True, true.
"dont bother with that because I fixed it myself"

MikeM

 

like mentioned, a compression test would not have revealed this anyway. hopefully, when you get your bike back, it will be running the way you want it to be. if not, then maybe it is time to find a new mech.

 

I never told him to ignore anything at all. I simply explained the entire situation and left it in his hands. This was not my first repair on a motor so I was pretty confident of my repairs.(Turns out what I did was perfect) Maybe if it were me I would have started with the rear cylinder because of the ignition coil issue, but of course that is just me. I certainly have not blamed him for anything. I was just really surprised to find that it was what it was after spending all that time in the primary! As far as this thread goes, I was simply trying to get some feedback on a situation I am facing from a knowledgable group of people.

It is abundantly obvious that everyone thinks that I deserve to be charged for ALL the troubleshooting hours and I AGREE! Everyone deserves to be paid for services rendered even if "the customer" dosen't agree with the approach taken. I personally would have began my troubleshooting elsewhere, but again, that is just me. I took it to him for a reason, because it needed professional attention and I have always been prepared to pay for WHATEVER needed to be done. So it is what it is and hopefully tomorrow I can report to everyone that I have gotten my bike back minus "weird noise"

 

we have a sign in our shop
houly rate $50.00
if you watch $75.00
if you help $100.00
if you tried to do it first and could,nt $150.00
it's true people will lie to thier doctors and mechanics

 

I am not trying to incite any trouble..but this is one of those live and learn situations.. You state you don't agree with the approach taken, and would have began troubleshooting elsewhere. imho,.. maybe before you took it into the shop, you should have done your own troubleshooting, you might have saved yourself some $$$$. It's real easy to criticize others work in hind sight. Pay the man and be glad you got it back in running order.

I don't know why it would take so much time in the primary though there ain't that much there to check out for 8 hrs.

 

It is definitely a live and learn situation! I in no way lied or was deceiving with the mechanic at any time. 8hrs in the primary????? I Know! He said he went all the way back to the stator! Pulled the clutch and all that.
I have not even gotten it back yet. As of saturday it was still in pieces after he promised to have it back to me by then. I have been pretty patient. BTW he has had my bike for the entire month of May. Hopefully I will have a happy post this afternoon!
And oh yeah, I don't lie to my doctors either!
John

 

Let me start off by saying I am not a bike mechanic and my feelings on the subject would largely depend on the conversation I had with the mechanic before the work began. As a teenager I worked in a service station with a very good car mechanic. He always had tons of work and always had cars waiting on him. I think one of the reasons he had so much work (other than the fact he was a very good wrench) was that he treated people well. If he misdiagnosed a problem he did not charge his customer for his mistake. Working on motorcycles maybe different and I know little about it, but as a professional I would be embarrassed to charge someone for a bunch of time troubleshooting a problem in the primary that was really a head gasket. Like I said, maybe I do not know what I am talking about as I am not really that familiar with bike mechanics. I use to repair computers for a living. If I had a problem come in that I really had no idea about I would warn the customer that the labor to find the problem was probably going to be a little more than usual because of the circumstances.

Would you guys feel the same about a car mechanic? Lets say you have a tapping sound coming from your engine and you take your car to the local shop. You tell him "hey, I wonder if you could check the injectors for me, I think they maybe jacked up". After you leave the mechanic tears the top end of the engine down because he is convinced the tapping is a lifter. Well, he does not find a bad lifter and it turns out the tapping was a bad injector. Are you going to feel right about paying this guy the labor for tearing the top end of the engine down and putting it back together?

This is a good example of why I *try* to do most of the work myself and make if I cannot repair it that I ask the shop fixing it to call me before they do any work that will cost over 100$.

IMO and not knowing the conversation you may or may not have had with the wrench I would say you paying for parts (gaskets etc) and part of the labor would be fair, but paying the entire labor cost because he incorrectly diagnosed the problem just does not seem right. That being said you agree to let him do the work so now you really have to pay him.

Maybe I expect too much out of professionals these days and like I said I know nothing about being a bike mechanic so I could be way off here. I will say that guy would not see my bike again if he charged me for the full labor time for him to go exploring non-broken parts.

 

overhead--Thanks for your .02! I agree with you as well. I am a general contractor and if for example, a customer calls me and says "my sink is draining slow" OK maybe a clogged drain. If I go out there and take her sink drain apart and it turns out it is a problem from the house to the street. I certainly can't fix that and I am certainly not going to charge her for something I couldn't repair. I give her the name of my plumber, wish her the best and I have a repeat customer in the making. If I charge her for a "service call" and not fix the problem she will most likely not call me back in the future. Maybe I am like you and expect too much from the professionals. Probably because I am a professional myself and know how I conduct business! I know -not apples to apples but still! .
Unfortunately for the shop, he is relatively new and I can't tell you how many of my friends have asked me to report my experience to them. I am not one to badmouth anyone and I am reserving judgement until it is all over and I get my bike back, but I think they can feel my frustration by the look on my face. At this point, regardless of the labor charges, I am not happy with how long they have had my bike and their lack of effort to keep me in the loop.
Maybe(hopefully) tomorrow I will have a good report!
John

 

Good luck. And IMO if you are going to give a bad report to your friends it is only fair that you express (as politely as you can) your displeasure with the charges so the guy has a chance to make you happy.

 

I have found if I tell the dealer to fix more than one or two things. They will start fixing thing that are not on the list that have never been a problem and not fix all the thing on the list. And will tell they could not find that as a problem. I have it in the shop 6 times in the first year then change dealership to repair to get what I had them try to fix 6 other times but they still change one of the other fix to a new type part so I just fix that problem myself.