VFR1200FD engine failure at 23572km

That seems way off mark - I know several 1200 owners who are very happy with their bikes - so much so the blighters still won't even swap rides for a day! OK one is currently considering fitting the bigger tank from the Crosstourer.. but we all tend to mod our bikes to suit what we want.

I don't think there is any evidence to suggest this failure is more than a one off - but you can be certain the failed engine will be flown back to Japan and examined to work out precisely what went wrong.

As it stands I bet anyone owning a 1200 will be very reassured to see that once it was clear something was not right with this bike, Mr Honda has stepped in and all is good.

I guess you weren't around when this first came up - but if you track down the earlier thread, you will realise that this bike is well outside its official UK/European warranty cover area - so what Honda have done here is way beyond what they "had to do", and this outcome is an impressive demonstration of why you buy a Honda.

Take care



SkiMad

 

Great news and :thumbsup: to Mr. Honda for step up to the plate and take care of the issues. :whoo:

 

the 800 came with a big tank, what happened to the 1200 -seems like the style monkeys came in!:roll::roll::roll::roll::roll::roll::lever:

 

Sorry not sure how the dealer was even involved. The DIY component makes it tough to blow back and ask a dealer then never touched the bike to anti up.
Dealer services the bike....engine fails...Good dealer works with Honda to look after the customer. There were more then a few areas of the story that would lead me to conclude Honda would not pay. Its amazing that they did. Congrats. Such a great story!!!

 

Let's hope that by tearing into this engine Honda Inc. does not decide to back out of any warrantee. They will want to know the cause of the failure. Sometimes whole runs of bike come in that have a flaw that will cause a serious failure.

Be prepared for any local dealer to not do much in the way getting anything done save a lot of CYAWP dodging and weaving.


I sure wish I could say what caused this failure and how to fix same from looking at 3-4 low resolution JPEGs on a computer screen. I have not been blessed with those powers. I will pray for same every day from now on.


Aha!! New engine.. good stuff.. Honda Inc. comes through. What is not understood by some is that bikes and cars are purchased by the dealers from the various manufacturers. Tons of rules, regs ect go with the franchises. Bottom line is the dealers when faced with what might be a very unique problem want to find the nearest exit as quickly as possible.

Will Honda Inc be wanting the blown engine to be sent back? Or will a couple of small pix do...LOL

 

Yep, and all you have to do is say the customer didn't do everything that was in the book and it's tough shit Mr. Customer . Ve iss ondly folloving orderz. I can understand that you would step up the to plate about your business but you cannot speak for anyone but yourself on deals like this. This would be very close to trying to sell someone that car or bike dealers that sell any car or bike are the next best thing since fried chicken.

A guy in my club went through essentially the same thing. The bike spit a rod. The dealer fucked him around for months. Never did fix the bike. Guess what? This dealer is tits up. University Honda in Seattle. Lot of shit on that outfit on the www.

Dude you don't even want to hear about HD dealers at least from me.

 

I think it a million times easier being a Honda Dealer.
The reliability record on the Harley probably makes life tough
On the front line teams.
The goal is not to catch a person missing something.
You'd be shocked what we find for fluids and lack of interval that cause problems.
Not proporting to speak for everyone. Just another perspective.
The blatant neglect or rediculius tend to be on the hook for repairs. That leaves enough dough to cover
Grey areas and legite product failures.
Never mentioned the name of my business.
Not meant as a plug.
I love my VFR. Last bike I rode was a 1990 VFR.
I'm a huge fan of this bike. I met the President and the chief
Engineer responsible for the creation of
The VFR many years ago. I met them through the car side ... And all they wanted to talk about were bikes.
Glad this guy got his engine. Huge props to honda for stepping up.

 

The 2nd Honda engine failure I've heard of in a week. The other wasn't a VFR and destroyed itself before the 1st oil change.
Honda stepped up and replaced both engines. Yeah, one was under warranty but they actually carried that replacement in via airplane from Japan.
Honda clearly doesn't want their reliability reputation tarnished and I'd say that's a very good thing.

 

Coupling individual dealerships with Honda Inc is not a great argument in light of this guy living in Lagos whose engine went tits up. Honda Inc. took care if him and the dealer in UK didn't. Anecdotes aside.

The business I named is gone, tits up, bye-bye. They fucked way to many customers, had employees in and out like musical chairs and were sleazy. The name of that outfit was University Honda in Seattle, WA a motorcycle dealership who had the original Honda franchise dating back to the 1960's. They later had the Yamaha franchise. and blew that one too. Different owners than the original franchise holders who ran a great shop for many years. The new guys managed to flush the thing down the toilet in a very short time. The owner who ran it into the ground is now selling Fiats from a dealership in Seattle that was a Nissan dealer who also went tits up because of sleazy dealings.

