rdsmith3 wrote:Sander Abernathy wrote:
As for WorkinMan's question, there was an article concerning splines in an issue of BMW Owner's News published by BMWMOA sometime in the last six months. The discussion focused on proper lubrication. Apparently, some bikes that have received no maintenance have rusted splines at 10,000 miles while others look perfect at 60,000 miles. The article discusses proper lubrication, service intervals, etc. It also discusses the relative difficulty of performing the task.
But that is not an item on the maintenance schedule, right? Why would lubrication even be an issue at 10,000 miles unless there was a manufacturing problem.
To me, the worst part about this is BMW's denial that there is any issue.
I have used this example here before, but we have a GMC Yukon XL with almost 90,000 miles. At around 63,000 miles the transmission went, leaving my wife and one of the kids stranded on a busy highway. We do not tow anything, and we had all the scheduled maintenance done. A heavy duty transmission like this should not fail at 63K miles. It was out of warranty, but GM offered us a choice of a rebuilt transmission for free, or a brand new one for a $100 deductible. I took the new one for $100. That was my total cost to fix the problem, including labor. Yes, I would buy another GM product. I don't expect perfection, but I do expect a manufacturer to admit there is a problem if something fails prematurely.
No one said it was an item on the maintenance schedule. Someone asked for information on how to address a known weakness with a mechanical device and I referred them to an article that answered their question. BTW, the article indicates that the spline failures have been an issue since the airhead days and continue albeit at a lower rate than before because the shafts are now nickel plated and beefed up. The recommendation is to inspect and lube the splines at 40,000 miles
If you build 10,000 of anything on an assembly line each one will have a weak link and because of common design, common parts and common assembly processes many will share the same weak link. Manufacturers and customers know this and that is why manufacturers offer and customers expect warranties.
You cited an example where GM fixed a premature failure that occurred after expiration of the warranty for a small co-payment. My parents had a GM car once. A 1980 Pontiac Diesel station wagon. It used a GM manufactured diesel engine designed by Oldsmobile of which 1 million were produced. To say those engines were a catastrophe would be an understatement. It was basically a Chevy 350 repurposed for diesel use. Anyone that knows the first thing about diesel engines realizes how stupid that was. The compression ratios required to ignite diesel fuel ripped apart every one of those 1 million diesel engines. GM took no responsibility. The FTC forced them resolve the problem and they finally agreed to force every owner who wanted to make a claim to go through arbitration. If you won arbitration they paid 80% of the cost of a replacement engine, the same engine that would again destroy itself. Many people didn't win arbitration since the arbitration panel was trained and paid by GM on a per claim basis and liked being paid for something that was so mindless.
The Oldsmobile diesel had two long-term impacts on the US car market: It gave birth to lemon laws and it virtually killed the market for passenger car diesel engines in America to the present day. Quite a legacy isn't it? Particularly following such fiasco's as the Corvair, which gave us Ralph Nader. That's enough response to a claim that GM is responsive and concerned about customer satisfaction.
In October 2003, I bought a new car manufactured in June 2003. It was a very high performance car that produced over 100 hp per liter of output. I was lucky because June 2003 was the first month of manufacture those engines didn't periodically suffer catastrophic engine failure. The manufacturer attempted to blame vehicle owners for the failures early on but eventually started replacing rod bearings, oil pumps, and whole engines under warranty (which was extended to 100,000 miles for the engines in question). This fault was attributed to a problem with the connecting rod bottom-end bearing shells that were supplied by a third party that did not meet specifications. Not only was my warranty extended to 100,000 miles but the catalytic convertors were replaced and when the alternator failed, that was replaced as well and both occurred outside the warranty. The manufacturer, of course was BMW and the car is an M3.
At 103,000 miles, the car runs perfectly and I fully expect that to continue for another 100,000 miles. In my case, BMW also replaced an alternator and catalytic convertors at no charge outside of warranty because they had a high incidence of failure and there was a technical service bulletin published on those issues.
