[frank]

First-I don't have a problem with Honda. They make a lot of fine products and ocassionally "stuff happens". They're agreement to change the "ECMs" and inspect the heads without charge is fair enough. They did this without the lawyers involved.
Second-all the lawyers got for us was a "Two-Year Extended Limited Warranty". What is this worth? Not much. If a 3 year extended warranty on the WHOLE bike costs us costs us $500 , this should be worth about $333. Only problem is that it covers only PART of the bike which cost-wise to repair is probably worth two thirds . So we are going to get - value-wise two thirds of $333 which is $222. While I am greatful to Honda fo this, I HAVE A VERY LARGE PROBLEM WITH THE LAWYERS. For the $222 they are getting for us, THEY ARE GETTING FOR THEMSELVES(AFTER ALL EXPENSES) $ 7,500 FOR EACH ONE OF US REPRESENTED IN THIS SUIT. THIS IS TOTALY O-U-T-R-A-G-E-O-U-S.

WHAT ARE OUR OPTIONS?

A---DO NOTHING AND AGREE TO THIS FIASCO.

B---REMAIN A SETTLEMENT CLASS MEMBER AND OBJECT TO THE SETTLEMENT. READ PAGE 5- PART B PLEASE. We must get a lawyer and object. HERE IS MY PROPASAL---WE OFFER THE LAWYER THE STANDARD ONE THIRD FEE-THAT IS $2,500 FOR HIM AND WE GET THE BALANCE OF $5,000 FOR OURSELVES-THE ONE THAT HAVE SUFFERED THE INCONVENIENCE OF THE PROBLEM. (yes, I still love my bike and am very happy I bought it). ANY DOWNSIDE TO THIS??? NOT TO US- IF THE LAWER DIASGREES , WE ARE STILL IN THE SUIT AND GET THE AWARD. ANY DOWNSIDE TO THE LAWYER? YES-IF ONE THOUSND OF US DROP OUT OF THIS SETTLEMENT HE STAND TO LOOSE $7,500,000. IF HE AGREES, HE STILL MAKES $2,500,000. NOT BAD FOR PROBABLY 2 OR 3 MONTHS WORK.

C---IF THIS DOESN'T WORK, LET US GO TO HONDA AND TELL THEM WE WILL TAKE $5,000 EACH AND DROP THE LAWSUIT. THAT WILL SAVE HONDA $2,500,000.

I AM VERY SERIOUS ABOUT THIS SITUATION-I LIVE ABOUT FOURTY MILES FROM THE LAWYER'S OFFICE (SAUGUS,MA) AND I HAVE A VERY GOOD LAWYER IN TOWN (HAMPTON,NH) WHO RIDES A HONDA- I WOULD BE WILLING TO PRESENT MY LAWYER WITH ONE THOUSAND OR MORE NAMES. I AM SURE I COULD GET HIM TO DO THIS FOR A REASONABLE FEE. IF YOU WANT TO PARTICIPATE, I'LL NEED THE LETTERS BY 3-15-04
THE REST IS UP TO YOU GUYS.
SINCERLY YOURS, FRANK.

PS- IWILL WILL NEED SIGNED LETTERS WITH THE YEAR AND SERIAL NUMBERS OF YOUR BIKE. SEND TO; FRANK CHIARANITARO
5 STOWECROFT DR.
HAMPTON, N.H.03842-1159

 

[wingnutzz]

Not worth my time...

...Everyone to their own, but I'll take the results of the class action. Shoot, I wasn't willing to step up and take any action before, so am not willing to do so now. Maybe Honda stood-up on their own on the ECM, and then again, maybe this suit behind the scenes helped them with that decision. I don't know -- just glad they did it. I have 7 years warranty on the Wing and will take the two extra years on the engine. My guess is that by then I'll have near 200k on the engine, so maybe I (or someone else) will need to take advantage of it.

So, no action by me. I'll just ride my great Gold Wing that makes me a very happy man and enjoy. However, my best wishes to those that want to proceed down another path.

