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Joined: Feb 15, 2007 Posts: 1356 Location: LaPorte, Indiana, USA
Posted: Mon Jul 18, 2011 8:20 pm Post subject:
It's a common tactic for shops these days to quote prices like that for our old bikes.
They just don't want to work on it at all, and are trying to put you off - that price to replace two tires would sure put me off.
It's probably a one hour job, if nothing goes wrong..............
Now if it's a full dresser Gold Wing or something, that's a different matter - but not a stock 750 K model, tire changes are not that big a deal. _________________ Bill Lane - CB200-CM200-CB450-C70M-CL350
"When your only tool is a hammer,
everything starts to look like a nail."
Joined: Oct 02, 2006 Posts: 2050 Location: New Britian, CT
Posted: Mon Jul 18, 2011 9:38 pm Post subject:
Most shops these days do not want to mount tires that they didn't sell. A lot of them will say no, well the others who do will charge you an outrageous amount of money to do it. The simple explanation is that they want you to buy tires from them, because by buying them else where you are taking business away from them. Remeber when you bring in tires, these guys have to pay for disposal of your old tires, pay their people to remove and mount your tires,etc.
Not to mention if this is a licensed shop they should have their hourly rates posted in plain site. Most states require them to have it posted by law. Not to mention you have the right to a written estimate of all work.
Joined: May 28, 2009 Posts: 423 Location: chicago area
Posted: Tue Jul 19, 2011 4:15 am Post subject:
#1
to hell with the dealers, find a local shop around here that will do it. theres a couple on north ave that might do it if you take the rims in, but not the whole bike. its not that hard, so id suggest breaking out the tools. 20-50 bucks
#2 break out the tools, and order the parts online. after parts cost... free
#3 break out the tools, order a manual (if you dont have one) order the parts, do it yourself. 30 bucks for a manual, parts ? and no labor costs again.
in vegas ive seen dealerships REFUSE to work on bikes after a certain year. "new to 10 yrs old 95/hr, 11-15yrs 115/hr, 16 yrs and older we will NOT service" since ive seen that posted, i dont even bother taking my bikes into a shop.
ok that and being quoted the costs for having a dealership work on my ducati didnt help either. for the cost of tires, oil change, valve shim, cam belts, chain and sprockets, and brake pads i could have bought a brand new honda rebel. did it myself for about 700 total. _________________ No, actually I DONT sleep much, I have M.A.D.D (motorcycle attention deficit disorder, means i change bikes about twice a year) drink too much coffee, have too much energy and dont do much besides work and motorcycles.
Joined: May 19, 2009 Posts: 118 Location: W.DesMoines, Iowa
Posted: Tue Jul 19, 2011 5:41 am Post subject:
Wow, that is a scary price. You can find all the info you need to do all that stuff yourself on this site. I knew nothing about bikes and was just going to sell my 750 cause it had some problems but luckily found this site before making that mistake. When doing tires make sure the dot is by the valve stem and the arrow is pointed back when at the bottom or you do it 3 times. (worked all night so someone correct me if wrong). This could help you immensely http://www.dansmc.com/indexindex.htm also here is a pdf file of the cb750 shop manual. (seems like there was a page missing in brake section but can't remember) http://www.honda4fun.com/man_officina/man_officina.html There is one in english about half way down. Good luck. _________________ geez, I�m so amateur
Joined: Oct 03, 2005 Posts: 1595 Location: Marshall, MI
Posted: Tue Jul 19, 2011 9:44 am Post subject: Shop Prices
$45 per tire for mounting and balance is the going rate. If it is on the bike, that might be $60-65. Oil change might be $30 but maybe I charge too little. Carbs for me at Mar-Creek Motorsports is around $40 per carb or $150 for 4 cylinder bank of carbs and $40 for a dirt bike. I have no overhead so I am too low to compare to but some dealers have too much overhead. I am around $45 an hour which is too cheap for sweating my butt off in the shop. _________________ You only go around once in life, but if you do it right, once is enough!
$45 per tire for mounting and balance is the going rate. If it is on the bike, that might be $60-65. Oil change might be $30 but maybe I charge too little. Carbs for me at Mar-Creek Motorsports is around $40 per carb or $150 for 4 cylinder bank of carbs and $40 for a dirt bike. I have no overhead so I am too low to compare to but some dealers have too much overhead. I am around $45 an hour which is too cheap for sweating my butt off in the shop.
"I have no overhead"........you really should quit working on the sidewalk and move inside!
..........Paul _________________ �77 CB550f
�77 CB750a
�78 GL1000
�80 CB650c
�75 GL1000-finally finished
�79 KZ200
68 CB450K1-taking up all my time
$45 per tire for mounting and balance is the going rate. If it is on the bike, that might be $60-65. Oil change might be $30 but maybe I charge too little. Carbs for me at Mar-Creek Motorsports is around $40 per carb or $150 for 4 cylinder bank of carbs and $40 for a dirt bike. I have no overhead so I am too low to compare to but some dealers have too much overhead. I am around $45 an hour which is too cheap for sweating my butt off in the shop.
"I have no overhead"........you really should quit working on the sidewalk and move inside!
..........Paul
What 'inside'?.....there is no 'inside'....it is solid motorcycles....guessing up to around 68 of them by now. _________________ _________________________________
GONE.......WITH A PUFF OF SMOKE AND A BLUR OF SPOKE........
