DIY: koso gauge install

[dyeforever]

My first write up. Not the best, did it after i installed the gauge. Please feel free to comment criticize and/or redo it.

DIY: Koso RX-2 gauge


Tools needed
Phillips screwdriver
5mm hex driver
4mm hex driver
8mm ratchet
Flathead screwdriver


First get your bike up on a bike stand or jack stands. I don’t have a bike stand so I use jack stands and they work just fine.


Now get those fairings off. Use a #3 screwdriver to remove the side covers and a 5mm hex driver for the seat.






Remove the battery cover with a #3 screwdriver and disconnect the battery.


Remove the two 5mm bolts on the side, the four 4mm bolts on the top, the three plastic rivets and one 4mm bolt on the inside of the fairings. Use a flathead screwdriver to remove the three plastic rivets on the bottom.










After removing all the bolts and clips pull the fairing back. It will pop out of the headlight fairing. Use a small standard screwdriver and unplug the blinker plug. Repeat and remove the other side.




Remove the front radiator ducting with a phillips screwdriver.


Alright now let remove the front headlight housing/fairing. Start by removing the four 5mm bolt around the gauge cluster. The two lower 4mm windscreen bolts and the two 5mm bolt on each side of the housing. (yes the rx-2 installed already)






Disconnect the headlight plugs and pull the housing off. Disconnect the speedometer cable by twisting it and unplug the gauge cluster. The remove the gauge cluster and shroud.


Now that you have the gauge cluster and shroud out, remove the three 8mm bolt holding the gauge cluster in.




That the three rubber grommets out of the universal bracket and place into koso panel and install panel into the shroud. Use the supplied hardware and bolt the koso panel in. Set to the side.


Now let’s install the sensors and run the wiring.

Remove the radiator cap and loose the upper radiator hose. Place a bucket underneath to catch the coolant and remove the upper radiator hose. Use Teflon or loctite and install the water temp sensor into the water temp sensor adapter. Cut the upper radiator hose in half and install the adapter in between the two. It is a very tight fit.


Install the oil temp sensor into the koso oil plug sensor adapter. Remove your old oil plug and install the koso one.
Use the temp sensor wire and run it along the bottom of the engine and up near the lower radiator hose to the gauge cluster.


Install the supplied magnets into the rotor bolts. Make sure the “N” is facing out. Install the magnetic pickup sensor with the bracket on to the brake caliper. Adjust the gap between the sensor and magnet to .8mm or .030”. Run the sensor wire along the brake line.


Run the supplied red power cable along the wiring harness from the front to the battery positive terminal.


Plug the koso harness into the ninja harness and secure to the wire bracket with zip ties.


Reinstall the gauge shroud and push the koso harness through the hole in the koso panel. Plug the harness into the rx-2 gauge and secure with the supplied screws.


Recheck your connects and reattach the battery cable. Turn key on, and check to see that everything works. The wiring on the koso plug and play harness, does not show the gas gauge. Enjoy your koso rx-2 gauge.


Uploaded with ImageShack.us

[tjkamper]

Pictures?

[shaun2891]

yeah pics arent working for me

[randomwalk101]

Pics are fine. Very nice & detailed DIY.

[bob706]

Looks good

[wayanlam]

you might want to consider putting the sensor in the front, since that bolt that holds the front brake bracket should be tightened really well...



just a suggestion, since i personally thought about doing the same as you did, but decided not to put it there in case i compromised the brake bracket, and i want to be 100% sure that the brake always works, lol.

i also didn't want to have to align the sensor every time i took the front brake off to clean, which i do on a regular basis, and i was afraid that the aluminum sensor bracket might break if i tightened it too strong.

[dyeforever]

thanks for the tip. looks better mount under the fender.

[headshrink]

Very nice, thank you.

A suggestion:
-You might want to add a step at the end to remind people to put oil back in their bike after changing the oil plug. It may be elementary, but everyone makes elementary mistakes from time to time.

A few questions:
-Is the Bezel from Koso, or 3rd party (thought I heard there where two versions of the bezel)?
-So you are getting both oil temp. AND h2o temp.? Sounds strange - I would have thought you could choose between the two, but display only one.
-You mentioned the plug-n-play harness doesn't mention gas gauge..... does that mean you have to figure it out, or it isn't possible?
- Is it programed to give actual speed, or "industry standard speed?"
- After removing the old speedo cable, do you remove the little gear mechanism on the front tire and add any type of spacer, leave it open....?
- Where you able to get original mileage programed in?
- Any complaints, buyer's remorse, thoughts after using it?
- Can I have it?

