Service.....

[Mr.Chips]

servicing an x9 is not rocket science

Neither is using a sewing-machine but how many of us make our own clothes or even use one to turn up a pair of trousers, for example?.....and if not, why not?
(Well, I know the answer to the second part; clothes 'dealers' know that people won't/can't so now produce trousers of all waist measurements in all leg lengths)

Once again we are experiencing the constraints of the written word being used as the sole form of communication.
We cannot see facial expression and body language and hear inflection in the voice.
The technique requires much greater thought and care than most writers feel the need to take in what becomes a spontaneous conversation.
Bald, unqualified statements are met with equally bald, unqualified responses.

There are quite a few people on here who have views with which I do not agree. I know for a fact that they don't agree with mine.
However, some of them I know them personally - face to face - and can see beyond the views to the person and they are good friends agreeing to differ (in public, at least).
I am also privy to other information which may affect their approach from having met and seen them 'in the flesh'.
How much easier this makes things.
I doubt I'm alone in attempting to pretend I know those I haven't met and respond on here as if I do.
Of course there are others I haven't met but about whom I feel the same, not least because they seem to respond to me in the same way.

Perhaps we should follow more closely our oft-quoted maxim: there's no such thing as a stupid question; it's only stupid not to ask.

   

P.S. My choice of quotation is not an attack on the writer; it stimulated thoughts on the situation.

[DrChip]

I pay for someone to service my bike and my car and my air conditioner and washing machine and TV and DVD ...

Because servicing them does nothing for me, to do a good job you need to have that little spark that makes you enjoy servicing bit like that...

Give me a computer of any sort.. its what I do and do well and enjoy.. it does get up my nose in people telling what I should or should not do... I'm a big boy and will decide what I do with my time and money...

Anyway I get paid a lot more per hour so using them lets me do my paid work and saves me money...

Mind you not as much as a plumber.. I can only wish to earn that sort of money      I could even buy a Nexus    

[Apex]

Strong views indeed on service charges then.....

Anyway futher to this i have just replaced the rather poor 9aH battey with the one fitted in the 500's and it now starts a lot better and the bike feels compleatly different, all this after the advice i gained from here

How ever a downer to this is that the bike as just past 4200 miles and now i have two gremlins.

At top speed and 10500 rpm the rev needle jumps back to 9000rpm and take forever to get back to 10500, now this doesn't happen all the time and has only just started to happen but never the less it's worrying.

It doesn't seem to be effecting speed, so i don't know if this is just a rev counter issue or theres something else going off.

2ND
The oil warning on the digi dash pops on for 5/10 secs when ever i start the bike up from resting on the side stand, now i not checked the level yet but am guessing that i need to drop a bit of oil in ? thing is should the oil level be checked at a service if so then they havn't done that and they charged be 95 quid for not a lot....


Drew

[joyce]

If the oil light comes on when you switch the X9 on, it is a service reminder - due at 4650 miles. see other thread http://x9.ipbhost.com/index.php?showtopic=11022

[Big Ears]

Apex

Please clarify. Do you mean that the word "OIL" shows in the LCD panel, or the square oil can light above comes on?

[PaulK]

I have no problem paying THE dealer (the ONLY one in Adelaide) to do my X9.  Last bill was about AUD$230. Included tappets and all.  Very happy with the result. As for the money side, I worked this morning for an hour and billed AUD$880. About 60c worth of parts and a bit of electricity.  So, I 'm quite happy to pay when I can more than make up for it in my time.

Howver, that being said, ultimately, I would LIKE to be able to do it myself so that I understand clearly what is going on under me.

PaulK.

[Ashley Elford]

Maybe I can hi-jack this thread?

When I turn on my X9 [BELT] is displayed for the first few seconds, yet my bike was serviced only a few hundred miles ago! Whilst they didn't replace the belt, surely it can't have deteriorated that badly since?

[x9moto]

Ashley, any warnings that are displayed on the digidash in text format ie: oil, belt, and service are preprogrammed warnings like an alarm clock, telling you to inspect it, this means that if it was just serviced then dont worry the dealer just forgot to reset it or the warning was'nt on when he saw it.


 BACK TO THE DEALER ISSUE

i wont speak of JT because i have never been there but there  is a dealer here (NOT THOMAS) that i have been disgusted with, 2 times i took my other bike there before the x9 and it was due for its service and when i got it back they had not changed the oil and the second time they changed the oil and not the filter and left 3 bolts out of the engine, when i had trouble with my x9 they put the claim through and took 3 months to order a bloody switch, one of those little black clips fell out on the mirror the second day i got it they said dont worry we will sort it, has been a year and a half now its still got f*cking tape on it when i had my tyre done they didnt balance it and i am under the impression this is essential to a smooth ride.

i can think of many other occasions too and guess what the whole time i pay'd a premium price for this lousy service my next bike WILL NOT be a PIAGGIO because i have had it up to here with the lousy service on a bike that cost me nearly 5,000 quid so i do it my self now and i figure that i have saved enough to buy another x9 the prices i was paying but i think it will be a honda or suzuki this time, i also considered taking my bike to JT in the early day's, but guess what i practicaly got told to f off because i had modified my own bike on this very forum so no thanks piaggio im going jap from now on.

