This might be my last ever Suzuki

Baggsy

Baggsy

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V-Strom 650 SEA K9.
I bought the bike in '09 from Envy. Go ahead and laugh, but at the time they seemed to have the least number of complaints here. Probably, because they were so new. Anyway took it in to get the servicing done there and everything seemed o.k. at the time. I found out different later on when they "lost" my service manual that I paid for just before they went belly up.

Fast forward to three weeks ago when I was on a trip to Toronto from Ottawa and the clutch stopped working. Bike has 12,000 km on it. Took it into Cyclewerx, and apparently the freeplay adjustment on the clutch lever was not adjusted correctly, allowing it to slip slightly until it gave.

it's been sitting there for the last three weeks waiting on a couple of clutch parts from Suzuki.

I had a 25 year old Honda and it was faster to get parts for it than this bike.

Are all makes having these problems now a days or is it just Suzuki?

Should it take 10% of the riding season to get a couple of parts for an almost new bike, that should not have failed in the first place?

Is there any way to get parts back on a bike in a reasonable amount of time?

If it takes any longer I'm going to have to put the bike on a truck and have it shipped to Ottawa for repair.

At this point I can no longer imagine taking this bike anywhere far away. I don't have 4 or 5 weeks to spend away from the family waiting to be able to ride home.

Sorry, I'm kind of angry about this. Hulk smash!
 
Baggsy said:
V-Strom 650 SEA K9.
I bought the bike in '09 from Envy. Go ahead and laugh, but at the time they seemed to have the least number of complaints here. Probably, because they were so new. Anyway took it in to get the servicing done there and everything seemed o.k. at the time. I found out different later on when they "lost" my service manual that I paid for just before they went belly up.

Fast forward to three weeks ago when I was on a trip to Toronto from Ottawa and the clutch stopped working. Bike has 12,000 km on it. Took it into Cyclewerx, and apparently the freeplay adjustment on the clutch lever was not adjusted correctly, allowing it to slip slightly until it gave.

it's been sitting there for the last three weeks waiting on a couple of clutch parts from Suzuki.

I had a 25 year old Honda and it was faster to get parts for it than this bike.

Are all makes having these problems now a days or is it just Suzuki?

Should it take 10% of the riding season to get a couple of parts for an almost new bike, that should not have failed in the first place?

Is there any way to get parts back on a bike in a reasonable amount of time?

If it takes any longer I'm going to have to put the bike on a truck and have it shipped to Ottawa for repair.

At this point I can no longer imagine taking this bike anywhere far away. I don't have 4 or 5 weeks to spend away from the family waiting to be able to ride home.

Sorry, I'm kind of angry about this. Hulk smash!
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Very unusual, IMO. Could be a side effect of the Japan earthquake?
 
So, you agree that the reason the clutch failed is due to negligence and human error? Clutch parts are not something that dealers stock normally. I just had to order a weird part for my gsxr and they had to order it in. it was in 3 days later.

To be honest, are you riding their ***? i find some part departments are absolutely horrible at ordering and keeping on top of things.

you could have ordered the parts from BikeBandit and had them in a long time ago.

i hear your frustration thought, and honestly Honda is not any better. IMO Honda parts are also priced higher.
 
Clutch freeplay is something you can just feel by hand. It sucks that this is what teaches you to keep it adjusted, but it's not hard to do. And I agree with Red_Liner740, some parts departments need to have a fire lit under their ***. The clutch on your bike should not be hard to come by.

Normally I'd say you could be fairly confident about a V-Strom not breaking down and stranding you somewhere.
 
I don't know about negligence. I know I took it in for the service intervals and it was supposed to be adjusted during those intervals. I don't really want to spend my time trying to get clutch fixed for free, and I'd like it done right. But, now I'm spending my time waiting for parts for a two or three hour job. The OEM parts were in the next day. Imagine if you were up in Cochrane when something like this happened, would you want or be able to spend your entire vacation up there waiting for parts and not being sure or not if they will arrive?
 
I'd get at least a couple of quotes, or take my bike to a different service spot, which may deal with Suzukis more often. If you wanted the part faster, maybe you could have ordered it through Suzuki dealership and left CW install it?
 
Honda is excellent with ordering parts. A 2009 Honda would have all it's parts stocked somewhere in Toronto or at least in Canada and would usually take 2 days to arrive. I can still get parts for my 40-year old bikes.
 
