot to diagnose, and it lit right up. Then it proceeded to dribble gasoline out of the carb vent and die. I turned the petcock to the off position and fired it up. Was able to get to the store on just what was in the carb bowl. Diagnosis: float valve stuck open. I bought groceries, loaded the bike up and headed home. Every quarter mile or so I would reach the petcock, turn the gas on for ten seconds and turn it off again. A thorough carb cleaning fixed the issue.

All three of these failures happened in the first week, and within 20 miles of riding. I feared that I had a lemon, but decided that either I trusted the bike and my repairs, or not. So the next grocery run I bough ice cream. That last failure was 11,000 miles ago. Some of those miles were rough duty for the old bike too.
 
On a Christmas holiday, rolling down Old San Antonio Rd, GS just shuts down like I had hit the kill switch. I rolled to a stop and after cycling the power, it would crank, run for a couple seconds then die again.

After fiddling with it for a while, I called the wife and she brought the recovery vehicle to rescue me. Turned out to be a pinched CANBus wire the tech at Gulf Coast BMW caused when he did the fuel float tweek. :headbang:

Bike was new and I had no idea how things worked yet or I could have got it going myself. Instead, I killed time by trying to knock dead branches out of the trees with rocks and watching passers-by.

Had several bikes ride by, including an 1150 Dakar and nobody stopped. Did have one truck stop by with two hunters in that offered assistance.

Dead by the roadside.

88d8b701.jpg
 
I have been stranded twice so far with the same bike.

A year ago, my son and I were riding our bikes on IH35 to Georgetown and my son rides up beside me to tell me that smoke is coming out from under my rear seat. Pulled over and stopped and sure enough there was quite a bit of smoke. Waited until the smoke cleared and noticed the rectifier was fried. Sat there with the bike, while my son rode back home to get the truck.

There were a couple of motorcyclists that stopped and asked if I needed help, which was nice.

I guess I should have replaced the stator or checked it too, during that time.

Because…..

I got stranded this past Monday-Labor Day on IH35 south of Waco. I was heading back to Austin from Dallas. Stopped for gas and the gauges started going crazy and when I turned off the bike, it was dead…the battery. I was having problems with the bike being a little sluggish on starting the week before. Thought it was the battery and replaced it before the trip to Dallas. I waited at the gas station for two hours on my son to come pick me up with the truck again.

I will be checking my electrical system this weekend. I have a guess, that it’s probably the stator.

I don’t want to “hi-jack” this thread. I need to buy a multimeter. If anyone has any recommendations on a specific brand, send me a PM.
 
It was the day before I started college. I had driven my rusted old vw bus from houston to waco the day before, ridden back with a roomate in his car to retrieve my r65ls and get it to waco (hewitt) too. Here's a pic of the bus that is my father's new r100gs a few years later. I might even have one of the r65ls, it looked good, but was slow, unreliable and didn't get very good gas mileage. Prolly kept me alive though.

454553322_DprSA-M.jpg


It was midnight, on sunday when i pulled up to the only stoplight in Marlin on hwy 6, about 60 miles south of waco. The city cop was dutifully observing me. When I started rolling the bike backfired and died, and would not restart. It just cranked on and on. I was a bit puzzled, it had plenty of gas. I pulled a plug wire and saw it sparking a bit when I cranked it. By now the cop was rendering assistance. Finally, I just decided to hold the plug wire when it cranked over to see if it would shock the heck out of me. I found I could easily hold it and felt just the slightest electrical jolt. Coils had blown up.

The cop let me park it in city garage, and a greyhound bus arrived 5 minutes later and got me to waco for $10. Next day, I drove my clapped out bus down there and loaded it up. The coil pack turned out to cost $145 and their exploding was well known.

Thats why I always get a chuckle when everyone says the old bmws were so reliable in comparison to the new ones. That stupid little airhead kept me thin, because I was spending a lot more money keeping it going than on food, and it only had 40k miles on it. It wasn't through costing me money, but that's the only time in 300k miles any of my bmw's left me stranded. Well, there was a sudden battery failure on my k1200s that put me afoot, but I can't blame bmw for that.

edit: forgot to mention input shaft failure on my r1200gs @ 52k set me afooti:in vanderpool
in '08, it was at an adv rally, and a fellow inmate gave me a ride back to austin
 
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Riding around Medina Lake one Saturday afternoon on a Buell Blast the rear engine mount broke. On that bike the engine is a stressed member of the frame so it folded up like a lawn chair at 50mph. :eek2: Luckily the muffler under the engine kept it from going to far down and I coasted to a stop on the shoulder. It was sitting so low I couldn't get the kickstand down. Called the wife and she threw the ramp in the truck and came and got me. Sat there for an hour holding the bike up. Lesson learned - I'll think twice before buying another bike with the engine as part of the frame.
 
About three weeks ago I was just North of Georgetown, riding IH-35 from the Health Camp in Waco back to Austin on my Ninja 250 when I noticed my temperature gauge had pegged! :eek2:

I was close to an exit so I coasted off and shut down. I didn't notice any obvious leaks or anything. I figured that this was a chance to test Progressive towing.

Fortunately my wife came out to rescue me so I could wait in an air conditioned car instead of frying by the side of the road.

Two hours latter the tow truck showed up. I learned a something that surprised me. Progressive only pays for 15 miles of towing! :miffed: Since my house was 25 miles, I had to fork over $45. Thank goodness this didn't happen in far West Texas!

