Main Dealer Servicing

Cant say I m impressed with the so called experts looking after my bike. I've just bought a 4 & 1/2 year old bike with Full Main Dealer service history. There is 4 stamps in the book by 3 different dealers.

The bike was last serviced 110 mile before I collected it. A quick look round the bike on Saturday morning and I found the following.

No evidence of a coolant change (all invoice's are very detailed with a schedule of works completed) despite it needing doing every 3 years irrelevant mileage.

Bald front brake pads. Listed as checked on the invoice only 110 miles earlier.

Blade wrote:Cant say I m impressed with the so called experts looking after my bike. I've just bought a 4 & 1/2 year old bike with Full Main Dealer service history. There is 4 stamps in the book by 3 different dealers.

The bike was last serviced 110 mile before I collected it. A quick look round the bike on Saturday morning and I found the following.

No evidence of a coolant change (all invoice's are very detailed with a schedule of works completed) despite it needing doing every 3 years irrelevant mileage.

Bald front brake pads. Listed as checked on the invoice only 110 miles earlier.

Cable clutch loose and needed 30 seconds of labour to adjust. Actually carried out on the M6 on the way home

I wonder how many people are out there, that trust their servicing to Dealers are being let down?

agreed. Do it yourself. Or learn. Save a fortune and know it's done properly. It's not hard at all.. depends if your goal is a stamp in the book. Personally I gave up on log book stamps after a 2nd service on a new bike about 11 years ago. And learnt what to do over time since.. valve checks still a garage.. but A trusted mechanic you know..

Valve clearances aren't as difficult as you might think R1ckster, if you follow a procedure with plenty of decent photographs, work methodically and triple check everything you do.

If your happy and competent at home servicing and can change spark plugs, it might be worth trying the clearance check yourself, as only really that with the addition of removing the rocker cover to check clearances. Admittedly changing shims if adjustment is required needs a little more skill but the actually clearance check is quite easy.

You can be sure that if you mention the name of a dealer someone will pipe up with "I had a bad experience there". Sadly mechanics are human like everyone else and the can miss things.

Then there are the dealers who don't give a shit. Action Motorcycles in Redditch were horrendous. I went to war with them when they overfilled my Daytona 600. The mechanic swore blind that it wasn't overfilled and that a seal popping (the day after a service) was just "one of those things". When he collected the bike I showed him that that bike was still over the sight glass despite the rear of the bike being covered in oil.

I suspect your seller may have asked the last dealer to just do a quick job so he could say it had been serviced for the sale.

You can be sure that if you mention the name of a dealer someone will pipe up with "I had a bad experience there". Sadly mechanics are human like everyone else and the can miss things.

Then there are the dealers who don't give a shit. Action Motorcycles in Redditch were horrendous. I went to war with them when they overfilled my Daytona 600. The mechanic swore blind that it wasn't overfilled and that a seal popping (the day after a service) was just "one of those things". When he collected the bike I showed him that that bike was still over the sight glass despite the rear of the bike being covered in oil.

I suspect your seller may have asked the last dealer to just do a quick job so he could say it had been serviced for the sale.

Not sure he did tbh, as the invoice for the last service specifically had notes from the customer asking for Brake and Head Bearing checks as additional work to the routine service and checking for seized brake pistons was part of the standard service work scope.

A full service was carried out with a detailed report and schedule of work also.

I have had a bad experience with a Honda dealer on recall work before also. As far as I can see it's quote common, well is so in my experience.

That said I did use the Ducati main dealer with no issues and although I prefer to home service I decided to use the main dealer to protect residual value as FMDSH is expected with a used Ducati. Brand snobbery I agree and I would prefer to home service but customers (wrongly imo) expect a FMDSH with Ducati

I try and find one I can trust now before I even consider if it’s a bike I want.

Staffs Triumph were brilliant, as have been JHP and Cornerspeed for Ducati.

I think the Ducati expectations relate back to the older bikes which needed someone with the knowledge and experience to know what to look for and what can go wrong.

Problem is now that you need an expensive diagnostic machine to not only reset service lights but also to read all the data on the bike or car. We also come back to the issue of a warranty is voided on a bike if it doesn’t have a dealer service history on the correct schedules.

You can be sure that if you mention the name of a dealer someone will pipe up with "I had a bad experience there". Sadly mechanics are human like everyone else and the can miss things.

Then there are the dealers who don't give a shit. Action Motorcycles in Redditch were horrendous. I went to war with them when they overfilled my Daytona 600. The mechanic swore blind that it wasn't overfilled and that a seal popping (the day after a service) was just "one of those things". When he collected the bike I showed him that that bike was still over the sight glass despite the rear of the bike being covered in oil.

I suspect your seller may have asked the last dealer to just do a quick job so he could say it had been serviced for the sale.

Shocking but tbh I'm not surprised either as so many people accept sloppy standards the technicians deliver sloppy work as they can get away with it. Not saying you do, just a general comment

My boss always says "The standard you accept is the standard you will receive" and it's so true.

No excuse for over filling imo. It takes less than a minute to decant the waste oil from the drip tray into a calibrated jug or old oil container (easier disposal too) and then you know exactly how much came out and can put sightly less back in knowing you can then top up in a controlled manner to the correct level exactly. Simple as that, not rocket surgery or brain science at the end of the day

My MT only went to the dealer for one service and they rounded the head on one engine mounting bolt while leaving another loose, used the cheapest oil they had in stock (Yamaha specify fully synthetic for the CP4 engines) and almost everyone that I have spoken to who has used them for servicing has a horror story.It went to a local independent after that who did top work for less money, even when I added the £20 oil upgrade (Motul 300V).

I might try the local-ish KTM dealer for the SDGT, they seem reasonable on price and very passionate about the bikes which is usually a good sign.

KTM seem to be pretty good, my local dealer (premier bikes) has been about for ages and they are all proper bikers. Helped me out a couple of times by squeezing me in the workshop when really busy. The main one was to fix the oil leak the day before the IOM trip last year.

I can do it myself, but I've got much better things to do with my time.

Sounds like we have all had bad experiences which isn't great to hear as it means it's common place and that good dealers with good technicians are rarer than you think.

The worrying bit is alot of it is done on blind trust as you assume their a main dealer, their bikers, their helpful and thereore must be professional, but if you never check how would you ever know, what has and what hasn't been done.

Sadly you can't even go on reviews as many of them just quote the dealer was helpful, friendly, squeezed me in etc.....not reviewing the actual work technically.

"We understand that some owners may wish to use an independent dealer or carry out the work themselves. However, in the unlikely event an issue arises with a machine, Kawasaki cannot accept responsibility or cover the repair under warranty if incorrect or incomplete maintenance work is found to be the cause, or a contributory factor towards the failure. We would however still cover any failure that is a clear manufacturing defect and is unrelated to any service or maintenance work undertaken."