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KIPASS and the C14 end of the line

U

ursharkfuel

God got one thing wrong: Stupid should be PAINFUL!
Member
Since Kawasaki has decided to end our beloved C-14, now may be a great time to invest in a back up or two while you can get them and there are still dealers out there that understand the system. Now that the sunset is upon the C-14 the dealer KIPASS tribal knowledge will dry up faster than you will believe. So now is the time to "get it while you can." That is, unless you like saying things like "I really which I got one when I had the chance."

Now if you don't plan on keeping your C-14, I can't imagine what kind of brain fart would induce such a move, but in that case all bets are off. Don't sweat the KIPASS.

But hey, what do I know?!? I just had someone PM me a professional question about computer data recovery. And I have to marvel about how little folks think about safeguards like insurance, data backups, and so on until the actual need them! A day late and many dollars short. Please don't be that guy that does nothing about your KIPASS until they accident happens and your current one gets takin out of the picture.
 
ursharkfuel said:
Since Kawasaki has decided to end our beloved C-14, now may be a great time to invest in a back up or two while you can get them and there are still dealers out there that understand the system. Now that the sunset is upon the C-14 the dealer KIPASS tribal knowledge will dry up faster than you will believe. So now is the time to "get it while you can." That is, unless you like saying things like "I really which I got one when I had the chance."

Now if you don't plan on keeping your C-14, I can't imagine what kind of brain fart would induce such a move, but in that case all bets are off. Don't sweat the KIPASS.

But hey, what do I know?!? I just had someone PM me a professional question about computer data recovery. And I have to marvel about how little folks think about safeguards like insurance, data backups, and so on until the actual need them! A day late and many dollars short. Please don't be that guy that does nothing about your KIPASS until they accident happens and your current one gets takin out of the picture.
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There's a guy that clones the immobilizer chip. I got 3 for under a hundred bucks. I also picked up a kds last year. I think I 'm set.😎
 
Ha..... I got 3 extras for each bike. My 2013 is now my commuter and I scored a 2018 with 2100 miles to set up for trips. If I see another C14 and feel compelled I have no qualms about picking up a really good deal. Unfortunately, the miles keep rolling. 90K on tjhe 13 and in 18 months the 2018 now has 24K.

He does a really good job on the clones. Out and back in about 3 days Gave me a break on 3 for each bike.

COntact is

harleyguy1998 @ charter.net​

Great guy to work with.
 
In 2011 when I bought this bike, I was reading this Forum but was not a member; I saw the problems involved with a missing FOB

So I ordered an extra one, at time of purchase 10% off and very happy did, I still have both, but at times I've misplaced .

And they wash well. in the laundry;)
 
I am a newer owner. I only have one KIPASS and Key. What is the best way to get an additional active KPASS and Key? Hopefully without breaking the bank. I also saw some people discussing backup RFID chips that you can touch to the
 
ilindy+c146274 said:
I am a newer owner. I only have one KIPASS and Key. What is the best way to get an additional active KPASS and Key? Hopefully without breaking the bank. I also saw some people discussing backup RFID chips that you can touch to the
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See post #7 Get ya some.
 
ursharkfuel said:
Since Kawasaki has decided to end our beloved C-14, now may be a great time to invest in a back up or two while you can get them and there are still dealers out there that understand the system.
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What exactly are you suggesting folks buy?

Another active FOB ($350), an entire KIPASS ECU with Active FOB ($950) or just a spare Passive FOB ($45) ???
 
Fred H. said:
What exactly are you suggesting folks buy?

Another active FOB ($350), an entire KIPASS ECU with Active FOB ($950) or just a spare Passive FOB ($45) ???
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There's a fellow who is cloning passive fobs, iirc 3 for 90.00 shipped. I have no business affiliation, but this is the least expensive method to insure you are never locked out of the bike. No expensive immobilizers or kds operated by an ignorant dealer involved. Freebird included his contact in his post.

Steve
 
Please verify that I am understanding this correctly. To get a back up Active Fob, I have to buy one a Kawasaki one for around $339. To get a passive backup I can order one from the guy in Post #7 for $90, or get a Ford Pickup key and see if I can find someone local to program it.

Can the guy in Post #7 program an Active Fob?
 
ilindy+c146274 said:
Please verify that I am understanding this correctly. To get a back up Active Fob, I have to buy one a Kawasaki one for around $339. To get a passive backup I can order one from the guy in Post #7 for $90, or get a Ford Pickup key and see if I can find someone local to program it.

