I don't know if this is any help at this point, but the seller I bought from was winlife2012. He does claim on his auctions that the internals of his speedos are different than others, and that someone else has used his photos on their auctions. But I also know that things can simply change from one production run to the next. Wire color changing in a harness because one or two colors ran out in the factory is pretty common in the electronics business.

Though we try to work with American manufacturers as much as possible in my electronics business, we are forced to buy some of the components we use in our products from China. I've heard similar stories for years about ripoffs of ripoffs. So I suppose it is possible.

What does the startup self test look like? Do all the indicators and screen icons come on? Does the needle sweep up to 15K rpm and back down, and the rim LEDs sweep with it? The only thing I can suggest at this point is maybe open one up and see if it's got the same board as in mine. Could be they just have a bad B switch contacts. It's also possible it's bad firmware, in which case I don't imagine there is much to be done. If you don't mind it being opened up, you could send one to me, and I'll take a look at it for you and see if I can figure anything out.

Edit - just trying to cover all possibilities - what is your bench supply voltage? Sometimes a slightly low voltage can make stuff like this act strangely. My speedo is seeing between 12.7VDC and 14VDC. If your bench supply is below that maybe try powering the speedo from a fully charged battery.

 

The test power source is my motorcycle battery, which I checked during the first bench test and it was at 12.7v. I'll send you one of the units on Monday, no need for me to open it, I would be as useful as a chimp with pliers. My start up screen is very similar, just not identical to what I'm seeing on line. I'm going to try another bench test today and check the battery voltage but this should not be this complicated. The unit should work with only the switch power, constant power and ground. Everything else is basically options if accessible to the machine or a signal to alert of a condition. if the alert is not triggered, it's the same as the unit wire not being connected to anything.

 

I got bored and opened up one of the units. The circuitry looks completely different from your unit. It looks so less complicated... Even opening the unit was not the same, I could not open mine with the front still attached. I had to remove the front face first then the rear had to be unscrewed off from the front of the unit

 

Ok, since I know that the circuitry on our speedometers are different, maybe the functions are different as well. When I hold down the A button and provide 12v to the unit, the attached picture is what comes up. The first three digits can each move up from 0-9, The fourth digit after the space can only change from 1 or 5 and the fifth digit can only change from 2 or 4, with no other numeric combinations. If I turn the unit off and then on, when I go back to the "settings screen" the system remembers the changes I made. If I disconnect the 12v constant and go back to the setting screen, the default is 756 12. I guess the next step is to do somewhat of a install on the bike and see what happens when I change the default?


Also, I don't think the A button was stuck or broken on the unit. If you hold it down, it changes the hour field and if you just press it, the minute file changes. With the B button, if you hold it down, it changes the miles to km and if you just press it, it cycle from odometer to trip. My version may just be a simplified version as indicated by the circuits compared to the ss1182 circuits.

 

That's very different indeed. The adjustables in mine are wheel rollout, no. of cylinders and no. of wheel magnets. They each come up as a single, separate setting display. Not sure how to translate that to what you have. Maybe the first string is somehow related to wheel rollout? On mine it uses four digits to set the rollout length, and you plug in the size in mm. So maybe this one is in cm instead? So like maybe about 185 or 190 might be a good starting point? Don't see how a default of 756 would correlate, though. Hmm, 75.6 inches would be about 192cm. Have no clue if that means anything.

1 or 5 being the only choices on the fourth digit is a stumper. I could see 1 or 6, as that might be for setting the number of speedo sensor magnets you have mounted to the wheel. And then maybe the last digit could be for setting the cylinder number?

Maybe see if you can get the tach to respond first, and then see if you can change the tach reading by changing that last digit. If that last digit is for cylinders, then try the speedo sensor and see if the other digits have something to do with speed.

 

Hi Doc, just letting you know that I was able to contact the seller you purchased your fake Koso from. He had a true auction and I was able to buy my unit for $50 with free shipping. I will try to get the unit installed this weekend. Regarding the bootleg fake Koso, I was able to get the seller to get me instructions on how the unit worked. The first three digits are wheel circumference, the forth digit is oil level resistance and the fifth digit is cylinder number. I received the information before I purchased the new unit but I just rather deal with something that's already figured out rather then spend weeks working with the unit and possibly get negative results with no back-up. In total, I still only spent $110 which is still way cheaper then the $400 price tag of the real Koso. Plus, after I figure out how the bootleg fake koso work, I can just sell one of them and be even from the additional expense. I plan to keep one just incase I have any failure on the ss182, I can just switch the units out.

 

Presumably it's really fuel level sender resistance? In that case I think if you set it to 1 (presuming that means 100 ohms) you might be able to connect it to the temp gauge wire instead, like I did with my gauge. The filter I made might work with that tach and setting the cylinder count to 2. If you try it out and verify that info, it would definitely be a big plus to motivate any buyer.

I think the new gauge should go in without any issues using the info I posted here, but let me know if you have any issues and I'll do what I can to help sort it.

 

Well the wiring are the same so once the ss182 is up and running checking out the bootleg should be a simple disconnecting of the ss182 and plugging the bootleg in then configuring it. I'll keep the thread updated on my progress.

 

I was able to get home early from work yesterday so I decided to do the cluster install. So far the RPM and temperature gauge, which is connected to the fuel level monitor are not working. I then switched to the fake ss182 and the tachometer continued not to work but the temperature gauge gave a reading at the fuel level indicator.

This leads me to believe that the temperature reading input may not be working on the ss182, since it worked when I plugged in the fake ss182. Also, the tachometer, wiring has to be double checked. I ground the resister to the green earth wire that ground the entire ss182. I will try to ground it on something else to see if it makes a difference. Also, I attached the resister further up the wire instead of directly at the junction of the capacitor and ss182 connection; would that make a difference?

 

The temperature has to come up a ways before it registers on the fuel gauge bar graph of my SS182. Was the engine fully warmed up? Mine runs one bar short of full scale with the bike fully warmed up at idle and close to tripping the fan switch, but it definitely takes some warm up time to register. I suppose it's possible that your temp sensor has a different resistance range.

Regarding the tach, I have the cap and resistor as close as possible to the plug I installed that connects the harness to the tach's plug. As I mentioned before I ran the ground wire of the SS182 directly to the battery negative with about 12ga. wire. By the way, I solder all of my connections to be sure of good continuity and maximum reliability. But I was able to get the cap and resistor filter to work just twisting wires together initially.

To test the tach you can try feeding it from the pulse generator output like I did when I started hooking it up. You can get signal at the positive terminal of one of the coil packs. It won't read correctly but you should be able to see the tach respond.

I'll try to get a pic of the connections later. Right now there's ice on the driveway and it's about 14F in my garage.