Sorry, a lot of questions, but thought I would get the inevitable out of the way..... I would be happy to repost them one by one

[Alex]

/linked from the DIY sticky...

[dyeforever]

Originally Posted by headshrink

Very nice, thank you.

A suggestion:
-You might want to add a step at the end to remind people to put oil back in their bike after changing the oil plug. It may be elementary, but everyone makes elementary mistakes from time to time.

A few questions:
-Is the Bezel from Koso, or 3rd party (thought I heard there where two versions of the bezel)?
-So you are getting both oil temp. AND h2o temp.? Sounds strange - I would have thought you could choose between the two, but display only one.
-You mentioned the plug-n-play harness doesn't mention gas gauge..... does that mean you have to figure it out, or it isn't possible?
- Is it programed to give actual speed, or "industry standard speed?"
- After removing the old speedo cable, do you remove the little gear mechanism on the front tire and add any type of spacer, leave it open....?
- Where you able to get original mileage programed in?
- Any complaints, buyer's remorse, thoughts after using it?
- Can I have it?

Sorry, a lot of questions, but thought I would get the inevitable out of the way..... I would be happy to repost them one by one

thanks for the comments.

really wanted to do a good write up but got excited when the gauge came in that i didnt take any pics. Went back and took pics when i was servicing the bike and did a really lame write up. planning on doing a video write up, when and if my brother order a koso unit also.

Alright questions,

-Is the Bezel from Koso, or 3rd party (thought I heard there where two versions of the bezel)?
The bezel i used was from koso. There is a sportisimoto bezel also, that has a gauge pod to the left.

-So you are getting both oil temp. AND h2o temp.? Sounds strange - I would have thought you could choose between the two, but display only one.
There is two supplied temp sensors. One for the oil and water. On the gauge you can cycle through and display, fuel/time, fuel/water temp, or water/oil temp.

-You mentioned the plug-n-play harness doesn't mention gas gauge..... does that mean you have to figure it out, or it isn't possible?
The plug and play harness doesn't use the koso gas gauge but has a supplied low fuel light. I didn't care for that, so i had to rewire the harness. I will tried and get a wiring diagram for that up soon.

- Is it programed to give actual speed, or "industry standard speed?"
The koso unit can be adjusted to your diameter of your tire. This makes the speedometer dead on accurate.

- After removing the old speedo cable, do you remove the little gear mechanism on the front tire and add any type of spacer, leave it open....?
I removed the cable speedometer and left the stock one there. I haven't had any problems with it. In the kit there is a adapter, so you can keep the stock cable.

- Where you able to get original mileage programed in?
You can't program the mileage on the koso unit. I have heard you can send it to koso and they can program the mileage you want. I just add the mileage from the stock gauge to the koso one to get the actual mileage.

- Any complaints, buyer's remorse, thoughts after using it?
I can be nick picky and say that i don't like how the gauge sit a little off the bezel. If someone wanted to, they could rid it off. I also don't know why they wired in a low fuel light instead of using the fuel gauge on the koso unit. Other then that, its a awesome unit.

- Can I have it?
Haha, maybe. If and when i upgrade i will be parting the parts of on here.

[wayanlam]

Originally Posted by headshrink

Very nice, thank you.

A few questions:
-Is the Bezel from Koso, or 3rd party (thought I heard there where two versions of the bezel)?
-So you are getting both oil temp. AND h2o temp.? Sounds strange - I would have thought you could choose between the two, but display only one.
-You mentioned the plug-n-play harness doesn't mention gas gauge..... does that mean you have to figure it out, or it isn't possible?
- Is it programed to give actual speed, or "industry standard speed?"
- After removing the old speedo cable, do you remove the little gear mechanism on the front tire and add any type of spacer, leave it open....?
- Where you able to get original mileage programed in?
- Any complaints, buyer's remorse, thoughts after using it?
- Can I have it?

