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Maintenance Poll


jemery12

Maintenance Poll  

32 members have voted

  1. 1. How many miles do you ride between oil changes?

    • <1500
      0
    • 1500-3000
      2
    • 3000-4500
      13
    • 4500-6000
      10
    • >6000
      4
    • I change it based on time, not miles.
      3
  2. 2. How many miles do you ride between lubing/adjusting the chain?

    • <100
      0
    • 100-300
      4
    • 300-500
      14
    • 500-800
      8
    • 800-1000
      1
    • I lube/adjust it based on time, not miles.
      5
  3. 3. How much of you maintenance do you do yourself? (Multiple choice)

    • Fluids
      31
    • Brakes
      30
    • Wheels/Tires
      19
    • Engine/Transmission
      21
    • Lights
      29
    • Electical
      29
    • I don't do any of my own maintenance.
      1


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I do mine as needed, except the interval stuff like valve checks and such.
Likewise. Always slightly bettering the manual, for example shorter intervals either in time or space. 6-10,000 Km oil changes instead of 12,000. Filter cleaned every time instead of every second oil change (used a washable reusable filter with magnetic trap, and also magnetic sump plug). Washable K&N air filter so easily revamped ahead of standard intervals.

Coolant, brake and fork fluids every year usually. CBS got bothersome so I did have that done a few times.

I never did have the valves checked though. Naughty me. Neither on the 5th nor the 6th gen.
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I do all my own work. I have to.

 

Not many local MC shops in my area and the nearest proper Honda dealer is a 200 mile RT.

 

None of them want to see any of my first gens or early VFR's anyway as Honda no longer supports parts for them.

 

Stopped at a dealer here in Maine a few years back on my VF1000R to look at a Scooter for my daughter. The mechanics all came out to have a look at the bike as none had ever seen one before.

 

 

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I do all of the easy stuff myself. Complicated stuff (for me) like suspension, tire installation, valve checks (few and far between, most recent first check at 56,006 all in spec). And I do not do engine work. However, in ~ 200,0000 mi of fifth gen ownership, over four machines, including my first one KIA @ 105,000 miles, no engine has ever needed any internal work. That's Honda engine engineering brilliance.

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While I do bring a wheel to a place to have a tire mounted, I do everything else myself. Always have been the wrenching geek foole. 

I dont trust any dealer to even tighten a license plate bolt.  :cool:

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I do almost all my own work. I take my tires out to have them mounted and balanced. In the off season this year I installed front and rear suspension from DMr and installed a Mosfet RR from Roadstercycle with new wiring. I change my own fluids. I have even had a try at minor repairs to the plastics. Fortunately those repairs can't bee seen, but so far they work.

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Same here - I do 100% including mounting and balancing tires - just finished doing a set.   I enjoy wrenching -  started on my Suzuki 90 when I was 14 and never stopped.   

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I do everything except tyres. 

Did my first engine rebuild on my mum’s Austin 1800 when I was 14, worked well even though I had a container full of left over bits and pieces. Obviously over engineered. 

Dont trust anyone else to work on my bike. 

 

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I do all my own work on brakes (fluid, seals, pads, hoses), forks (damper rebuilds, springs and oil), the cooling system (coolant, hoses, thermostat), chassis/wheel/suspension bearings, valve clearances, carb or starter synchs, carb disassembly and cleaning, chain and sprocket replacement, timing belt replacement, and manual camchain adjustment. I have removed and replaced an engine once as well. 

Tyres and wheel balancing I leave to a man with a machine. I'd love to learn how to spray paint bodywork one day as well. 

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I pretty much do everything I’m able to handle in the garage space and tools I have available. Sometimes I’ll go out and buy the tool(s) just so I can do it myself. I grew up taking things apart and putting them back together, got into engines right about high school. I had a job at an off-road shop mounting ATV tires and doing top end tear down and rebuilds on two stroke motors while I was attending motorcycle mechanics at the occupational center. 

 

When I did some desert racing, I was responsible for doing all the work on my ATC, that went for top ends, crank cases, suspension, carburetor, the whole lot. Not much has changed but luckily I haven’t had the need to split any crank cases (knock on wood) and now that I have a tire changer and wheel balancer, I seem to be the go to guy when friends need tire changes.

 

So far other than the actual rebuilding of the rear shocks, I’ve been able to do all of the mods on both my VFRs, probably why I have a huge attachment to both of them.