 LOCAL DEALERS


i have only used AR's a few times for parts but the service was spot on, promt supply of parts they were in new contition unlike my other dealer where you would think i was paying for second hand parts and the prices were ok for the promt service, also i recieved some very usefull advice about the x9 before i was even buying parts from them, so Thanks goes out to AR perhapse some other dealers could learn from you.

[dididowell]

[Derek]

I don't know how you can say that it is a rip off without knowing what was done and I would assume the customer was happy to pay the charge.  

It is not acceptable to post with the intention of causing offence and I feel that you should retract that statement.

[PaulK]

No didi..  What you dont see here is the $100's of thousands of equipment in the workshop (1.2M last count), and for example around $100,00 just in components alone and another $600,000 in whole modules, about years of training and experience, a technical library to die for and the balance of jobs.  Some jobs I lose money and others like this I win. Because the world is run by bean counters, I have to set a fee before they send it. How do you do that in such a volatile service environment?  You take the average time/cost index and set it as your fee per item.

So didi, before you make such a vehement criticism, you were not in command of all the facts and the background.  Like Dave from time to time, we might make a comment that on the surface appears "unrealistic" by your terms. Why should we have to give an essay on background?

I average around $400/hour, but not for 40 hours a week. (I wish). Of that $400, around $300+ goes in fees, expenses and so on. (Check your local dentist for example - same deal, except he can work 40hours/week!).  I don't get to call my work in but my running costs are constant. (Study business management if you need to understand this). Because this stuff is becoming throw away, I'm slowly becoming redundant. and so on and so on.

And by the way, I'm CHEAP.  Nothing I do is ever more than 50% of what Siemens charge (usually significantly less than that) and since they MAKE this stuff, their service costs, diagnostic tools and simulated environemts are a BY PRODUCT of what they do. I have had to set it up without that support. Big difference. They are the rip-offs which is one reason why I have such customers as GeneralMotors, Western Mining, BHP Billiton, (and typically the top 100 companies in Australia).

I also carry the warranty cost for the next 12 months. Most service places will only warranty for 3 months. I always give the customer the benefit of the doubt on warranty even though the odd one has had nothing to do with what the original one was.

So every now and then I make a killing. True. Guilty as charged. What about the three days on a job for $220?  It happens both ways because of the Fixed Price required by the bean counters. One has to take the good with the bad. That just happend to be the best of the best.  In this case it was about 60c in parts, but sometimes just 1 IC can cost $85 or more.  There can be up to 8 of these in one module, rare, bit it happens. so.. I'm a ripoff?

I believe I've made my point and whether you feel that I'm ripping the poor customer off or not, that's the way it is.  

Oh, BTW, I'm not a wealthy man. I -struggle- from time to time as well like most people. I don't get super, no holiday pay, no sick leave, no retirement fund and so on. I live in a shoe box and I live modestly.  My last wife of 14 months took around $400,000 out of the business and I will probably never recover (speaking financially). I actually don't care anymore - there are far more important things in this world than money or wealth.

So you now think, with all those assets I could always sell them and retire very comfortably. Unfortunately that is not possible because nobody else understands this equipment like I do. I am the only individual outside the domestic USA that does this. I can't train someone else to do this - they would buy into a business that works straight away (like a Maccas franchise). So really, I'm stuck with it, like it or not, and when I'm finished, it's all a bin job. I'm being phased out by new throw away technology. (Understand what I just said there.. the implications are deep and wide)

My scoot is my escape.

So, I hope that you now can see things are not always as they seem. (Which actually applies to most things in life).

Does that make you feel better that I made $880 for an hours work? Oh, so far, that's the only job in this week.

Yep, I'm a rip-off.


+++++++EDIT++++++

Oh, I didn't mention my Meniere's Disease. That makes me unemployable by any other means.

I'm not looking for your sympathy, just your understanding.  

I should apologise to you and others for writing that in the first place in such a provocative manner. But anyway, here's the essay. I was so pleased about that job as it paid for my bike to be serviced AND i get to eat!

[Ray Bain]

I have used the 'Preston' dealer for servicing in the past just for the stamp in my service book! It comes to something when it was costing more to service my 250 scoot every year than my 2.7 V6 4X4 (also dealer serviced). The warranty has now expired and I am now servicing the bike myself (including the main stand roller which was always neglected by the main dealer!).

Ray

[dididowell]

Thanks for the explanation PaulK, I only wish I had the time or inclination to read it, unfortunately I am far too busy scratching my arse.

[joyce]

Brian, you are out of order. We do not condone that sort of attitude on this forum.

[dididowell]

I have received a severe reprimand from one of the moderators by PM Joyce.

[joyce]

OK, so now it is time to move forward as friends

[Benelli Boy]

So.  Servicing.