Once home I found a bolt had fallen out of a radiator hose bracket.


The bottom line is that I'm probably going to get the AAA/RV tow policy before my next long trip.
 
I ran out of gas switching to reserve once. The petcock was plugged on the reserve side. It was 3 blocks from home and I just pushed it home. Another time I had a plugged fuel filter (better than a plugged carb) at LBJ Grasslands. I carry an extra fuel filter in my tool bag and 5 minutes later it was repaired.

Lucky here I guess since I have never had a long day beside a freeway on my bikes. Once in my F150 I spent an afternoon in 105 degrees with my wild dog. That was no fun. Couldn't find a nice cool pub since fido was with me.
 
About three weeks ago I was just North of Georgetown, riding IH-35 from the Health Camp in Waco back to Austin on my Ninja 250 when I noticed my temperature gauge had pegged! :eek2:

I was close to an exit so I coasted off and shut down. I didn't notice any obvious leaks or anything. I figured that this was a chance to test Progressive towing.

Fortunately my wife came out to rescue me so I could wait in an air conditioned car instead of frying by the side of the road.

Two hours latter the tow truck showed up. I learned a something that surprised me. Progressive only pays for 15 miles of towing! :miffed: Since my house was 25 miles, I had to fork over $45. Thank goodness this didn't happen in far West Texas!

Once home I found a bolt had fallen out of a radiator hose bracket.


The bottom line is that I'm probably going to get the AAA/RV tow policy before my next long trip.

Amazing, the exact same thing happened to me on my 250, though I was only 5 miles from my place. I pulled over and let it cool a bit then made a mad dash back home, keeping an eye on the temp gauge.
 
Amazing, the exact same thing happened to me on my 250, though I was only 5 miles from my place. I pulled over and let it cool a bit then made a mad dash back home, keeping an eye on the temp gauge.

I've had a couple of incidents of fasteners working lose on my Ninjette. Always after a long interstate run. I lost a fairing bolt, a passenger foot peg and an engine mount nut the same way.

From now on I'm going to re-torque every nut and bolt I can find every month or so. It's easy for us to forget that the 9-10,000 rpm we run along at is pretty fast compared to ordinary motorcycles.
 
this past monday i took my vfr750 for a ride with a few other people to grab some food in fayettville. half way through the ride we rolled through hempstead to turn on our next road. while sitting at the stop sign my bike died, no warning, no unusual noises. i pushed it a few feet over to a bank parking lot and starting looking over it. turns out my battery had died because it wasnt charging. luckily one of the other riders was kind enough to let me ride with him to pick up his truck and we took it back to my house. once the bike cooled down it started charging again.

took it to school to work on it during my automotive class and as soon as i got to school the starter relay shorted out! now i couldnt even get power to my guages i couldnt belive my bad luck after tinkering with it i managed to get it started and it appears to be charging when warmed up. i went ahead and ordered a new relay anyways to see if that was causing the problem.
 
My bike has left me stranded twice in the 10 years that I have owned it.

The first time was on a trip up to the Smoky mountains with a group of friends. THe battery on my buddie's bike had died. Harley batteries have a bad rep of just up and dying with almost no warning. We had ridden up from FL and been running around the area for a couple of days and one morning his bike was dead. So we ran over to Chatanooga to get him a battery for his bike. On the way back we stopped to pick up some beer for the evening at the last place in TN where we could get beer. Our cabin was in a dry county. So we get back on the bikes and I go to start mine and guess what. Yep my battery is dead. THe bike showed no signs of it riding to and from Chatanooga, but the battery was for sure dead. So we took my buddies new battery and put it in my bike to get us back to the cabin. THe next day we went back to CHatanooga for a new battery for my bike.

The second time my bike left me stranded was for a broken belt. No warning on that one either, and the belt showed no signs of wear. Went to take off from a stop light, got rolling and then the bike stopped accellerating. Engine revved fine, but I wasnt going anywhere. In my rearview I saw the belt laying there on the road behind me. Thankfully I have roadside assistance and they sent a flatbed out to pick me up.
 
Four times, all on BMW's

#1 - May, 1997, K75. At night and 5 miles from the Georgia Mountain Rally. All electrics (and engine) went dead. Had to be trailered in (very embarrasing at a BMW rally) Fortunately it was a simple fix to get it going again.

#2 - August, 2002, R100RT. Coming home from a Neil Young concert at midnight on I20. Had to call the wife to bring the trailer to get it home. Clutch input splines disintergrated, very $$$ to repair. I'd bought the RT used w/30K, splines went at 37K. The mechanic showed me the old splines, lotsa rust dust. Opinion was the former owner lived near the ocean and salt air was the cause :shrug:

#3 - July, 2007. K1100RS. I'd just gotten it back from a major service. Took it out to empty the tank to replace the fuel filter. Fuel pump folded on me. Got my son to bring the trailer (this is getting to be a habit :argh:) to rescue me. Was gonna ride the RS to the BMW MOA National Rally, ended up using my Triumph Sprint ST to make the trip.

#4 - May, 2008, K1100RS. I'd mananged to get the fuel pump up and running. But it failed again and left me stranded on ... (wait for it) I20, at least it was daytime when my son brought the trailer (sigh!) to get me home. Replaced the fuel pump.
 
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