The solution is simple. :D
HarleyNo1_600.jpg
 
AGAVE said:
The solution is simple. :D
HarleyNo1_600.jpg
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Yeah, parts can be found on the sides of the roads all over Ontario, right where they fell off, typically in a puddle of oil :D Baggsy, in your case, the techie screwed up and typically, you'd have to wait that long for non-generic parts for any bike, unless you REALLY luck out and the stealership just happens to stock it. Otherwise, count on chains, sprockets, spark plugs, crush washers and not much else.
 
since the earth quake there's a shortage of parts for anything coming from japan (except maybe honda cause since they moved to the power house model nothing has sold)

I was in a Kawasaki dealership today and the owner was complaining that he was having to use salvage parts because he couldn't get anything new from japan. I was in a yamaha dealership a few weeks back and they were down to two new bikes (still had plenty of used ones). he was having a hell of a time getting new stuff in.

last year i had to wait what seemed like a month for a gasket for my 91 honda (it was probably less). I took to calling every honda store in canada to see if they had one kicking around...
 
I've had no problems getting most parts from Honda for my last 3 bikes.
 
FiReSTaRT said:
Yeah, parts can be found on the sides of the roads all over Ontario.
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That's British bikes. For mine the parts can't be found, they have to be manufactured, then shipped by rowboat from Japan.
 
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Baggsy said:
That's British bikes. For mine the parts can't be found, they have to be shipped by rowboat from Japan.
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They don't have to Row the boat...they just ride the Tsunami waves to shore.
 
Try a different dealer.

I ordered a set of friction and steel plates for my son's SV650 track bike at Hillcrest on Tuesday and got a call this morning - Thursday - to say they were in.

Hope I didn't get the last set :)
 
Baggsy said:
That's British bikes. For mine the parts can't be found, they have to be manufactured, then shipped by rowboat from Japan.
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I was referring to Harley Davidson.. As for your Suzuki.. Yeah, it's an unusual wait, but you just ended up in a perfect storm of a logistical mess just as you suffered the consequences from poor servicing. Nothing to do with the bike.. She may be slow, she may be ugly, but she's reliable and steady :cool: (had to throw in the dig ;) )
 
It seems to be all manufacturers, these days. The earthquake and reactor leak certainly can't be helping the issue, but fewer and fewer parts were being stocked locally even before that. I had to wait for about a month, for a couple of damper rod bolts and crush washers, in the off season prior to the earthquake. That's for a Kawasaki, not Suzuki.
 
Its not all manufactures, in my experience Suzuki sucks for parts. They take longer then Yam, Kawi, or Honda...We waited over a month for a fairing for a insurance claim this year, when it finally arrived it was the wrong color (their labeling mistake)...The dealer was nice enough to take one off a crate bike for us, if it wasnt for that we were screwed and Suzuki was saying "oh well **** happens"

Unless you can find a dealer that actually has those parts in stock, you are at the mercy of the crappy Suzuki parts network in Canada. Which usually never has any parts in the warehouse that you need, and everything gets back ordered to Japan and takes at least 3 weeks +....

As for your clutch adjustment thats totally on you man, as your clutch wears down your free play gets smaller...If you let it get to the point where thers is no free play, and it starts slipping thats your mistake for not knowing about it. This isnt something specific to Suzuki, every cable clutch bike is like this, so all cable clutch riders should be aware of it, as it is in all owners manuals.... This is an adjustment every rider should be doing themselfs, its not something that requires dealer service....Its a simple adjustment that the riders should know how to do....There is no way for you now to say it needed to be adjusted back when they had your bike, it most likely wore slowly like every other bike out there and you just didnt notice it...When ENVY had your bike it was likely still withing spec...This is something that you as the rider and owner should notice.....
 
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FWIW I've had some troubles getting parts for my BMW as well. May have been partially due to it being a new model but it annoyed the hell out of me. Waited months for a simple part that should have taken days to get.
 
Griffin said:
FWIW I've had some troubles getting parts for my BMW as well. May have been partially due to it being a new model but it annoyed the hell out of me. Waited months for a simple part that should have taken days to get.
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For new models it usually takes a while for them to build stock in Canadian warehouses, and in Suzuki's case for some bikes they just never do....And almost all parts are back ordered to Japan......Rule of thumb, if its not in a Canadian warehouse, its 2-4 weeks direct from Japan....

Some are better then others however, for instance I just bought a new gas tank for my Monster Ed 09 ZX6R....No stock in Canada, and even no stock in Japan, they had to make it for me!...Still 2 weeks from order date and it was in my hands here in Canada, although the dealer did put a rush order on it for me...Without that I would be looking at about another week wait time
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