Sorry, a lot of questions, but thought I would get the inevitable out of the way..... I would be happy to repost them one by one

that bezel that dyeforever used is a standard that Koso sells i believe. i got mine with a custom fiberglass bezel, with an added voltmeter (not really useful, but looks cool and balances out the dash with the RPM centered).





there are three setting on the display for oil/water/fuel/time gauges.
option 1: fuel + time
option 2: fuel + water temp
option 3: water temp + oil temp
umm... something like that, i might have mixed them up. i keep it with time and fuel.

if the oil or water temp does exceed the temperature that you set, then it blinks "wat" or "oil" so its still noticeable, and then you can flip over the display to see how many Celsius, or Fahrenheit they are.

for the speed you actually manually set up the radius of the wheel and then you program in how many magnets you are using (i put in all 6). to measure the radius i put a piece of tape on the floor, rolled the wheel one turn, and marked the other spot, and measured the distance. i got 1575mm or something like that.

according to Racer X (Eric) said its really accurate, he compared it to the speed reading at the drag strip or in Maxton i believe.

make sure you face the magnets with the N stamp outwards, i put them in all back to front and got no reading, haha... then i wasnt able to get them out, so i had to go back to the shop to borrow a spare magnet to pull them out and flip them

the fuel gauge was just built into my plug and play cable thing, so i still get a reading, but its not very accurate... it jumps about indicating false amounts, so i just keep track of the distance ive ridden and fill up when i hit about 240Km (i get terrible mileage with the traffic here).

for the old speedo cable, i took that off, and plugged up the hole like this:


i had a spare broken speedo cable, which i took apart, and used the threadded cap, with a piece of plastic and covered the hole, i filled up the hole with grease before i closed it up, so that it wont get corroded inside, and i think it should stay put! it has so far

i heard that if you buy the unit directly from Koso, they can program in your current milage/km. but since i didnt, i started at 0. however i was @ about 10.000 Km, so its easy for me to remember how far ive gone in total, i just add 10k to the Koso reading, hehe

no complaint about the unit so far! i have yet to play around with the self timing thing. it has several settings, it can do lap counts, 0-60 timer (or any speed that you choose), and a couple other race oriented timing settings. none of which i have bothered to test, since the roads here aren't really adequate for drag racing. although id like to test the bikes 0-100 Km/h (same as 0-60 mph about) but like i said... no roads to do that repeatedly in safety...

and NO, you cant have mine!

[wayanlam]

lol, almost like reading a double post

[Ninja North]

Wayanlam, your gauge/bezel look great! Did you get your Bezel from Sportisi? How much did it cost you? Thanks.

[wayanlam]

Originally Posted by Ninja North

Wayanlam, your gauge/bezel look great! Did you get your Bezel from Sportisi? How much did it cost you? Thanks.

yeah, i think its the sportisi one. although im not 100% sure if its "Sprotisi". i didnt buy it from the sportisi shop, but maybe they got it from sportisi, or they are getting it from the same place that sportisi gets them. either way, from what ive seen its the same bezel. i like the way that this bezel centered the round part of the RPM in the center, and balances it out with the voltmeter.

maybe in the future i would like to add a wideband sensor in place of the voltmeter, i believe that its the same size, if not i can always MAKE It fit.

at least the ait/fuel sensor would be fun to use to calibrate the carb. in real life situations, rather than doing the dyno runs.

but i dont know if i want to put a hole in my exhaust piping, scared to damage it, and the sensor is not exactly CHEAP either, hehe...

ps. i paid about $365 USD. as a full plug and play package. otherwise it costs about $230 without the bezel and voltmeter.

[headshrink]

Thanks for the detailed responses. This one is going on my wish list.

[randomwalk101]

Why did you guys tapped the radiator hose for water temp gauge? Why not install temp sensor in stock water temp location?

[randomwalk101]

Btw instead of volt meter, it'd be nice loc for gear indicator

[Jerkson]

Originally Posted by randomwalk101

Btw instead of volt meter, it'd be nice loc for gear indicator

A gear indicator would be awefully hard to do considering we have no way for it to determine what gear you're in without an ECU. I want one too tho

[randomwalk101]

Originally Posted by Jerkson

A gear indicator would be awefully hard to do considering we have no way for it to determine what gear you're in without an ECU. I want one too tho

Note to self: this tool have to clue what he/she/it is talking about.

[Jerkson]

Originally Posted by randomwalk101

Note to self: this tool have to clue what he/she/it is talking about.

I think you mean "this tool has no clue what he is talking about"
I also don't understand why the he/she/it was necessary.

I had just woken up and yes my post was completely incorrect and made little sense. With the Koso gauge, now that we have an electronic speed sensor instead of the mechanical, it will be at least possible to get a gear indicator to work.. Since you're infinitely smarter than me/he/she/it, get to it and post a DIY when you're done.

[randomwalk101]

Originally Posted by Jerkson

I think you mean "this tool has no clue what he is talking about"
I also don't understand why the he/she/it was necessary.