I happily (well, perhaps not happily.  Maybe more "truthfully") admit that I do not understand the workings of my scooter.  This is a drawback, as it costs me money and it also makes me feel a bit daft if anything goes wrong, as I haven't got the first idea where to start.  But, it's where I am.  I do have all sorts of technical knowledge about things that no one in their right minds would like to begin to think about, and that's how I earn my living.

I love my scooter, and I use it as my main form of transport.  It is the thing that enables me to go to work and get decently paid for using my obscure technical knowledge.  It also takes me on great holidays.  These reasons are just the starting points as to why I am happy to take it to a recognised dealer and pay the going rate for work that needs doing (and that includes regular services).

I had an idea of the likely service costs before I bought the bike, and I've always thought of them as unavoidable costs (like insurance, protective clothing, breakdown cover, etc).  For me, my bike pays for itself (versus the only other real alternative - which in my case would be the Tube) over a 2 to 3 year period.  All the fun of riding is an added bonus, and comes for free (even if it is priceless).

If I had a lot of free time, and if I lived somewhere other than a shoebox, and if i had confidence in my ability, and if I had alternative transport for the times when I'd done something wrong, or was waiting for a part, then I'd love to start to learn how to tinker with my bike.  I'd maybe get an old, simple, machine and spend happy hours in the garage tinkering with it.  But none of those "if"s apply to me right now, so I take it to a Piaggio dealer and ask them to sort things for me.  

I realise that a lot of the members on here have knowledge of how to fettle bikes, and have been doing it for some time, and are probably pretty good at it.  They probably also have most/all of the necessary tools, some space to work in, and maybe even an alternative form of transport if the X9 is off the road for a few days.  For them, I imagine it's a different equation altogether.  

I also realise that there is the possibility that some garages could overcharge you, or do bad work.  I'm particularly vulnerable to this, as I start off with next to no base knowledge to gauge things against.  But in this respect it's no different for me than when I deal with any other form of specialised tradesman (be it lawyer, plumber, or mechanic).  So I just try to ask (what I think are) sensible questions, try to look around for recommendations, and try to stick with using people who are recognised in their field and/or members of appropriate trade bodies.  This forum is a great help in giving ideas of what to expect/what questions to ask/naming and shaming bad and good dealers, etc, but at the end of the day I've just got to do sensible preparation and then go with my instincts.  Just like in every other walk of life where I don't have expert knowledge myself.

[ShaunA]

(including the main stand roller which was always neglected by the main dealer!).

Theres a surprise  
I'm taking it elsewhere for the 12k service this month, I'll have to wait and see.

[Big Ears]

Simon, you have expressed my view point very well. I would add one personal  thought........
I am a lazy sod who doesn't like getting his hands covered in grease and dirt.  

My Piaggio dealer is reliable, friendly and trustworthy and, to me, worth every penny. Not sure about the Suzuki dealership yet. They seem friendly anough, but I've not had to ask them to do anything to the Burger yet.

[Apex]

Apex

Please clarify. Do you mean that the word "OIL" shows in the LCD panel, or the square oil can light above comes on?

Was  the oil light on the lcd, took it back to the dealer and got it sorted there and then...

just the 2nd issue puzzling me....

Drew

[jimc]

Sorry Apex, that didn't clarify anything for me...

The LCD doesn't have an Oil light.  It does have an 'OIL' icon.  OK, it's an 'OIL' dark if you will... This is of no importance if it comes on, it is merely a reminder.

The red Oil Light however is a stop immediately and check what's up/get towed home situation.

So some precision in your description would be appreciated, especially as it has been asked for before.  Did you ride to the dealer with the red Oil Light on or not?  And if so what did he do?

[Apex]

Sorry Apex, that didn't clarify anything for me...

The LCD doesn't have an Oil light.  It does have an 'OIL' icon.  OK, it's an 'OIL' dark if you will... This is of no importance if it comes on, it is merely a reminder.

The red Oil Light however is a stop immediately and check what's up/get towed home situation.

So some precision in your description would be appreciated, especially as it has been asked for before.  Did you ride to the dealer with the red Oil Light on or not?  And if so what did he do?

Was the oil icon on the lcd not the red oil light.

Drew

[Silver Sofa]

I came across this thread in a search for the mention of the location of the oil reminder reset switch.
No luck. I'll just whip off the front fairing for a laugh! Hehe

I must say, I am surprised at the amount of posts with no text - seemingly removed 'post' submission.
Especially when someone, admittedly not a mod, mentions the free speech and open opinions that are given time here (as there should be on a public forum).

[Mr.Chips]

Possibly but we had a humungous problem with servers(?) and the stalwart Admins and others constructed/moved the whole shebang on to a new system.
Unfortunately, due to the suddenness of said problem arising, some information and posts were lost - I don't understand the random nature of the losses - hence the blank posts.

If I'm not mistaken, posts which are removed by mods disappear completely, not just the text.

 

[jimc]

Mike is right.  Sadly some content is missing from historical posts made on the old system.  Muphry's law dictates that they shall be the ones with the best content and possibly worst spelling.