Rc390 let me down :(

[chrisdigital21]

SO, While riding home, the cooling system over pressured and blasted me with boiling hot coolant! What a cool feature!!!!! This bike only has 1600 easy miles to and from work.

 

[chrisdigital21]

Nobody seems interested or surprised here. That is discerning in itself. lol

 

[simpletty]

Nobody seems interested or surprised here. That is discerning in itself. lol

Thats not good at all, yikes

 

[btalont]

Sorry about your experience. Hope you weren't burned! I would suggest you check out the thread on what a lot of us have done to our cooling systems. I have dome the ICE coolant, higher pressure radiator cap and trimmed the shroud on the fan. Some advocate changing to a Spal brand fan. Did it blow a hose? Usually, overflow would go into the bottls and then out the overflow tube.

 

[chrisdigital21]

Thanks all. I was burned on the left leg a bit. This event happend so quick it was like combustion gasses filled up the system and then , POP. The Engine temp gauge was normal and it was only 56 degrees Fahrenheit out.

 

[chrisdigital21]

Nobody seems interested or surprised here. That is discerning in itself. lol

I only wrote this because I feared that this bikes problems like this had become so common place with these bikes, It was acceptable. That would have really made me think I bought the wrong bike.

 

[chrisdigital21]

Sorry about your experience. Hope you weren't burned! I would suggest you check out the thread on what a lot of us have done to our cooling systems. I have dome the ICE coolant, higher pressure radiator cap and trimmed the shroud on the fan. Some advocate changing to a Spal brand fan. Did it blow a hose? Usually, overflow would go into the bottls and then out the overflow tube.

Thanks all. I was burned on the left leg a bit. This event happened so quick it was like combustion gasses filled up the system and then , POP. The Engine temp gauge was normal and it was only 56 degrees Fahrenheit out.

 

[Fasteddy]

Lucky you were not too burned!
So did it blow the head gasket or was it just an air bubble that belched out / sudden pressure release (radiator cap causing too much pressure)?

 

[CDN Duke]

Lucky you were not too burned!
So did it blow the head gasket or was it just an air bubble that belched out / sudden pressure release (radiator cap causing too much pressure)?

Yes, where did it come out?

I haven't done either fan or cap mod yet, but did order the 'HD grill'... doubt the latter would have much impact though.

 

[unicorn_violence]

make sure you wipe off that green ooze your your bike will mutate into a ninja turtle. that green stuff is nasty!

joking aside im sorry to see that happened! i wonder if a hose blew or melted next to a hot surface? ive had my race bike get decently hot, but have not had any blow outs like that from the cooling system.
switch to ice when you get a chance though. its gonna take a long time to flush the oem green ooze out of the system.

 

[Diploman]

Very sorry to hear about your unfortunate incident: This is the first I have heard of such a cooling system failure. I can assure you that this is not something that occurs routinely with the KTM 390. So such a thing doesn't happen again, please help us understand just what too k place. Obviously, there was a sudden coolant leak that sprayed hot coolant around. Where exactly did the leak occur? Hose burst or came loose from its connection? Radiator cap failed? Radiator developed a leak? Head gasket failure? We need to know whether this is a design issue, a materials issue, an assembly issue, a quality control issue, or possibly a DIY repair/adjustment gone bad. Previously known 390 cooling issues relate either to the OEM fan, the thermostat switch, or the radiator cap causing coolant puking. All of these problems have simple remedies. But none of these involve hot coolant spewing onto a rider. It needs to be ascertained whether this is an unusual, one-off incident or whether the cause is some systematic flaw . Please provide as much detail as you can to help us understand the problem.

 

[chrisdigital21]

Very sorry to hear about your unfortunate incident: This is the first I have heard of such a cooling system failure. I can assure you that this is not something that occurs routinely with the KTM 390. So such a thing doesn't happen again, please help us understand just what too k place. Obviously, there was a sudden coolant leak that sprayed hot coolant around. Where exactly did the leak occur? Hose burst or came loose from its connection? Radiator cap failed? Radiator developed a leak? Head gasket failure? We need to know whether this is a design issue, a materials issue, an assembly issue, a quality control issue, or possibly a DIY repair/adjustment gone bad. Previously known 390 cooling issues relate either to the OEM fan, the thermostat switch, or the radiator cap causing coolant puking. All of these problems have simple remedies. But none of these involve hot coolant spewing onto a rider. It needs to be ascertained whether this is an unusual, one-off incident or whether the cause is some systematic flaw . Please provide as much detail as you can to help us understand the problem.

SO here are the riding conditions:

*56 degrees F
*Bike temp Normal 3/4 way on bar gauge as it has been since new.
*Riding on public road in a normal manner

The coolant came from the coolant vent hose on the left side inside the faring
The bike temp remained the same.
The coolant came out at a high rate of speed at my left leg.
The bike is at Freedom Cycle in Concord NH.

