You have to remember that alot of guy's buying Harleys never, ever turned a wrench before. Alot of people don't even own a lawn mower anymore.

No offense to the RUB's PUB's and Posers.

 

 

I own/ride a metric and can assure you that HD bikes require no more maintenance than metrics.

I am no mechanic but I quickly learned the basics re: motorcycle maintenance in order to save a buck. The service manual and a little time with your bike will save you a ton.

Any motorcycle mechanic skills you devloped while riding those other bikes will help you with the HD.

If you are comfortable working on your bike, I recommend you don't even take your new bike to dealer for work unless it's either warranty work or something beyond your abilities.

Bikes (HD and otherwise) may have some items requiring maintenance that didn't exist on bikes from the 60's, but there's nothing on an HD requiring maintenance that's not found on other bikes. Today's bikes from all of the major mfr's are very well made.

oh, and congrats on your new bike!

 

You all made good points. I'm afraid I'm in love with the harley scooter. I quess a Harley is like your wife.....some are high maintenance and some are low maintenance...which ever way it is ...you still love um.Thanks

 

If you ride less than 3000 miles a year you only need to service it once a year.

 

1. Do what you can yourself.
2. Find a good indy to do the jobs that need doing but you are not comfortable with yourself.
3. Ask yourself whether a particular service item specified in the maintenance chart really needs to be done or is makework for the shop, e.g., how many steering heads or rear swingarms actually fail? If it is going bad, you will get plenty of warning, and the cost and effort of servicing it far exceeds the cost of replacing it if it fails.

 

If you only ride 3000 miles a year, why not rent one???? a heak of a lot cheaper to maintain. THat reminds me of my dealer ,took mine back for it,s 1000 service when new, and he was doing a 2500 mile service on a bike that was 3 years old!!!!! Yes only had 2500 miles in 3 years. I know shut up. BY!

 

You still can "ocassionally" change your oil if you want...but then that might really cost you. Talked to a BMW owner friend of mine. Now THERE is a maintenance costing ****!

 

"over maintnence"Interesting point and maybe it should be in another thread. People that never did some of the maintnce items for 25 years and x milesand bike was fine. I know a few. never changed fork fluid,adj/ck'ed replaced bearings/,adj clutch?,,hell when it slips..ect

 

Just picked up a really good bike jack and starting to do my own maintenance... the harley "system" of their engines if you will, actually is quite simple. Its pretty amazing how quick you pick stuff up, might take you twice as long the first time you do your own service as it should, but the next time it goes by quick as you tend not to forget it. I was a little nervous when I first started wrenching on my $30 plus thousand dollar bike as I'm a computer nerd and don't know a damn thing about engines... but the local dealership here anyway, if you get in over your head... they will come out for free with a trailer and pick it up for you and you can just let them tell you what you were doing wrong for the next time. Manual is great, just follow the instructions implicitly its well illustrated with good pics and diagrams... you really can't go wrong. Taking a bike in for the periodic maintenance, you're getting charged for the dealer to fix and adjust things that don't need fixing or adjusting most the time... example I thought the friction zone on my clutch was perfect... took it in for the 1K service and they screwd with it, now its way outta whack and I hate where its at. Do your own service, it isn't that much time... and for me anyway, its actually become half the fun of owning the thing. Plus the accomplishment does enormously add to the sense of pride with ownership. With the one time charge of a manual and tools... all it should be costing you is the price of the materials. And there aren't that many tools you're going to need. Plus hell... you get stuck... this forum is so active you'll probably have more than half a dozen reponses in the same amount of time you'd be on hold trying to reach the dealer.