The New And Improved Unofficial R65 Forum V2
General Category => Totally Off-Topic Discussions, Rants, Tire & Oil Threads, Etc. => Topic started by: thrang on July 08, 2015, 02:03:50 PM
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I took my R1200 in for its 12k service today, and while I was there the smiling sales chap offered me a test ride on the new 2015 R1200rs... Never one to say no to a test ride I grabbed the keys and off I went never guessing that it would be bloody two wheel smack! Honestly its heroin on two wheels.... The RS handles like its on rails, goes like a rocket ship and is really comfortable... Never trust a smiling sales chap, because now I want one, I really want one and the wife will not be best pleased.... Ah well, in the dog house again.
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Mind sharing how much weight was lifted from your wallet for that 12K service on your 2013 R1200r?
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It was a significant weight Monte, £391, (including 20% VAT) inc three sets of break pads, full oils, fluids, filters, gaskets, plugs and labour, which is expensive but not as bad as I expected.
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It was a significant weight Monte, £391, (including 20% VAT) inc three sets of break pads, full oils, fluids, filters, gaskets, plugs and labour, which is expensive but not as bad as I expected.
More than $AU800 Pacific Pesos!
Further and redundant proof that owning an airhead is much simpler
Rear Brake Shoes $57
Front Pads $24
Engine Oil $31 (some left over)
Gearbox/Arm/Final drive oil $17
Two Spark Plugs $10 (on special)
Oil Filter $14
Air Filter $20
Time 1.5 hours (free)
Total $173
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It was a significant weight Monte, £391, (including 20% VAT) inc three sets of break pads, full oils, fluids, filters, gaskets, plugs and labour, which is expensive but not as bad as I expected.
That works out to be $602.20 USD, but that 20% VAT (Value Added Tax) would set my hair on fire. I squawk at the .0825% we get hit with here in Tejas. The dealer's shop rate for labor likely accounts for most of your final tab.
There is a one-man indie motorcycle repair shop I use for machine work on heads and 2-stroke cylinders. Elmer, a graduate of the Butler & Smith and Ducati service schools, is no spring chicken but has run service dept's for several large dealerships back in his younger days.
We got to chatting about shops that won't work on Airheads. My friend states that there are very few dealership technicians these days competent on our classic BMWs. Charging a customer anywhere from $90+ per hour to track down something like a bad ground on a 1978 R100/7 just isn't fair to the customer nor the dealership technician's time. He referred to the required periodic service schedules on motorcycles as "gravy work" -meaning fast turnarounds and plenty of cash flow.
My friendly BMW/Triumph dealer in Austin, Texas, has put a soft stop line on Triumphs that are ten years old. If they 'know' the bike and customer, maybe. At fifteen years, the shop will not accept a bike in their service dept. Same holds true for BMWs. Ask about getting your Airhead sorted and they are definitely not interested. They will sell you a $45.00 Motoraad/Airhead T-shirt... like mine.
I spent a week in Austin in late June. More bikes than I could count from exotics down to scooters. Some checking with my Airhead-riding Soldier son confirmed a large number of successful indie shops in Capitol City; including a shop recently opened by the former first bench Triumph tech at Lone Star BMW/Triumph.
No rant. Just reality.
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It was a significant weight Monte, £391, (including 20% VAT) inc three sets of break pads, full oils, fluids, filters, gaskets, plugs and labour, which is expensive but not as bad as I expected.
More than $AU800 Pacific Pesos!
Further and redundant proof that owning an airhead is much simpler
Rear Brake Shoes $57
Front Pads $24
Engine Oil $31 (some left over)
Gearbox/Arm/Final drive oil $17
Two Spark Plugs $10 (on special)
Oil Filter $14
Air Filter $20
Time 1.5 hours (free)
Total $173
Around $128 USD. Now THAT'S what I'm talking about! [smiley=thumbsup.gif]
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I enjoy working on the Airhead myself, but the 1200 is a complex bugger and for all I could do the work myself as I have 'acquired' the BMW software to run the diagnostics, and am a qualified IMI Motorcycle tech, I want to be able to PX it in next year on an RS so its worth while from a resale value to keep a complete BMW service history.
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Here's a review of Tony's next ride, The 2016 BMW R1200RS was just posted on Cycle World Magazine's web site. A beauty and not too terribly over the top price wise.
http://www.cycleworld.com/2015/07/08/2016-bmw-r1200rs-sport-touring-motorcycle-review-first-ride-photos-specifications/?cmpid=enews070915&spPodID=030&spMailingID=23012965&spUserID=NzM4NjMwMzMyNjAS1&spJobID=600850953&spReportId=NjAwODUwOTUzS0
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This "full service history" thing is something of a dilemma. Not for our old airheads of course but it is a real dilemma for more modern vehicles. I've been tempted in the past when I bought a 5 year old Mercedes with FSH and for the first 5 years I lashed out ridiculous amounts of cash to keep it up. As it turned out I kept the car for 21 years so the FSH didn't really matter a damn and I just wasted a lot of money.
I don't think I'll be tempted to do it again and not just from the financial perspective. After many years of no one else touching any of my vehicles I recently found interactions with dealerships to be enormously time wasting and highly stressful. So stressful I think I'd even be prepared to pay to stay away from them and accept that the vehicles value will be lower. I invested in a vacuum oil extractor for servicing my current 5 year old Merc and it makes changing the oil an absolute breeze. Didn't even get my hands dirty which admittedly doesn't seem right but the airhead will make up for that.
If I really have to have a Pro do some work I'll steer clear of the glass palaces with a receptionist and choose an outfit where you get to talk to the person doing the work.
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Revenge is sweet Tony, some years ago one of my customers was the Bradford Main BMW car dealership. I installed a fixed installation wash system for them and at the time I had a BMW 318 which was still under warranty so I had to keep up the service schedule which gave me an idea what labour rate they were shafting us with.
There installation now out of warranty developed a fault which I fixed, on my next visit I was summoned to the MD,s office who complained that my labour rate was far too high..............
MD .. Mr Sherwood I do feel your hourly rate is too high
Me .. Its half of what you charge.
MD .. My engineers are BMW trained
Me .. Get one of your BMW trained engineers to fix it next time then
MD .. But they cannot access the PLC programme
Me .. Exactly goodbye
We continued to have a good working relationship and he payed his bills on time until the Bradford Riots when the dealership was torched along with all the pubs on that road by our Asian cousins. the company went bust due to an insurance [BLEEP!] up ...
Lou
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I've had my oilhead 13 years and have performed all of the maintenance myself .
Not a difficult bike to work on, just have a shop manual available and go through it before you start working on it .
Also an online forum helps a lot when you get stuck on something .
I've been a member of R1150R.net they have subforums for the R1200's and other oil head bikes .
http://www.r1150r.net/
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If anyone's interested here's my response to taking the new RS out while mine was being serviced.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au80A2EJzjc
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Years ago when I was scraping out a living servicing Piper, Beechcraft and Cessna aeroplanes we had a customer who owned an Alfa Romeo dealership. He used to come in and keep an eye on us when his Beechcraft was in as he had a special relationship with the management. His labour rate for serving cars was twice what ours was for flying machines.
And guess who scrutinised and complained the most when it came to paying his bill......?