Can the guy in Post #7 program an Active Fob?
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ilindy+c146274 said:
Please verify that I am understanding this correctly. To get a back up Active Fob, I have to buy one a Kawasaki one for around $339. To get a passive backup I can order one from the guy in Post #7 for $90, or get a Ford Pickup key and see if I can find someone local to program it.

Can the guy in Post #7 program an Active Fob?
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1) if you buy a fob, you'll need to have it programmed at the dealer or someone with a kds If you buy a kawasaki immobilizer (the credit card fob) it will also have to be programmed at the dealer or someone with a kds. The link in Freebird6's post to Harleyguy98 will get you 3 immobilizer chips cloned, and you won't need to find anyone to program them, they'll be ready to use when you get them. Harleyguy98 is not programming fobs. that requires the presence of the bike, the fob, and a KDS programmer.

Here's a video I did before cloning was available. it still explains the difference between active and passive immobilizers.

Steve
 
Steve in sunny Fla said:
1) if you buy a fob, you'll need to have it programmed at the dealer or someone with a kds If you buy a kawasaki immobilizer (the credit card fob) it will also have to be programmed at the dealer or someone with a kds. The link in Freebird6's post to Harleyguy98 will get you 3 immobilizer chips cloned, and you won't need to find anyone to program them, they'll be ready to use when you get them. Harleyguy98 is not programming fobs. that requires the presence of the bike, the fob, and a KDS programmer.

Here's a video I did before cloning was available. it still explains the difference between active and passive immobilizers.

Steve
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Thank you for the clarification Steve! Now to find a dealer who can do the KIPASS without messing something up!
 
ilindy+c146274 said:
Sorry, I need to get a second Active Key Fob.
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Only buy a fob that has its registration number. Take all your fobs and all your passive immobilizers to the dealer when you go. Fobs are only registered one time, but each time you add an immobilizer you have to key in all the passive immobilizers. So when you add the new fobs passive immobilizer, you’ll also have to redo the passive immobilizer in your old fob. Clear as mud?
 
I added some cloned chips to my collection and put 1 in each index finger of my right glove on my summer gloves. Gloves are always on the bike, comes in handy when ur doing maintenance and don't wanna go back thru the house to get the active fob.
 
Bud said:
Why? If you have money burning a hole in your pocket, we can find more enjoyable things to spend that money on. Just trying to be helpful.😉
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Who knows how long the KIPASS will be around. I know it is available on other models. I have owned cars, such as the Pontiac G8, which within a year of going out of production certain parts became nearly impossible to get. With the Active Fobs, there is also the getting them programmed to your bike by the dealer. As someone else mentioned, the knowledge base on how to do this can be lost quickly. My bike is a 2015, in 3 more years dealers will not want to work on my bike anymore.
 
I can clone existing passive key card fobs, or the PASSIVE chip in your other FOB for folks if you want a back up. This will give you another working PASSIVE FOB in the event that you loose yours. No programming to the bike will be necessary.

I'm not able to clone the active FOB. And I also can't clone your entire motorcycle, unfortunately.

Contact me if you're interested.
 
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By the way, this is a photo of what the PASSIVE FOB looks like that I can clone. It should have come with the bike when new and is a thin card like piece of plastic with no battery in it.

You can test it by holding it against the top of the ignition switch and pushing down on the key knob WITHOUT the active FOB present. If it works I can clone it.

IMG_6051.jpg
 
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Just to add some clarity, to clone the passive fob I'm guessing that we would have to send our current passive fob to the cloner? So those with only 1 fob would be taking the risk of sending it through the mail?
 
Yes, if you only have ONE FOB, I would NOT mail it. It should be only cloned in person or on-site, I wouldn't want to risk mailing it. I've mailed a lot of stuff and never had a problem, but I don't think I'd risk it if it is your only one.

Here's a look at my cloned passive FOB, same size and shape as original.

IMG_6053.jpg
 
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I've known about it for several years, just never really invested any time or money in being able to make clones. After seeing this thread and doing some more research into it, I became interested in it, and wanted to see if I could do it myself. I'm not looking to make money, I'd just like to be able to pay for the equipment.

I also have a KDS and I'd be happy to program new FOBs to a bike for free for anyone that needs it, but that would require them to bring the bike to me, which isn't as easy as mailing me a passive FOB.

Oh, and by the way, I also have had the ability to reflash ECUs as well as my own "tune" for about 15 years now. I can also test and repair TPMS sensors too. My background is electrical engineering and I have a heavy mechanical background as well, so I'm always interested in this type of stuff.