I had just woken up and yes my post was completely incorrect and made little sense. With the Koso gauge, now that we have an electronic speed sensor instead of the mechanical, it will be at least possible to get a gear indicator to work.. Since you're infinitely smarter than me/he/she/it, get to it and post a DIY when you're done.

hehe..i just woke up and on my iphone and was just playing around man...

[captlombardi]

Originally Posted by wayanlam

for the speed you actually manually set up the radius of the wheel and then you program in how many magnets you are using (i put in all 6). to measure the radius i put a piece of tape on the floor, rolled the wheel one turn, and marked the other spot, and measured the distance. i got 1575mm or something like that.

just wanted to make sure, since you may have been driving around with it already and it could be working...you said to put the RADIUS into the unit, but measuring the way you did it gives you the CIRCUMFERENCE of the wheel. 1575mm/25.4mm (25.4 mm in one inch) = ~62". Front wheel is 17" if i'm not mistaken, maybe add 1" on each side for the tire, so 19" = 9.5" wheel radius = ~241.3 mm. I would imagine your speed would be off a bit if you put in 1575 mm. i guess i'm assuming maybe you took the circumference and divided it by 2*pi but left that detail out?

why not just pull out a tape measure?

[randomwalk101]

Originally Posted by dyeforever

thanks for the comments.
-You mentioned the plug-n-play harness doesn't mention gas gauge..... does that mean you have to figure it out, or it isn't possible?
The plug and play harness doesn't use the koso gas gauge but has a supplied low fuel light. I didn't care for that, so i had to rewire the harness. I will tried and get a wiring diagram for that up soon.

I believe you hook up the light green fuel sensor wire (from bike) to the green wire on the Koso to give you the signal to display fuel level. Is this how you did it?

[Canoas]

I also recently installed the panel Koso.
My kit came with a cable plug and play and used the speed sensor cable original. I used a pilot light that is thrown when the fuel is in reserve.


The oil sensor installed in place of the original, as the tip of wayanlam. The sensor of the water was not possible because the original size is different. I noticed that the Ninja FI has three wires on the sensor and the carburetor Ninja owns only one wire.

I'm having trouble configuring the gear indicator of Koso.

The speed sensor front wheel is not quite accurate to set the indicator currently. Once set up the indicator shows many errors. I found it very strange, because I can only configure it with the bike in motion.

I plan on using the speed sensor located near the pedal gears. So I can put the bike on a rack and configure properly. Besides finding that more accurate sensor.

Sorry for my poor english

[Jerkson]

Originally Posted by randomwalk101

hehe..i just woke up and on my iphone and was just playing around man...

no worries

[randomwalk101]

1) Does the Koso gauge shows the gas level increments or just give you a 1vague warning when fuel is low? I believe it will display in increment (10 increments?

2) The gear indicator is part of the plug-n-play harness or did you have to hack the harness to install it?

Originally Posted by Canoas

I also recently installed the panel Koso.
My kit came with a cable plug and play and used the speed sensor cable original. I used a pilot light that is thrown when the fuel is in reserve.


The oil sensor installed in place of the original, as the tip of wayanlam. The sensor of the water was not possible because the original size is different. I noticed that the Ninja FI has three wires on the sensor and the carburetor Ninja owns only one wire.

I'm having trouble configuring the gear indicator of Koso.

The speed sensor front wheel is not quite accurate to set the indicator currently. Once set up the indicator shows many errors. I found it very strange, because I can only configure it with the bike in motion.

I plan on using the speed sensor located near the pedal gears. So I can put the bike on a rack and configure properly. Besides finding that more accurate sensor.

Sorry for my poor english

[Canoas]

Originally Posted by randomwalk101

1) Does the Koso gauge shows the gas level increments or just give you a 1vague warning when fuel is low? I believe it will display in increment (10 increments?

2) The gear indicator is part of the plug-n-play harness or did you have to hack the harness to install it?

1) This "new" cable to the Koso Ninja disabled the function of the fuel gauge. The display is blank. I use the screen that marks the temperature of the oil and water. Only light installed next to the panel is my reference for the fuel. My original panel, has no fuel gauge, only a light to indicate the reservation. Just as the Koso is running now. This is a limitation of my Ninja and not the panel. I believe the fuel sensor of the Ninja FI is limited, unlike Ninja carburetor that has a better sensor.

2)The indicator is not part of the kit. I cut the wires from the kit plug and play. Thus, the wires have preserved the original bike. I bought the kit complete with Paul (Shinto). Koso Kit 3.

