Minor Electrical Problem and What Do You Get for $89/Hr.?

O.k., so this is my first, non-Introductory post here on VFR World.

I wasn't sure whether to post this in this Forum or over in Maintenance?

Seeing as it might get more coverage, thought (and hopefully feedback), I thought I'd put it up here.

(Moderator, Feel free to move this if it seems most approprate elsewhere)

A few weeks ago I bought a "new" to me '99 VFR in good shape with relatively low mileage (12K) considering its age.

The original evaluation (peformed by a friend in another state who surveyed the bike for me there) was that it was in "really great" shape.

So in the past couple of weeks I've been going over it and making some minor mods and upgrades.

In going over the bike I noticed that the High Beam on one of the Bulbs appeared burned out. "O.k., what fun Top/Front Fairing's gotta come off to get to this...wonder how much a new bulb's going to cost?"

I get the "Top Cowl" off and take the Bulb out...Hmm...looks good. Grab the Multimeter and check the continuity of the filaments. Hmm...good, that's nice, it's NOT a spendy bulb, wonder WHERE in the wiring things aren't working?

I don't have to look far. Starting with the Plug I have to go no further. "Hmm...this doesn't look good, a portion of the Plug is melted/burned!" I check the wiring to the plug and note that someone's effected a "repair" of some sort in the past. There's a portion of the wiring with some solder and tape on it. That's not standard.

I can't really see exactly what happened to the plug. I'm the third owner and I'm guessing that any maintenance chores were done by the original owner. On the phone, the 2nd owner told me that besides having the shop do services on the bike, he'd never touched anything. Also he barely rode it as in the 5 years he had it he only put 1,500 miles on it.

It appears that somehow someone might have pulled the wire OUT of the plug's crimped terminal and somehow tried to reattach it, creating too much resistance and therefore more heat, which melted the plug.

O.k., get a look at the plug...Hmm AMP, o.k. I know of them.

In the 5 minutes or so that I've been checking out the melted connector and wiring I've schooled myself on what I'm looking at here. I can see how the crimp terminals press into the plastic plug body...clever. With small screwdrive in hand I figure out how to release the other 2 (good) Terminals and seperate them from the plug.

This is going to be pretty easy. I'll just run over to the Auto Parts store nearby and buy one of these AMP Plugs in the morning and I'll have this fixed in 10 minutes.

Well, not quite. My "full service" Auto Parts store only has one, cheap pre-assembled plug that will fit. Made in China, it could be made to work, but just coming up with the correct AMP Plug is going to be the best way. It's Sunday, now I've got to wait til Tuesday for the local (big) Honda Shop to be open.

Tuesday rolls around and I'm going to run over to the BIG Honda Shop (Honda, Suzuki, Kawasaki, KTM). I decide I'll speed things up and before going over during Lunch Break, I'll look the Part Number up. I go to one of my bookmarked online pages with the VFR Microfiches and find my wiring diagram. Hmm...there's where my part's going to be part of the Wiring Harness. But wait! There's NO illustration of the Plug as a stand alone part! What?!!

Suddenly I get this sinking feeling. I'm figuring my local "full service" bike dealership is well versed in fixing "little things", things like a burned up wire or melted plug. I mean surely all those Motorcycle Tech Schools that our modern "Technicians" go to to learn to work on today's modern and technically sophisticated machines.

To further shorten matters I get on the phone and call the Parts Dept. of said big bike shop. I describe what I'm looking for. They find the illustration on their PC and say, "Hmm...we dunno! Maybe you'll have to talk w/Service" O.k. so they put me through.

I describe my problem and the best they can do is tell me, "Bring your original plug over. We have a bucket of old/used plugs we've cut off of various bikes. If you're in luck, you'll find it and we'll sell it to you."

With less than my previous level of optimism I head for the bike shop. I get there and go to the small Service Dept. area (you're not allowed anywhere near the actual Service Dept. where the Technicians are, pretty typical these days) Up on the wall there's a big banner that exclaims "Labor Charge-$89/Hr."!

Shortly, an attractive young woman in her 20s shows up. She's the Service Manager. She's already expecting me as she's the one who I'd spoken with who told me they have a bucket.

Hmm...back in the days when I was "around" bikes a lot, Service Managers were usually someone (it could be a woman, but usually not) who WERE a very skilled mechanic, who could look at a problem and have a good idea of what it was, what it would take to fix it, and give you a ballpark estimate, subject to change of course, of what it would cost to repair.

She says to me, "I'll get one of our Technicians, be right back."

Mr. Bike Technician comes in carrying this plastic bucket and hands it to me, "Here, look through this and maybe something like that is in here"

I set the bucket down and hand him the plug, "This is what I need. Don't you ever repair/replace these?" I show him how it works, how it has these nice little snap loks that allow it to open up and expose the crimp terminals. He looks at me like I'd just stepped off my saucer from Mars.

I rummage all through their bucket combing through handfulls of white connectors. Finally I spy a black connector that looks like it has close to the right shape. Viola! There it is...the ONLY one! This one is only set up with two wires/terminals going into it, but it is the SAME Plug body that I'm looking for. It will work!

The Service Mgr says, "Find what you want?" Yep, right here, the ONLY one! "That'll be $5 let me print up the Service paperwork, take it out to Parts". At Parts they print out an invoice and collect my money.

Back at home, this part of the job is completed in less than 5 min. Getting the Fairing back on is more time of course, but not much.

However, reflecting back on all of this, I got thinking, "Gee, what if I'd taken the bike in to them and asked them to fix it. What would have that entailed?" I mean they DIDN'T have the new AMP Plug there, no way to replace it. I question if they even have the knowledge of how to effect this simple fix?

So would that mean they'd be taking my entire bike apart and replacing it with a new Wire Harness? I didn't look the price of that up, but I'm guessing it wouldn't be cheap? And then there's all that highly talented labor, the stuff you're paying $89 an Hour for. How many hours would that take? I'm guessing probably at least 3?

I'm also guessing that plug probably retails for $3-$5 when you can find one.

What are you getting for $89/Hr.?

 

Bloody nice post Bill!
I'm sure that many here feel as you and I do on the subject. The tecnicians today are for the most part, "parts changers". To actually repair something by using creativity and knowledge of mechanical / electrical theory is beyond many of the new generation technicians. There are examples of incredibly talented folks still out there but they are becoming harder to find, if not impossible.

I have a theory about the Service Manager BTW. nuf said.

 

Just for giggles (now that I wrote this) I decided to check and see what it might really have cost?

I checked and sure enough that plug is part of the Wiring Harness, no sub assembly to this part.

It's listed as WIRE HARNESS 32100-MBG-770 and the MSRP is $384.89.

Let's see, assuming my 3 Hrs of Labor is a correct guess (it could be more?) that would run $267.

Throw in "the part" and the total comes to $651.89.

Not bad for an open (broken) wire repair?!!

 

Those sorts of connector parts can be a real bear trying to find. Try these guys;

Wire My Bike