I do valve adjustments too. Just finished another one yesterday. I haven't been counting, but I've done well over 50 of them now.

And just for the record, I've been a member of COG for 28 years now, have served as an AD, AAD, Tech Editor, hosted a National and countless rallies, and have volunteed for other positions, as well as being an Industry Vendor for I don't know how many years. I also rebuilt this very forum on a new platform with new software for COG.
 
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In deference to the guy who is offering this service already, I'm only going to make enough of these to pay for the equipment I bought. After that, I'm out, but I'll still be able to do it as a back up for the Club in case he stops doing it.
 
You, the Man Fred

You just need to move to Cool Florida,

I gave up begging Steve to do work since his health went downhill,

I believe in specialization, and for work on these bikes, you are the best.

Thanks for your devotion,

So after so many valve jobs, have you ever found one way out?

I was told mine were all in specs, I find that hard to believe, 35,000 miles
 
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So Fred, how did you learn about making these:unsure:

I don't remember you or anyone ever talking about you doing a flash.

Back in 2012, I had a Gule flash the only person doing them from my memory.

Then everyone was talking up Steve's

I held back about a year from when Steve started, not really wanting to spend my money again

and for how much of a gain ? But I was very happy afterward

Steve also did a reflash 8 months ago to his newest version.

and I went to the COG-sponsored sport-turning school at Jennings GP

The bike has never run as well,
 
cuda said:
So Fred, how did you learn about making these:unsure:

I don't remember you or anyone ever talking about you doing a flash.

Back in 2012, I had a Gule flash the only person doing them from my memory.
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Cuda,

I was the one who originally worked with Don Guhl many years ago in developing the first reflash for the Concours. Don and I spent nearly two years cracking the ECU and reprogramming it. It's been so long ago, I've forgotten exact dates, but I think we started around 2009 or so. I've intentionally not advertised my ability to reflash ECUs on here because I didn't want to get into all the hate, discontent, and downright stupidity the "flash wars" have brought to this forum.
cuda said:
So after so many valve jobs, have you ever found one way out?
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Typically I'll find the exhaust valves get tighter than the intakes do, because of the heat on them. The bike I did yesterday almost every exhaust valve was at .006 inches, which is about 3 thousandths too tight. If they get down below about 4 or 5 thousandths you run the risk of burning a valve. I have yet to find a single bike that had every valve "in-spec".
 
Guhl, yes the local performance shop here sent my unit to him, If I remember right you had a power commander or something like it to build a program?

With Steve's new flash, it is not just more powerful but an all-around smoother, during hard downshifts no more music from the exhaust, sorry Steve I kind of missed it;) I use the 2008 ZX 14 headers/Two Brothers cans

At Jennings GP I tried to make a few laps at 100 % and I was scaring myself, hitting valve float at end of long straight so I was in the 130 range, they make us tape over our tack and speedo, so I'm guessing,
 
cuda said:
Guhl, yes the local performance shop here sent my unit to him, If I remember right you had a power commander or something like it to build a program?

With Steve's new flash, it is not just more powerful but an all-around smoother, during hard downshifts no more music from the exhaust, sorry Steve I kind of missed it;) I use the 2008 ZX 14 headers/Two Brothers cans

At Jennings GP I tried to make a few laps at 100 % and I was scaring myself, hitting valve float at end of long straight so I was in the 130 range, they make us tape over our tack and speedo, so I'm guessing,
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I rode some serious downhills yesterday, and still got plenty of "burble" off throttle. I love it! I was actually a little nervous that I would lose that based on Steve's website.
 
Fred H. said:
I was the one who originally worked with Don Guhl many years ago in developing the first reflash for the Concours. Don and I spent nearly two years cracking the ECU and reprogramming it. It's been so long ago, I've forgotten exact dates, but I think we started around 2009 or so. I've intentionally not advertised my ability to reflash ECUs on here because I didn't want to get into all the hate, discontent, and downright stupidity the "flash wars" have brought to this forum.
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Fred:
Several years ago, in attempt to lower my flashing costs, I began researching alternative programmers. I was led to a website that had the original ECU crackers discussing how to reverse engineer the ECU's. I learned about the Piazini programmer and actually bought a clone that didn't work at all. I reached out to a man who iirc posted on that programmers page as "Ridgeracer" (actual name Marlin) who lived in Washington state. He claimed to be the first in the US to have cracked an ECU, a zx12 iirc. In a conversation with him, He told me that he was Don Guhl's partner; that he cracked the ecu's and made them wrteable, and that Don, as the tuner, was responsible for doing the tune. He also told me that the Guhl company (him and Don) was the only to have the ability to reprogram a tune into the ECU. He also told me they were working on a commercial programmer to sell, much like the woolich programming hardware.