[randomwalk101]

Originally Posted by Canoas

1) This "new" cable to the Koso Ninja disabled the function of the fuel gauge. The display is blank. I use the screen that marks the temperature of the oil and water. Only light installed next to the panel is my reference for the fuel. My original panel, has no fuel gauge, only a light to indicate the reservation. Just as the Koso is running now. This is a limitation of my Ninja and not the panel. I believe the fuel sensor of the Ninja FI is limited, unlike Ninja carburetor that has a better sensor.

2)The indicator is not part of the kit. I cut the wires from the kit plug and play. Thus, the wires have preserved the original bike. I bought the kit complete with Paul (Shinto). Koso Kit 3.

I got it. You have the FI version instead of carb version that's why you don't have fuel sensor (thus blank). I guess this is the reason why the PnP wire kit doesn't include the fuel wire in it (so it a PnP universal wire kit to be used for both version of bikes). But if you have the carb bike, I think you can connect the wires I think it'll show you the fuel level and all.

[randomwalk101]

Originally Posted by Canoas

2)The indicator is not part of the kit. I cut the wires from the kit plug and play. Thus, the wires have preserved the original bike. I bought the kit complete with Paul (Shinto). Koso Kit 3.

Also, I thought Paul (Shinto) sells the kit with this type of cover rather than the "flat" generic Koso cover like you have shown??

[dyeforever]

Originally Posted by randomwalk101

I believe you hook up the light green fuel sensor wire (from bike) to the green wire on the Koso to give you the signal to display fuel level. Is this how you did it?

the kit also comes with the wire harness for the gauge. i spliced together the plug and play kit with the extra harness. on the plug and play harness, there is no green wire for the fuel gauge.

for the water temp, i was going to swap the stock sender for the koso one but didnt know if it was going to keep the water light on or not. will try it when i get the fairings off to paint.

[dyeforever]

Canoas - look and see if all your magnets on your rotor have "N" facing out. i had poor speed read out when one of my magnets are installed backwards.

[Canoas]

Originally Posted by randomwalk101

Also, I thought Paul (Shinto) sells the kit with this type of cover rather than the "flat" generic Koso cover like you have shown??

I know, I just bought this kit with it. But the generic Koso cover of fiber was broken and ordered another kit with the gear indicator.

[Canoas]

Originally Posted by dyeforever

Canoas - look and see if all your magnets on your rotor have "N" facing out. i had poor speed read out when one of my magnets are installed backwards.

I'm not using the magnetic sensor Koso. In the kit plug and play there is a adapter sensor to put on speed cable. Using this sensor just set the RX-2 with 714 and 6p. The speed is perfect, I made a comparison with a GPS.

[randomwalk101]

Ohh because you're using stock mech cable thus the irratic readings...swap out to the magnet setup and your pulse sensor will be much better and your gear indicator will work right.

[dyeforever]

i think he's talking about the gear indicator not be accurate. you have to set the gear indicator while your moving.

[randomwalk101]

Originally Posted by dyeforever

the kit also comes with the wire harness for the gauge. i spliced together the plug and play kit with the extra harness. on the plug and play harness, there is no green wire for the fuel gauge.

huh? are you sure man? the green wire from the Koso is for fuel gauge... Look here..

http://www.kosonorthamerica.com/fCMS...t/BA010001.pdf

You connect this wire to the green/black wire on the bike..this green/black wire runs all the way to under your tank which connects to the fuel sender.

[Canoas]

I was thinking of using this sensor.



My speed is correct and without distortions. I need a speed signal to set the gear indicator and I'm just using this adapter for Koso to take this signal 5V. Since this sensor is the front wheel, to set the gear indicator it is necessary to keep moving.

[randomwalk101]

Hmm..you might have the FI version or something? Not sure but I don't think carb version has that sensor that I know of (I didn't see one when I did my sprocket change).
That may be the tach/rpm sensor ??? if that's the case, it's the wrong sensor..
gear indic uses both tach and speed pulse to calculate gear.

[randomwalk101]

Originally Posted by dyeforever

i think he's talking about the gear indicator not be accurate. you have to set the gear indicator while your moving.

oh yeah..gotta set it up first for it to work right...lol..
on my cbr, i put it on rear stand and run it while adjusting/setting the GI. The ninja uses front wheel kinda make things more interesting..but hey, we don't have to worry about speed error when changing sprockets

[Canoas]

Yes, for the indicator to function correctly it needs the two signals (speed and RPM). The RPM signal is OK. My problem is with the speed sensor. The sensor is for speed not for RPM. In their own service manual indicates as speed sensor.