Rostra Electronic Cruise Control

[Pezzz]

Well after 4 months of procrastinating on this projects (work got in the way) we managed to get it all in .

We used a combination of US site instructions found at  http://www.st-owners.com/forums/show...r-ST1100/page3 and http://www.st-owners.com/forums/showthread.php?60988-Audiovox-Cruise-Control-CCS-100-vs-Rostra-100-Electronic-Cruise-Control

Parts and part numbers ordered from Ebay are:
250-1223 - Universal Cruse Control
250-4165 - Speed Signal Generator
250-3592 - Control Switch - you can save some $$ and get 250-9006 - same unit just no engaged light (which i still have not got working on mine anyway)
Total cost around AU$380 delivered.

A big thanks to Yorkie for his help as we actually started the work at his place and after i went home he continued working on it and let me know to my surpise a couple of days later that it was all done. Also thanks to my long distance taxi driver Wombat.

Ok the nitty gritty part .....

The circumference of the rear tyre is 2m which means with 6 magnets (1 in each disc bolt head) we would end up with 3000 pulses per km. Without buying a signal multiplier, there was no dip switch setting for this (the closest being 2500 ppk). So I ended up using 4 magnets instead inside the heads of disc bolts - more on this later.

The main unit we mounted in the duck tail with cruise cable running down left side of bike and wiring harness down right side.
The hardest part by far was the installation of the cable to the throttle. That and working out the wiring. As Yorkie said - the main problem is instead of buying 1 unit, we are buying 3 parts to make 1 unit (the universal cruise control, the pickup / signal generator, and the controller). After a fair bit of head scratching and shortening or wires, we got the cabling sorted out.
We followed drseth's install for the cable but used a longer piece of metal from the bolt securing the throttle cables. I am not sure if drseth wound the loop cable around the spring or just attached straight onto the stop like we did.
Yorkie put a notch in the idle stop on the throttle assembly to hold the cable in and routed cruise cable behind throttle cables.
Next time I have cover off i will add a photo or will add once Yorkie sends me his pics.

On the ride back from York, i tried the unit at 100kph. The bike surged up to about 105 and then dropped back to around 80 .. then back up to 100 and back down and so on and so forth. Needless to say the rest of the trip was done with just normal throttle handling.

I spent a few hours yesterday (and around 100km on a 4km circuit) setting dip switches to all sorts of things, removing magnets, playing with cable slack (over and over again). What was happening was that when i would engage the CC at say 80 kph, the bike would surge forward to about 84, then drop to 70 then back up to 80 and straight back down to around 65, back to 80 then down to 60 ...... very jerky ... Wombat suggested it sounded like a pickup / sensor problem and i should either move sensor closer or further away. It was around 10mm away at this time so i moved it closer. Surging didn't change noticeably so I moved it away to around 13mm ....
It Worked !!!!!!!!
Set at 80 kph, holds at 80 kph ... maybe a little rough when it needs to adjust but have not tried any real hills etc. I found the higher the speed, the better it performs (rock solid at 100 kph on flat-ish road).
As for the magnets, with 4 magnets i get 2000 pulses per km which is on the chart for the dip switch settings. To use 6 magnets i can get a multiplier that will bring up to 600 ppk which is a setting but that is additional cost. I am not sure of the effect of having not spaced equi distant as all it is really saying is that when i have pulsed 2000 times, the bike has done 1km. This may make things a bit smoother but i am not sure.
 
Thoughts so far ...... An interesting project ... once sorted it seems to perform OK.
Bear in mind this was 1/3 the price of the MCCruise. Yorkie has the MC Cruise and said that it was made for the bike in that all terminations were there to add to existing ST1100 harness so no need to strip wires etc, and being 1 kit, all works happily together - no guessing of wires. I bought the controller with the engaged light and still cannot get that to work.

Thanks again to all involved

Pezzz

[Yorkie]

For this project I bought 6 rare earth magnets, 6mm dia x 6mm length to fit in rear brake disc bolts, Pezzz is only using 4, cost $1.00ea,
1 M8x50 bolt with nyloc nut, this is to replace axle clamp bolt and nut is to hold bracket to underside for pickup.





2 pics of the bracket I made to mount the pickup, copied from my MC Cruise unit, length o/all is 130mm, 35mm wide, tab for pickup is 25mmx25mm and the 2 smaller tabs are only about 5mm to stop sideways movement.



This is how I mounted the controller, backing plate is 50mm x 35mm with tang at top for mounting 5mm in and 20mm wide x 20mm high.
I had to file 2mm (thickness of ali) from the bottom of clutch bracket.





This is the throttle connection, I used a dremmel to notch the stop so the loop cable will not come off.





The fuel tank was removed for installation of wiring to pickup and easier access to throttle connections. Wiring was pretty straight forward with connections to rear brake switch, ignition at plug in front of air cleaner and on left side for coil. I had to shorten all wires by about 1.5 mt as 1100 is a bit shorter than most cars

The complete install took about 8 or so hours, Pezzz has spent some time sorting and fine tuning, when he is satisfied we will know what settings work.

This was an enjoyable install for me, now that I know what is involved I would gladly do it again.

[Pezzz]

I was thinking if we wrapped the loop cable once around the shaft that the throttle return spring is on then we could shorten that bracket you made. At present I have cable tied the bracket to the air cleaner to stop movement.

[kappy5003]

Hi guys,

I spotted the same set up on ebay and came on to ask questions and found this post.

So all in all is this set up any good, and is it difficult to set up.

the price seems reasonable http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Rostra-250-1223-Universal-Cruise-Control-Kit-with-250-3593-Dash-Mount-Control/260987064062?_trksid=p2045573.c100033.m2042&_trkparms=aid%3D111001%26algo%3DREC.SEED%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D29393%26meid%3D62cf122ac9ac4875bab7084222bbfe5b%26pid%3D100033%26rk%3D4%26rkt%3D4%26mehot%3Dag%26sd%3D191468441824
compared to Mccruise close to a RIO.

[Pezzz]

Yep. Works good. That was the controller i showed you in my bike at Jarrahdale. Pics show all the parts. Yorkie is full bottle on it . :-)