Motorcycle Forum / General / Yamaha / May 2005

Price? Dealer markup?

Yamaha's are one of the best-built bikes on the road, if not the best.

What are you trying to avoid, specifically?

doc

I own a '04 FZ6. Great bike with only one exception...the TPS takes a sh.t 
about every five months it seems. I bought my bike march 27, '04. It ran
GREAT until mid June, then developed an intermittent drop in idle speed
leading to stalling at idle. Turn the ignition off for 30 seconds and it
restarted and ran fine (for awhile...five minutes or five weeks). The local
genius at the Yamaha shop altered the CO setting ("the factory always sets
them too lean") which killed my fuel economy and didn't fix the problem.

The bike was back to the shop ("I set the CO AGAIN") a couple of times a
month until I said the magic words (Lemon Law). Yamaha in L.A. told them to
replace the TPS in December. That fixed the stalling, but I don't think
Einstein knows how to set the CO's because the mileage is still down 20%.

I am planning a road trip to Cali, so I contacted Yamaha direct and got the
name of a GOOD So. Cal. service manager and set up an appointment for
Wednesday to get it fixed (only 200miles and a day out of my vacation from
what I had planned, but what the heck).

Last night on my way home from my last day at work before my vacation, the
idle speed problem re-surfaced. So now I am unsure about that ride through
Death Valley to the eastern slopes of the Sierra Nevadas that I planned as
my route to So.Cal. I will have to stick to I-15 for the trip to Montclair
to the dealer (cell phone coverage and available help if things suddenly get
much worse). I hope he can get a TPS by Wednesday so I can at least ride
some back roads on the second half of my vacation.My eight day trip through
the back country followed by a ride down the Pacific Coast Highway is
circling the drain.

The real shame of all of this is that the bike is fun to ride (the best I've
owned in 32 years of riding). It is quick and reponsive (I can hang with
many larger sport bikes through the twisties with no problem). It HAD great
mileage (42 mpg in town, 50 mpg at 80 mph on the highway) running 87 octane
gas. It is comfortable enough for an old fart like me(53 years old) to use
for light touring (300-400 miles per day easy) and has a five gallon tank (I
have gone 240 mile on a tank without pushing the 3/4 gallon reserve more
than 15 miles before Einstein did his thing).

It is a real shame that such a good bike suffers from a combination of one
poorly designed minor part and (in my case at least) crappy service at the
dealership level. Would I recommend the bike? HELL YES. But choose your
dealer carefully. BTW, I have heard (from a Yamaha service rep) that there
is a new TPS in the works, but it was not yet available in December when my
first TPS was replaced.