 

[Tiger-Fl]

class action

Sue, Sue, and more Sue.
Is that what America is all about.
Get over it and move on.
Honda has done their best to help us out so move on. :idea:

 

[Guest]

I LOVE to sue :lol:

 

[Mike L]

I just simply appreciate the time and effort Greg Ayala and his friend put into this. The lawsuit was entered a LONG time ago.
This was a very long process. And it's my opinion that Honda would NOT have done a thing without the pressure of legal ramifications. Look at the frame issue, how long did they take to deal with that and look what it took for them to finally act ! We still to this day have a very poor radio/audio system, that vendors have to build filters for. Ya they stepped up to the plate alright, after there arm was twisted. It's all BIG Buisness and Big money, do you think a large corporation is going to spend money if they don't have too ? We all knew about this because of the internet and these BB's. But there are a lot of people out there that are not informed as well as we are. So THANKFULLY ! Someone stepped up to the plate and called them out. My Hat's off to those guys BIG TIME ! :s27: :clap2:

 

[larry31]

Class Action

Just another point of view!

Back in 1985 - 1986 Suzuki designed & sold a great touring bike.
( Cavalcade )
I rode one for 17 years and I had a few "normal" problems over the years. Nothing like he new GL1800 is experiencing.

Last year I finally decided to switch over to the Honda Gold Wing 2002 GL1800. ( First Wing ) I've had several Honda XL 250's, a 1974 CB550 4 cyl.
They were all good bikes and reliable. My gut feeling over the years has been that Honda had it's act together as far as reliability.

I just liked my Cavalcade better. To each his own!

The Cavalcade could not compete with the new 1500 and Suzuki just threw up their hands and stopped competing. Other makes still make a good touring bike but they don't sell anywhere the number that Honda does.

I think it's fair to say Honda really does not have any real competition in the touring market. And they know it!

Maybe this is why the GL1800 has so many reported problems.

Whether you agree with the class action or not this could be a way to get Honda back on track as far as reliability.

I love my 1800 and think I made the right choice BUT I probably got one of the better one's. I feel for the guy's that didn't. If I got one of the Frame or overheating ones I probably would contact the guy I sold my cavalcade to and offer him more than I sold it for to get it back.

I just hope Honda is listening and get's it's act back together.

 

[uneasyrider]

I read it as 1.4 million bucks for the lawyers and $7500 each for the 2 guys who hired them to file the class action suit.

I for one am pleased with my 2 additional years of engine warranty, but I think that the cost to Honda is closer to $30 - 50 per unit if they warranty the entire production of wings. There are lots of warranty companies who would sell a giant engine only policy really cheap.

 

[jiment]

Class Action

Question: my 03 is not in the frame problem VIN list and I have never had an overheat problem (3000 miles), however, if I should have one does this settlement waive my mfg warranty (giving me an extended warranty instead of ECM replacement)... I did not plan on having the ECM changed by my dealer but I am wondering if I should have it done in anticipation of a problem... thanks for any input .... jim

 

[Guest]

My understanding is we get the ECM replacement AND the two-year extended warranty on the engine
(and we have until sometime in '06 to get the ECM replaced at no charge).

What's not to like... :wink:

 

[Jim Mathis]

Haveing the ECM changed out is left to the owners choice. As I read it, we get the two years extended warranty on the engine regardless of weather or not the ECM get's changed out.

 

[bcmc58]

Lawyer and Law suits

It's interesting to me that when the overheating thing hit the Internet, many howled for a law suit. Honda started the service campaign on the ECM voluntarily. It was not a recall. No Gold Wing engines have been damaged by overheating. Now that many have gotten their wish for a suit, some are still not happy. "The lawyers got rich." "The price of my new Wing will go up." "All we got was a couple of years on the warranty." etc, etc. What did they think would happen? What did they expect? And 1.4 million dollars is "chump change" for Honda, if they pay that much. I don't see this settlement as a bad deal, but to me, it was all way overblown by many and this is the result. Big deal!

 

[Mike L]

How do you know that Honda started this ecm recall voluntarily ?