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12 hours ago, mello dude said:

While I do bring a wheel to a place to have a tire mounted, I do everything else myself. Always have been the wrenching geek foole. 

I dont trust any dealer to even tighten a license plate bolt.  :cool:

I completely agree. Just took apart my new bike to find an electrical bug, and the PO had previously installed a radar detector. The wiring was absolutely shit (not the cause of my bug, but it was terrible). I texted the PO to ask who did it, and it was the dealership. Needless to say I removed it. I don't know how you work on bikes for a living and can't do decent wiring, or put all the bolts, and parts back where they came from.

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12 hours ago, mello dude said:

I dont trust any dealer to even tighten a license plate bolt.  :cool:

 

With you here Mello.

Had four VFR's from new, only ever had one shop service on a brand new bike, they overfilled the oil and my chain was tight as a banjo string. Had a harness recall on my 2004, got the bike home and noticed all my inner fairing clips were missing!

Pre delivery on my latest 8gen, not good, loose battery terminals and warm Idle Speed set at approx 2000rpm, storage straps under seat missing.

No doubt there are many a good motorcycle mechanic around, but when its based on a time and money factor, rushed jobs are often Bad jobs.

The thought of anybody frigging with my pride and joy makes me cringe! 

Do it all myself.

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I think it's a case of not many mechanics left that know our bikes (as far  the 5G/6G).

Every bike is different, and the current version is not exactly selling like hot cakes.

But the whole time is money thing is something that is accross all industries.

To do something properly cost more than most people are willing to pay I'm afraid.

In my job I'm often asked to match the lowest quote, I always tell them "so you want me to do a professional job for the price of a backyard hack?"

I'm expensive, but you get what you pay for.

There are some bike shops that are good, but none of them are cheap.

There is a lot of bike shops, most of them are not that good.

 

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Although I would normally have done this myself, the insurance company and my vacation kind of dictated that I drop off the bike at a Honda dealer to have it repaired after someone knocked over my 6 Gen in a parking lot. I probably could have argued with the insurance company about it but since vacation was higher on my list, I just dropped the bike off and had the dealer make the repairs. Pretty simple, replace the front cowl, front sub frame, left side panel and right side mirror, nothing too complicated, right?

 

Well work was done while I was enjoying my vacation, bike was ready before i came back, went to pick up the bike, click the starter and it wouldn’t start. Hand the bike back over, they bring it back into the garage and try to figure it out. The first question out of my mouth was, “They did test ride it, correct?” “Oh yeah, it’s probably something simple” About 15 minutes later they came out of the garage and said they’d have to keep it overnight as they couldn’t figure it out and it was right about closing time. Of course I get grilled as to when the last time it was ridden, how was it running, etc. I told them that I’d been riding it since it was knocked over (which was a couple of weeks) and even rode it to the shop and all that was wrong was cosmetic damage and a slightly bent front sub frame. 

 

So I get a call the next morning and they say they got it running, it was a loose ECU connector on the harness. Go figure huh?

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8 hours ago, VFROZ said:

I think it's a case of not many mechanics left that know our bikes (as far  the 5G/6G).

Every bike is different, and the current version is not exactly selling like hot cakes.

But the whole time is money thing is something that is accross all industries.

To do something properly cost more than most people are willing to pay I'm afraid.

In my job I'm often asked to match the lowest quote, I always tell them "so you want me to do a professional job for the price of a backyard hack?"

I'm expensive, but you get what you pay for.

There are some bike shops that are good, but none of them are cheap.

There is a lot of bike shops, most of them are not that good.

 

Agreed. Bike shops can be pretty bad but they are under tremendous cost pressure, which, among other things, leads to them hiring very cheap labor.

 

A dealer near me prints the following at the bottom of every service receipt:

 

"Fast. Cheap. Done Right.  Pick Two."

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5 hours ago, St. Stephen said:

 

"Fast. Cheap. Done Right.  Pick Two."

 

I'm surprised that they give you two choices . . . ! 

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My local dealer, Honda Town in Minneapolis, is a family-run affair; mom & dad and dirt racing-bred  sons. I remember buying my first helmets from them in 1969. They have been really great to deal with, giving me special consideration. They also have a mechanic who used to own a VFR750. That is until he became older and switched to a couple (his & her's) Audi TTs. So they have me covered. I'm really fortunate to have this dealer. Highly recommended.

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