In March 2018 I bought a new Tiger 1200. After 7000 kilometres one morning the electronics went on strike; instead of illuminating the TFT display, the ignition switch only made the red LED above the display blink a few times. There was nothing I could do, the electrons were decisively uncooperative that day - and I was in the Swedish outback 300 kilometres away from the nearest dealer and a few thousand klicks away from home...
The Swedish dealer took a week to get as far as to read out the error codes from the four build-in electronic black boxes. The dealer and myself learned that the blinking red LED indicates that one now has exactly 45 seconds to connect a laptop to the OBD II socket of the bike to read out the error codes even without the ignition being switched on.
Result: the four black boxes (ECU, suspension control, ABS and immobilizer) would no longer talk to each other. It was quite interesting to see that the dealers have absolutely no manual on what to do in case of electronic problems. All error codes have to be reported directly to the factory where the analysis is done and the dealer then is informed on what to do to fix the problem - that's certainly quite frustrating for the mechanics.
After the Swedes fiddled unsuccessfully with the bike for a week I brought it back home. My Swiss dealer then fiddled for another month with it. In early July I got the repaired bike back. The number of replaced parts was exactly zero; all that was done was to re-load the firmware into the various black boxes.
The repaired bike lasted for exactly seven kilometres and then broke down again with exactly the same problem - luckily this time not halfway up towards the polar circle.
I could now have canceled the purchase contract or demanded a new machine from Triumph as a replacement for this "Lemon", but that would have involved the usual legal proceedings, meaning that I would have gotten a replacement bike in time for the 2020 season. The dealership made me a good offer for the Lemon and for a small payment gave me a brand new Tiger 1200. The new bike so far shows no electronic gremlins.
In fairness I have to say that this was the first total failure of a Triumph Tiger for me in nearly 400000 kilometres.
I you are bored you can read the whole gory story here with pictures. I have asked Triumph for a statement on this electronics breakdown, but unsurprisingly Hinckley remains silent even after two weeks.
My question: am I the only Tiger 1200 rider who suffered a total electronics failure or have other riders had similar problems?
The Swedish dealer took a week to get as far as to read out the error codes from the four build-in electronic black boxes. The dealer and myself learned that the blinking red LED indicates that one now has exactly 45 seconds to connect a laptop to the OBD II socket of the bike to read out the error codes even without the ignition being switched on.
Result: the four black boxes (ECU, suspension control, ABS and immobilizer) would no longer talk to each other. It was quite interesting to see that the dealers have absolutely no manual on what to do in case of electronic problems. All error codes have to be reported directly to the factory where the analysis is done and the dealer then is informed on what to do to fix the problem - that's certainly quite frustrating for the mechanics.
After the Swedes fiddled unsuccessfully with the bike for a week I brought it back home. My Swiss dealer then fiddled for another month with it. In early July I got the repaired bike back. The number of replaced parts was exactly zero; all that was done was to re-load the firmware into the various black boxes.
The repaired bike lasted for exactly seven kilometres and then broke down again with exactly the same problem - luckily this time not halfway up towards the polar circle.
I could now have canceled the purchase contract or demanded a new machine from Triumph as a replacement for this "Lemon", but that would have involved the usual legal proceedings, meaning that I would have gotten a replacement bike in time for the 2020 season. The dealership made me a good offer for the Lemon and for a small payment gave me a brand new Tiger 1200. The new bike so far shows no electronic gremlins.
In fairness I have to say that this was the first total failure of a Triumph Tiger for me in nearly 400000 kilometres.
I you are bored you can read the whole gory story here with pictures. I have asked Triumph for a statement on this electronics breakdown, but unsurprisingly Hinckley remains silent even after two weeks.
My question: am I the only Tiger 1200 rider who suffered a total electronics failure or have other riders had similar problems?