Now if that engine failure problem raised its head tomorrow and the car threw a rod and I had to buy a new crate engine at a cost of $15,000 what could I complain about? It's six years old, has 100,000 miles on it and its living on borrowed time. I bought it hoping it would run 200,000 miles but no one guaranteed that and most reasonable people know that six year-old high performance vehicles break and when that happens it may very well be very expensive. What's my alternative? A Corvette? A Porsche? Both are far more likely to have a significant repair expense than a BMW before 100,000 miles and far less likely to still be a car you would want to drive.
The topic of the thread is a transmission failure at 62,000 miles and you cited the example of your SUV which had a transmission failure at 62,000 miles. I think you miss the point. Comparing auto miles to bike miles is like comparing human years to dog years. Autos are much heavier and parts can be overengineered and no one even notices the extra weight. If the transmission in your SUV weighs an extra 50 pounds to make sure it will stand up to the demands no one cares. The transmission in the R1150R weighs only 39 pounds in total.
Since bikes aren't overengineered to the same extent as cars they don't last as long even though they weigh far less. Let's assume though that BMW has neglected the transmission splines issue and the bikes fail prematurely and there are better alternatives available. Do the facts bear that out? It's hard to say because we don't know the mileage run up on bikes still on the road. However, we can see how many miles bikes are carrying by brand when owners decide to get rid of them. That data is readily available on eBay with two problems. Some bikes are listed on eBay with obviously faulty mileage readings which are either 999,999 or 99,999 miles. Some bikes (Goldwings and Harley tourers) are extremely heavy and overengineered similar to cars and used only for highway travel that involve many miles with very little wear. With these caveats, I looked at eBay data as of this evening for the most common motorcycle brands excluding bikes with listed mileage of 999,999, 99,999, Goldwings and all Harleys.
Here's a list by brand of the number of motorcycles for sale with >62,000 miles as a percentage of all motorcycles listed for sale
Ducati 0/159 = 0%
Moto Guzzi 0/28 = 0%
Yamaha 4/877 = .46%
Kawasaki 4/762 = .52%
Honda (excluding Gold Wings) 9/1361 = .66%
Suzuki 9/778 = 1.16%
BMW 14/222 = 6.31%
Amazing isn't it? 40 of 4,187 bikes listed above are listed for sale with more than 62,000 miles. That's just less than 1%. There are 1686% more bikes of other brands but only 86% more bikes of other brands with more than 62,000 miles. Of only 222 BMW's, 14 have more than 62,000 miles. Of 3,965 bikes of other brands listed above 26 have more than 62,000 miles. BMW accounts for 5% of the bikes in the sample but 35% of the bikes with more than 62,000 miles.
I struggle then to understand what BMW should do in the case of a bike with a spline failure at 62,000 miles. Clearly BMW is the most reliable longest lasting bike (a fact we all knew) but a 7 year-old bike with 62,000 miles and a rebuilt title is a very mature bike. There less than a 1% chance any bike but a BMW even makes it that far yet more than 6% of BMW's last that long. Apparently, BMW has produced a bike of such exceptional durability that any mechanical failure is evidence of manufacturer negligence even if every competitor's bike would have already been scrapped.
Even the most reliable bike will have a weakest part that will fail first in a large percentage of cases. What should the manufacturer do if that failure occurs several years and a trip around the globe after a competitor's bike would have been scrapped and five years and 38,000 miles after the expiration of the warranty? My answer to that question is sell you the parts and install them for a reasonable fee.
Others may have a different view and that leaves a few options. The owner can:
Replace the bike with an identical used bike with 60,000 miles that may last to 100,000 miles for $3,000, or
repair the one he has for $1,500 and continue to ride it to 100,000 miles, or
go buy a new bike from another manufacturer for $8,000 to $12,000 that may also last 40,000 miles.
There's one thing that's not an option. He can't go buy a new bike from another manufacturer for $8,000 to $12,000 that will ever see 100,000 miles.