_______________________________________
Joined: Oct 03, 2005 Posts: 1595 Location: Marshall, MI
Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2011 4:39 am Post subject:
I just bought a couple more motorcycles!! I may be up to over 70 bikes now. Weeee!!! I am taking (6) to Mid-Ohio so my herd may be smaller but then again maybe I will find one that will follow me home too. Oh what fun we have. If you see a blue Kaw KE100 that is pretty nice stop me. That would be my new bike with just 289 miles. See you all this weekend at Mid-Ohio. _________________ You only go around once in life, but if you do it right, once is enough!
Joined: May 08, 2011 Posts: 37 Location: Auckland, New Zealand
Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2011 4:23 pm Post subject:
I took my honda in to a local shop and paid 50 dollars which is about 45.00 USD to have the two tyres I had already purchased mounted-which I found was reasonable. But they also quoted me 330 dollars which is about 280.00 USD to replace the swing arm bushings and rear wheel bearings which I thought was outrageous, so I looked elsewhere.
I was driving home a few weeks later and saw this van drive by with a sign on the side that said "VINTAGE HONDA REPAIR" and as if it was a sign from the spirits above I called the number and took my bike in to have this guy service it. He was just an older gentleman who did work out of his own car port and charged me 125.00 USD for labour to do a complete top end rebuild and another 50.00 USD to replace the rear wheel bearings and swing arm bushing. Granted I spent twice the amount he charged me on labour for new old stock parts, I will never take my bike to one of those large shops again.--He had all this done in two days too--I suppose I got lucky on my drive home that day!
Joined: Oct 26, 2007 Posts: 1143 Location: Greensburg Pa
Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2011 6:35 pm Post subject:
719frontier719 wrote:
I took my honda in to a local shop and paid 50 dollars which is about 45.00 USD to have the two tyres I had already purchased mounted-which I found was reasonable. But they also quoted me 330 dollars which is about 280.00 USD to replace the swing arm bushings and rear wheel bearings which I thought was outrageous, so I looked elsewhere.
I was driving home a few weeks later and saw this van drive by with a sign on the side that said "VINTAGE HONDA REPAIR" and as if it was a sign from the spirits above I called the number and took my bike in to have this guy service it. He was just an older gentleman who did work out of his own car port and charged me 125.00 USD for labour to do a complete top end rebuild and another 50.00 USD to replace the rear wheel bearings and swing arm bushing. Granted I spent twice the amount he charged me on labour for new old stock parts, I will never take my bike to one of those large shops again.--He had all this done in two days too--I suppose I got lucky on my drive home that day!
Those sound like some very reasonable prices. You were very lucky, I'd say.
..........Paul _________________ �77 CB550f
�77 CB750a
�78 GL1000
�80 CB650c
�75 GL1000-finally finished
�79 KZ200
68 CB450K1-taking up all my time
Joined: Nov 02, 2008 Posts: 1085 Location: New Zealand
Posted: Wed Jul 20, 2011 11:58 pm Post subject:
'719frontier719' you didn't tell us if the quote from the bigger shop included swing-arm bushes and a rear wheel bearing set.
As another Kiwi who is acutely aware that hourly rates for servicing in this country now routinely run somewhere between $65NZ an hour -$90NZ an hour I'm not sure that the quote was excessive. Have you ever actually replaced swing-arm bushes yourself? Its not hard to imagine removing a rear wheel, and swing-arm, replacing the swing arm bushes and the wheel bearings, then re-assembling, taking upwards of 2 hours.
Sure it's great you had the serendipitous experience of spotting the retired gentleman,but I'm not sure your bike-shop was unreasonable n their quote.
Last edited by Russell on Thu Jul 21, 2011 1:48 am; edited 1 time in total
Joined: Dec 26, 2009 Posts: 241 Location: Heist-op-den-berg
Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 12:34 am Post subject:
If I take the wheels at the tyreshop mounting and balancing the two is normally 5 euro, but as I get regulary tyers for my work(drivngschool) I get it for free
Joined: Jul 10, 2008 Posts: 1639 Location: Galveston County, Tx.
Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 5:09 am Post subject:
Walk in with a loose rim/tire flat (off the bike)...usually get charged the half-hour rate which around here would be about $35-$40. Now one time in north Houston I did get charged only the real time it took to do it...about half the half-hour rate. A couple of months later I had another flat and happened to be near that same dealer again. This time I was charged the full half hour rate. I mentioned that I had been only charged for real time on the labor before (which I was surprised about) and the guy looked at me like he thought I was trying to put one over on him.
I said "I see how you are looking at me and doubt what I said, so please look up my last visit here". He looks it up...He says "Yes, you were only charged for the real time it took.....they must of made up most of the difference with the cost of the innertube they sold you". huh?
That sounded about right....I usually bring in my own new innertube that I can usually get for around $10.00 when I shop at my leisure but on this occasion I had to use what they had and I think they charged me right around $20.00 for the tube plus tax and I figured the mechanic that did the work was very fast at tire changing and/or since it was just a flat repair he did not spin balance it. _________________ _________________________________
GONE.......WITH A PUFF OF SMOKE AND A BLUR OF SPOKE........
_______________________________________
Joined: May 08, 2011 Posts: 37 Location: Auckland, New Zealand
Posted: Thu Jul 21, 2011 2:52 pm Post subject:
Russell wrote:
'719frontier719' you didn't tell us if the quote from the bigger shop included swing-arm bushes and a rear wheel bearing set.
this quote didn't include the set. I would have had to purchase the parts myself. This is my first vintage bike, and the only bike I've owned that needed work like this. I suppose I'm accustomed to doing my own maintenance and the low costs associated with doing your own maintenance. So perhaps not unreasonable...but call me cheap
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huh? 
