Warranty Woes

The plans for this past weekend changed abruptly as most of you know.  I'd contemplated riding out to Buffalo to visit Myszka in the hospital but then remembered that I was already long overdue for my next service on the bike, and going straight up to Buffalo and back would have added at least another 1,000 miles to things, and I couldn't do that to the bike.

Instead, I opted to bring it in for said service, hoping that maybe I'd have it back in time to still be able to shoot out and see him, but no luck.  They were jammed up, and the best they could do was to take it in on Sat and have it back to me on Sunday.  Ok, fine, let's do it.

When I dropped it off, I asked them (again) to check the alignment on the drive belt because the squeal had been getting a lot louder.  This is the same noise I've asked them to check out a couple times before, and each time they said things looked ok to them...

Saturday's drop-off went pretty smoothly, as did the pick-up of the loaner bike.  It was a '17 Road Glide Ultra - which I really didn't care for, but that's neither here nor there.

Sunday's visit back at the dealership was a little more chaotic.  It was a gorgeous sunny day and all the idiots who'd procrastinated getting their bikes inspected all year long, were now swarming the service dept.  This of course log-jammed the entire dept so things were moving very slowly.  When I was finally able to talk to someone, they said they'd found some pulleys needed to be replaced, along with the drive belt.  No kidding.  The good news is the pulleys should be covered under warranty, the bad news is the belt may not be, since it's a "wearable item".  This may be true, but I have a feeling if they'd done a comprehensive check on things way back when I asked them the first time, I wouldn't have a belt that needs to be replaced.

Anyway, they said they hadn't had a chance to call corporate's warranty dept yet, due to being so busy, so my choices were; leave the bike there or take it and bring it back later.  I opted to take it now because I had no other means of getting home, even though it meant I'd have to bring it back soon.

On the way home, the squeal was even louder than before - even to the point where I'm a little hesitant to put a lot of miles on it until it gets fixed.  I called the dealership this morning to see if they'd had any luck with calling corporate and they said they'd been slogging through inspections all day and hadn't had a chance to do much else.  They said they'd call today and get back to me, so now I'm waiting on that.  Then comes the fun part of loading the bike onto a trailer to bring in and drop off, and then going back to pick it up when it's ready.  Hopefully it won't be too long.

The good weather will probably arrive just as I put it into the shop...

Ride Hard, Take Chances