When I went for the service, I spoke with the service head, described the main issue of the awful ride quality, informed him of the warranty replacement of the monoshock.
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Took the bike to the other SvC in town (20 km from home) about a month ago for its second service and got the troubles that haunted the bike since Day1 looked into as well. Now, a month later, there seems to be some movement towards a final fix for the issue. Details below.
When I went for the service, I spoke with the service head, described the main issue of the awful ride quality, informed him of the warranty replacement of the monoshock, showed the videos I had made of the bike, and left the bike overnight with them to have a go at sorting it out, hoping the information I provided was enough to narrow down the cause.
They got back to me the next day. Confirming things from the videos, the lead technician had diagnosed it as a case of misalignment of the needle roller bearings on the swingarm. They reseated the bearings, greased them and returned the bike to me.
This sorted out the rattling noise completely. It sorted the terrible ride quality and thudding noise to some extent. But it still didn’t completely fix them, just made the issue much more tolerable.
I could still feel every bump on the road and riding for even an hour or so would still leave me in quite a bit of discomfort. But this was a BIG improvement from the horrible, horrible condition the bike was in when I bought it. The bike was now actually usable for the first time since I bought it.
So, I went back and gave them my feedback and asked them to check again. The technician was convinced the issue was completely sorted though, and despite my insistence that the issue was not suspension related, he made the usual preload adjustment and asked me to check. This obviously didn’t fix the issue and it meant I had to visit them again to get them to understand the issue. Between work and personal affairs, it took multiple visits over the duration of a month to get some meaningful movement towards a proper resolution.
I had them ride my bike and their TR bike back-to-back offroad and later made videos of the same to show that the issue was not sorted.
They inturn suspected the monoshock again, and replaced it with the one from their TR bike.
When that didn’t fix things, they decided it must be a case of defective or damaged swingarm bearings, and ordered the part, which they informed would take about 2-3 weeks to procure.
At present, I’m awaiting a call from them to get the replacement done under warranty.
I don’t blame them for the delay though. Atleast their responsiveness was much better than the resistance and incompetence of the dealership I bought the bike from. The service head here gave the impression of being responsible, thorough, and conservative. The lead technician, though overconfident, was responsive.
So, the question swirling in my head now is: how the heck did the bike get misaligned swingarm bearings??? Now, I didn’t probe into what way they were misaligned. I didn’t have a look at the type of bearings Suzuki uses either, but how hard is it to fit these correctly anyway?
The technician suggested it was a PDI failure at the dealership end. If checking the swingarm bearings comes under the purview of a PDI, I don’t find it hard to swallow that the dealership I bought from fell short or goofed up. There were a few other goofups too and a hell of lot left to be desired from them in other aspects as well.
But the bikes get delivered to dealerships in completely-built state, don’t they? Which means the misalignment must have originally occurred at the Suzuki factory. Either that, OR my particular unit was possibly used as a donor bike for something at the dealership and carelessly put back together.
Regarding the other issues:
- No movement on the irritating engine noise. The technician initially didn’t acknowledge the issue. When I showed the bike to him after riding it for a couple hours, the hot engine made the issue very apparent and he acknowledged it. He advanced the timing a bit, but that hasn’t fixed things. It’s actually made the bike less eager to rev. He said he’d checked the valve clearance and found no issue when I had left it overnight.
- The technician adjusted the suspension in the clamps and the handlebar for the left-pulling issue. The bike seems slightly better but it still pulls a bit left when I let go of the bar. Atleast, I’m not experiencing any shoulder pain issues at the moment. But the steering stemconeset has been set towards the looser end on my bike. Will need to tighten it to my preferences and check again if the left-pulling gets bothersome.
- The technician said he tuned the horn, but it still sounds weak to me.
- I took a blower to the ignition switch, and then sprayed some WD40. Seems to have fixed it. Haven’t really paid much attention to it amidst other things.
- The fuel average meter is still acting up. The average over my total odo reading had risen up to 33kmpl, but inexplicably once again dropped back to 30.
That’s it for now.
Keyword: My Suzuki V-Strom 250 SX: 2nd service & fixes for ride quality issues