Approaching Rhayadar’s clocktower in mid-Wales after shaking off another heavy downpour, my Tero X 5.0’s display reset itself and then the ‘Down’ button took several presses to reach Eco. Next day it did not work at all. There were no error codes on the display and all other switches on the remote worked fine.
I presumed this was the consequence of nearly a week’s riding in daily rain but you’d think these controls are made for such conditions. It’s not like I dropped it in a ford and left it there while I checked my socials. These assist level buttons get used a lot, but the way the down button played up, then died altogether suggested it wasn’t a broken wire, but creeping moisture, perhaps seeping in from the housing’s top joins (below).
I’ve been expecting some sort of electrical fault on the Tero, and assumed it would be the display freezing. The bike has done about 900km.
When you switch the system on the Tero automatically fires up in Trail (middle) mode with lights on. You wonder if they’ve designed it that way to get you home in case the remote rocker switch packs up. So the following day I enjoyed the last 45km from Rhayader to the car at Knighton with greater than normal levels of boost, all aided by the same stiff westerly which had caused me to ditch a couple of into-the-wind moorland stages in recent days. After a while I realised that, had I really needed to stretch the battery range, I could just switch off at the display. In fact, I think even in whatever Assist mode, freewheeling down hill will consume less battery power than having the lights on. All I’d lost was the daily/factory reset functions and access to Eco and Standby/Off modes.
Sadly, not the left one for only £56, but the right ‘bundle’ for five times that ;-(
Back home I pointed a hair dryer at the remote with no improvement so wondered if the contact inside could be repaired. I found this old Levo page but it looked complicated. A replacement Wired Trail Remote 2 p/n S216800019 was only £56! But had I looked more closely, I’d have noticed the fat connector is way different. What I needed was an ELE TCD-W 2 Wired Display with Remote (p/n S216800041; above right) for a cool £240. All because one switch was dead.
Fitting the new one looked relatively simple, but being effectively a new ‘speedo’, it requires pairing with the system which has to be done at a Specialized dealer with a five-day turn around and another £80 with a new chain.
I went on to Wales straight after but once back plan to seal the new unit’s joins with silicone. A micro-soldering electronics pal has offered to try and fix the original.
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