Took a few temp reading once i was home only a minute after the event.
Left side of the head was 235 degrees
Right side of head was 180

Hope this helps. Miss my bike already.

Interesting note:
In the past three days leading up to this event, The bike seemed to crank/ not start after a hot soak, aka after sitting for example, when I would go in to a store and come back out. the crank time was much different than it has been all along.One time Tuesday, it would not start and i had to turn the key off and on and it still had trouble , but started. ( It Always started up enthusiastically before Monday)

bike has only 1580 miles
All street commuting, no track
Services up to date and valve check/adjust complete.

 

[chrisdigital21]

make sure you wipe off that green ooze your your bike will mutate into a ninja turtle. that green stuff is nasty!

joking aside im sorry to see that happened! i wonder if a hose blew or melted next to a hot surface? ive had my race bike get decently hot, but have not had any blow outs like that from the cooling system.
switch to ice when you get a chance though. its gonna take a long time to flush the oem green ooze out of the system.

After the picture was taken by my wife, I hosed it off. It seemed like non diluted coolant.

 

[Fasteddy]

Interesting, FWIW.
Temps seem normal I have done the same thing using a couple of different infrared digital thermometers, Left always seems to pick up heat from exhaust.

It seems like the anti freeze is not anywhere near diluted correctly in most from the factory.

The drain hose, I just had to go down and actually verify on mine even after looking at the manual, is routed all the way down and out the bottom of the belly pan. It does not seem that it should have allowed coolant out where you described, I wonder if the hose was mis routed / connected incorrectly when fairing was off for service? still does not explain the starting issue though.

From viewing pics of mine disassembled the coolant overflow tank has "Y" that connects the fuel fill cap pocket overflow into the drain tube. IIRC, this was an issue in another thread but the coolant came out around the fuel lid.

 

[chrisdigital21]

Interesting, FWIW.
Temps seem normal I have done the same thing using a couple of different infrared digital thermometers, Left always seems to pick up heat from exhaust.

It seems like the anti freeze is not anywhere near diluted correctly in most from the factory.

The drain hose, I just had to go down and actually verify on mine even after looking at the manual, is routed all the way down and out the bottom of the belly pan. It does not seem that it should have allowed coolant out where you described, I wonder if the hose was mis routed / connected incorrectly when fairing was off for service? still does not explain the starting issue though.

From viewing pics of mine disassembled the coolant overflow tank has "Y" that connects the fuel fill cap pocket overflow into the drain tube. IIRC, this was an issue in another thread but the coolant came out around the fuel lid.

The vent hose was not in the "normal" spot for sure as I moved it during service because it was routed in a way causing it to kink from the factory. So, I routed it like all other bikes I have owned in the past and positioned it lower left side of faring. Never had a Issue on any other bike like this though. if it was down further, the coolant would have gone all over my tire.........

 

[Deleted member 452]

My bike does it quite often but it never burns me. In fact I don't realize it happened until I get off the bike and see sprayed coolant on the motor, frame, and swingarm. I'm running Engine Ice, high PSI cap, and a SPAL fan so I'm going to try Evans Waterless Coolant the next time I change the coolant since it doesn't expand like other coolants.

 

[chrisdigital21]

My bike does it quite often but it never burns me. In fact I don't realize it happened until I get off the bike and see sprayed coolant on the motor, frame, and swingarm. I'm running Engine Ice, high PSI cap, and a SPAL fan so I'm going to try Evans Waterless Coolant the next time I change the coolant since it doesn't expand like other coolants.

It is not NORMAL or ACCEPTABLE for any street bike to purge coolant like that. I have owned close to 80 bikes in my life and not one has ever done this, ever. Just food for though.

Chris

 

[Deleted member 452]

I completely agree with Chris. It's also not normal to have to replace a head gasket, water pump, and clutch before 5K miles but that's what happened with my little bundle of crap.

 

[Fasteddy]

I agree with the not normal / acceptable, I now have 4000+ miles on mine since April 2015, all stock with exception of a dampened Comp Werkes pipe and a 1.6 bar rad cap. I have engine ice to put in it but have not got to that yet and am still running the OEM coolant. I hope I don't jinx it but never had an issue with cooling yet and it has seen full range of operation.

 

[chrisdigital21]

I agree with the not normal / acceptable, I now have 4000+ miles on mine since April 2015, all stock with exception of a dampened Comp Werkes pipe and a 1.6 bar rad cap. I have engine ice to put in it but have not got to that yet and am still running the OEM coolant. I hope I don't jinx it but never had an issue with cooling yet and it has seen full range of operation.

One other thing I must also point out I have observed in this forum is that people are changing the rad cap. I think that is ludicrous and the stock cap should be more than sufficient and If a update needs to be made, KTM should provide the updated part. Nobody should be spending money on parts or coolant on a new bike, that was not right from the Factory.

Am I being unreasonable?