At the time, Guhl, was flashing for several well known tuners, including Brock. Brock actually made a video on you tube that Don was in, talking about this soon to be available flashing hardware. I contacted Don and spoke with him. He told me that the project was not going to come to fruition. In reading the flashing website, I could see that Ridgeracer had moved into the ski-do community and away from motorcycles. I actually have no idea what happened there, but as we know Don stopped flashing for all the tuners and doing his own flashes.

The fact that none of the well known tuners actually had the hardware to do thier own flashing and actually had to send the eCU's to Guhl for flashing would lead me to believe that nobody but Guhl actually had the ability to read and write a new flash to the ECU.

If I understand the nexus here, Remembering you posting about tuning with a power commander and remembering a post from Murph in which he said he provided the first C-14 ECU to Don Guhl (iirc correctly) it would seem to me that this was the historical sequence of how c-14's were flashed: 1) ridgeracer cracks the ECU, and provided the maps and hardware to Don; 2) Don flashed the c-14 ECU with the secondary throttle maps opening very early, based on Brock's work with the zx14 from 2006; 3) Don then provided the flashed ECU for you to run with a Power Commander to correct fueling; 4) when you were done, you provided the power commander settings and the ECU back to Don, who then flashed the settings in. This may have taken a couple or more flashes to get the fueling corrected to your standards. I'm sure the fueling was done with a power commander because there's no IAP changes on Don's flash, and as we know, the PC's only screw up IAP fueling, so it was left stock.

Do I have this sequence correct? Or have you actually been in possession of programming hardware since you started that project?

Either way, thank you for your many contributions to the improvement of the C14, and to the COG community.

LINK to the Brock - Guhl video

LINK to Ridgeracer duscussing cracking a zx12 in 2006 http://bikeland.org/board/viewthread.php?FID=1&TID=23797

Steve
 
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ilindy+c146274 said:
I rode some serious downhills yesterday, and still got plenty of "burble" off throttle. I love it! I was actually a little nervous that I would lose that based on Steve's website.
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It's crazy how many different maps. Steve has made, I told Steve I don't care about fuel mileage, so he did add fuel To the mountain runner flash upon my request.

But the exhaust downshift talking is gone, and I miss that sweetness:cry:.

But she is stronger than ever, I was hoping to run with other C 14s around the track at Jennings GP Cog sponsored event, to compare but heavy, heavy rain covered two days, and on the website, It said rain or shine, so I called the office and asked about moving our group to Sunday and they said OK, I posted it, but no one from our group showed, except the member and his wife that puts it all together,
 
Fred H. said:
Yes, if you only have ONE FOB, I would NOT mail it. It should be only cloned in person or on-site, I wouldn't want to risk mailing it. I've mailed a lot of stuff and never had a problem, but I don't think I'd risk it if it is your only one.

Here's a look at my cloned passive FOB, same size and shape as original.

View attachment 36541
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Fred, so just a follow up to my previous question, a good locksmith could clone the passive chip in the active fob also? Can a locksmith do the Kawi passive fob? I recently traded my 08 for a low mileage 17 and of course the dealer only had the one active fob. I'd rather just drop by a local locksmith than wait around for the service department on a Saturday at the large dealer. Thanks!
 
The passive chip in the Large FOB, and the one in the Small (key card) FOB both work the same way. Remember, the Large Active FOB with the battery in it, also has a PASSIVE chip in the top of it as a back up in case the battery in it dies.

The ACTIVE portion of the Large FOB can not easily be cloned, so if you're looking to use your spare ACTIVE FOB with the bike, you'd need access to a KDS3 as well as the CODE that came with the FOB originally.

You may be able to find a locksmith that can clone your PASSIVE FOB, and/or the Passive Chip in the Active FOB. I don't know where you live, but the last time I tried to find a real locksmith I had a hard time locating one. They seem to have gone the way of the dinosaur.
 
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Thanks Fred.

Yeah I was thinking of seeing if a locksmith could clone the passive chip in the active fob. Looks to be a couple of decent locksmiths in the area, so I may try that first. Maybe the Ace hardware store too.
 
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