Your RDC control unit can save 2 wheel sets, identified as “Set A” and “Set B”. The RDC control unit will accept data from any of these four sensors. Generally only Set A is used and when there are no Sensor ID’s assigned to a set it will read: “Current ID: Not set”, as shown in the screenshot below.
Learning a new Sensor ID is easy. Select the wheel (front/rear) and wheel set (A/B). The GS-911 application will then ask you to wake the NEW sensor (that is supposed to be in the wheel by now). The software will wait for the sensor ID (sent by the sensor that you just woke)… if it does not receive it, it will time out and let you know.
The RDC wake-up tools tools that BMW uses, are shown below. The one on the left is the older one and the one on the right is the newer/current one as of this writing. The tools have the BMW part number shown on them.Â
The Sensor ID is the unique number through which each sensor is identified. This number can have a maximum of 8 digits (most current ones are shorter as shown in the picture below). The newer replacement sensors seem to have this their Sensor ID on an additional bar code (circled in yellow in the picture below). In the example below, the Sensor ID is : 282353
Naturally not everyone has a BMW RDC Test Tool in their workshop, and thus we have devised some alternatives to learn a sensor.
Option 1: If the new replacement sensor has 2 bar codes (One of which is the Sensor ID)
In this case the one with the shorter number is the Sensor ID. Instead of waking the sensor and learning it, you can assign a Sensor ID to a particular position. Here you would enter the sensor ID number if you wanted to learn it to your motorcycle.
Option 2: use a 3rd party wake-up tool
We have tested several wake-up tools and found the Ateq units to both work and be good value for money. Unfortunately the VT05 is discontinued, hence we could not test it, but we tested the VT15, VT30 and VT55, all of which work on all of the BMW motorcycles models that we have tested on.
The VT15 is the lowest cost option. This only wakes up the sensor and has no form of feedback, while the VT30 and VT55 actually show you the sensor data once it is active. That said, the VT15 worked great for me on all the bikes.
The VT15 only has a start and stop button. We found that the BMW sensors are woken around 10 to 12 seconds after the transmit button was pushed (remember they cycle through a number of wake-up patterns etc, as this is a generic tool)
Cost for such a device should be in the order of US$ 120
read more on Ateq's product page
The MaxiTPMS TS408 is also a popular choice. You can read more about it on their website
Option 3: waking a sensor manually (does not always work!)
As the sensors are still active for a while before going to sleep, your first thought would be to take the bike for a short ride, thus waking the sensors and allowing you to learn a sensor.. This however is NOT THE RIGHT WAY!! This will wake both sensors and when you instruct your RDC unit to learn a specific position, e.g. front wheel, Set A, the control unit will be receiving signals from both active TPM sensors and might not learn the right one, or any for that matter…
THE CORRECT ALTERNATIVE, also known as the “ALERT method” is to let the air out of the wheel rapidly (we simply depress the valve for around 10 seconds)… this rapid fall in pressure wakes the sensor and places it in an Alert mode, where it starts sending its data (which obviously includes its Sensor ID!).
Thus, to summarize, if you do not have a RDC wake-up tool, either enter the new Sensor ID manually (this of course assumes you noted the Sensor ID before refitting the wheel 😉 ), or when the GS-911 application asks you to use the wake-up tool, simply depress the valve of the tire that you want to wake for around 10 seconds, which will in turn wake the sensor in an Alert mode where it then sends its Sensor ID and pressure information.
Newly retrofitted controller
We are aware of an issue where some cluster controllers require a longer reset period and/or some drive time before displaying tyre pressure values after an RDC retrofit. We are investigating this further.
The XRDC works the same as the RDC, except that XRDC only support a single set of tyres and only supports the use of a wake-up tool.Â
Here are some screenshots how to configure it:
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The latest generation of tyre pressure monitoring is controlled by the key-less controller. New sensors are not compatible with older XRDC controllers, and the older sensors are not compatible with new XSLZ03 controllers. Older wake-up tools also appear to only have limited functionality with the new sensors. It is advised to take careful note of sensor IDs before installing if a compatible wake-up tool is not at hand.
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