Wiring harness recall leads to stator failure? *Correction* Leads to rectifier failure?

[Guest Turbeau]

Help! It seems to be way too big of a coincidence for the stator to go out right after getting the wiring harness recall done. Now a simple free recall service has morphed into a $300+ electrical problem.

Brief disclaimer: Yes, I am a newbe and this is my first post. I have done a little bit of searching but I have not come across a direct link to my situation. If this issue has been written to death already, please point me in the right direction. I am in the middle of finals at the moment, so my free time for research is extremely limited and if I can help it, I want to provide evidence that it was in fact the dealers fault and I shouldn’t be held responsible.

The story: I have an 02 VFR800 with 30,000 miles. I am the second owner and the only thing I have had to change thus far is the battery, and that was in 09’. This past Friday the 3rd, I finally took my bike in to get the wiring harness recall done on my bike. Up to this point, the bike has had zero electrical issues. The day I get it back, I took it straight home (about 4 miles) with no issues. The next day, I leave for a ride and 5 miles into it the gauges go dim and shortly after the bike starts to stutter and then completely dies. So obviously this is a recharging issue right… I took it back to the dealer, and they totally excepted blame and were way cool about it. The dismissed it as “some wire must have come loose, and we will have you up and running later today”. Well later today comes around and I get a call. They are now telling me that my stator is dead and I need to get a new one. They went further on to say that they had called up “someone at Honda” and tried to find a connection between the harness fix and the stator going out and were unable to find a connection. The dealer was very sympathetic with me and said they would help me out with cost as much as possible, which is great in all… But… The timing of this happening! Am I that unlucky?

So my question is, Is this really just a coincidence or this there actually a connection here? Could they have done something to cause the stator to fail?

Any help here would be greatly appreciated.

[spud786]

I dont know if your that unlucky, but not much you can do I guess.

Here's the thing, the 02 model had a no longer used flywheel and stator, ugraded in 2003. What you have on that bike is important, as in having the full 2003 upgrade that included a flywheel and different stator. Thats also a paid recall

I kind of think, you may have the original 2002 stator and flywheel, which means you need the full upgrade kit, its important to find out, as you need that upgrade.

[Guest Turbeau]

To give an update, turns out there was a bit of a miscommunication somewhere and it was actually the rectifier that went out, not the stator. I haven’t come across a connection between what they could have possibly done and the rectifier dying so I guess it really could have been a coincidence…