When R/R #2 failed on my 1991 VFR. U-Honda wanted $200.00 for a the new one. With tax that was $220.00. I went online and got a new one from some little Honda shop in Arkansas, no tax and no shipping for $113.00.

Your supposition that I would be shocked at how vehicles are treated is absurd but not nearly as absurd as the position you seem to be taking that since your particular dealership or whateverit is may be. is on the up an up, therefore all dealerships Honda or otherwise are just doesn't wash.

We all have anecdotes. war stories. and many times tall tales to back up what we would like to purport as fact or what we would like to believe is true. For your pleasure, my own:

Mitch Boehm was writing a review on a VFR on loan from a dealership in SoCal. The R/R crapped out in mid ride. He calls the dealer who picked him up and retrieved the bike. Later someone asked Boehm for a follow up on the failure and the bike had been sent back to Japan and the dealer was stonewalling..

161 Honda CR250 motocrossers came into the Port of Seattle Honda dock with an almost transparent shard of aluminum alloy blocking the cooling loop. Honda sent over a test rider and quality control engineer with tools and a set of drifts so the shard could be broken loose to fall into the pump and removed. My job was to assemble a team to do an assembly line teardown of the bikes so as to effect the fix. The engines were then re assembled by the Honda guy. Also involved was one of the big wheels from Honda Inc. Who flew in from the Honda facility in Torrance.CA. Very professional operation. Very smooth, very Honda Inc. To say that if some of these bikes got to dealerships and fried themselves the dealers would have taken care of the problems is BS. Honda Inc is well aware of shit flowing downhill after it hits the fan.

The next stop for the guy from Honda was another bunch of the same 250's delivered to the Honda warehouse in Canada.

If your "dealership" is as you say and you are so willing and able to solve problems both major an minor it would seem the smart thing to do would be to put in a plug for yourself.. The suspension and electrics guys who have fixes and tech support here seem to do just fine and nary a complaint from the peanut gallery.

Can't say the same for certain jacket makers who sold a certain Canadian ex RCMP a leaker.

 

Keep in mind this wolf cub may not be playing on a level floor..

 

Fotodadi....My story. July 27th 2014 i am doing 90 kph when my engine makes a slight noise for 30 seconds before it stops running. I will give you the short version of the story. My local Honda dealer finds after 16 hours of labor that the #2 rod bearing spun causing metal filings and seizing my motor solid. Honda Canada promises,after having to send a letter to the president of Honda, to help me if its a flaw in the engine. The dealer has a record of all my oil changes and that they were done 3000 kms before it was ever needed. Honda came back to me and said,sorry,the bearing didn't have a flaw in it,it didn't receive enough oil which caused it to fail,and then seize the engine. NO HELP FROM HONDA! They admit i had enough oil in the engine,and oil changes were done on time,but the cause was an oiling issue,and they don't cover those problems. I am on the hook for a $10,000 repair bill as Honda will not sell me a new engine,only the individual engine parts. $350 for towing, $2200 to local dealer, i am not happy. And because the warranty is up,i dont have a legal foot to stand on in Canada. Sorry to know you had the same trouble that i am going through now.

 

I have heard the 1200 engine has a defect in in it Honda is trying to hide this fact by Blaming= anything goes wrong BB did it.

 

These failures are terrible for the two owners that have reported them. However, I am not going spend even a minute worrying about my motor. Plenty of owners have already logged much higher mileage without a similar problem.

Every motorcycle engine ever produced has had a failure. For example, BMW had plenty of catastrophic failures on the first year S1000RR. There was lots of traffic on BMW forums about the failures, but 98% the motors were unaffected. I suspect even a smaller % of VFR1200 motors will have this problem.

 

I checked with two Honda shops in my area based on the VIN number and there wasn't a recall on mine... I guess we'll see, in the mean time I will enjoy it.

 

the 1200 seems to be a ticking time bomb-when it goes bad BB did it by putting used dino oil oil in it.

 

Unlikely.

 

but very possible ,Honda left metal parts in the engine when making them- a engine ready to fail at any time./

 

I just came across this thread and kudos to Honda for going above and beyond regular customer care. And any manufactured product can self-destruct for no reason. Just bad luck it was the one belonging to the OP, but good luck that it seems to have turned out well.

 

It is possible that Honda left metal shavings in 1 motor?...maybe but still highly unlikely. Is it possible that Honda left metal shavings in all of them? NO. It's not like they're made in some local machine shop. After casting and machining they're inspected, treated, tested, assembled, go through QA/QC, etc, etc, etc.

It's much more likely that it's a 1 off part failure like a bearing. Not even a little bit worried about my motor.