 

[cycledude]

I am very happy with my wing just the way it is. But I am very disgusted with the way blood sucking lawyers are leagally able to molest for thier own outrageous financial gains, and they get plenty of help from the general public. This additional 2 year warranty is nearly useless, it will be a very rare case if anyone ever gets to use this additional warranty. Lawyers do many good things and are needed but this case in my opinion is not one of them. The way I look at this case all the lawers did was line thier pockets and drive up Hondas costs so in the end we consumers loose.

 

[bcmc58]

Lawyer and Law suits

Mike L. and Cycledude,

I know because I was in the Honda offices on many occasions before the thing got to be a big deal on the Net. I have discussed the OH thing with every one from the Senior VP of Sales down to the C/R reps that answer the phones. That's an advantage of being associated with Honda for nearly 20 years. Some folks have accused me of being a "plant" here for Honda. Not so. I have no business connection with Honda since 1999, but my personal contacts are still there in place and have been very accommodating with me on information.

What really screws up things is when people file law suits. That causes a "blanket of secrecy" to be thrown over the free flow of information. Still, there was not much to cover up. Honda realized some bikes were overheating. But most weren't. That caused a delay in recognition of a problem. Dealers were not advised of the problem until Honda was sure there was one. All dealers had to go on was the existing definition of over heating: spewing coolant. Most bikes that showed in the red zone of temperature did not spew coolant and therefore, the dealers denied a problem. When the decision was made to remedy the situation, many dealers did not read their mail or were too busy selling Yamahas or Kawasakis to pay attention. All of this delay got blamed on Honda. Honda's anwer was, change ALL the ECMs under warranty.

It was not uncommon for Honda to increase warranty time in these kinds of cases, although most have been in the auto departments. I really don't see what the customer has "lost" here. In my opinion, the whole deal was way overblown in the first place. As in all of these kinds of issues, we usually only hear the bad stories and not the vast majority of non-issues. This does not mean to say that the issues should not have been discussed here and on other boards. But is should be clear that a vocal minority can create a false or misleading conclusion. I do not question and never did, the complaints of most of the posters on the OH issues. But when others who didn't have the problem start to chime in and throw blame and speculations around, things can get out of hand.

Bottom line for me is .... Those who had the ECM changed out are pretty happy. I had mine done, although I had never overheated. My bike runs better than ever. Will the customers have to pay for the lawyer's fees? I don't think it will affect the price of the Wings in the future. After all, 1.4 million is small change to Honda. We shall see in the future. Meantime, in my opinon, all this has dampened the sales of Wings to the extent that Honda may have a backlog of bikes to sell at discount prices. In that regard, the complants may have benefitted us.

 

[lucky Wilber]

I did overheat and had a lot of small problems with my 01. The overheating was a big problem for me as it used to happen all the time, even in Death Valley on the road to Artist's Palet and going up the mountain in Sequoia in the rain in 60 degree weather.
It took 3 years to correct the problem all the while, Honda denied that there was a problem.

My engine doesnt sound the same as yours. I have some ticks and almost a grinding noise all because of the overheating and bouling over... Honda will do nothing to check the problem.

All that said I am glad to get the extra two years on my Honda extended warranty 2007 and I am going to keep this Wing till then..

I think that when Mr. Honda died everything changed, like values, integrity, honesty, responsibility... The almighty dollar is now the Ruler.. :evil: :x :x w1:

If the lawyers are responsible for this action I sat "Thank you lawyers"

Steve Wilber

 

[loren]

heres my settlement

keep the no value warranty and give me $ 20

sounds fair

loren

 

[Laserman]

The loopholes in the warranty.

I hope you all are keeping your receipts for the oil, filters and fluids you purchased... along with a maintenance record. Cause Honda is going to insist you have them for any major engine warranty work. And then there's the "normal wear and tear" clause, they can sight it at their discretion.

It'll be a cold day in hell when Honda rebuilds an 9 year old engine with 200 grand on it... for free. The will find a loophole. They don't honor their 3 year warranty, what makes you think they'll honor this one. This extended warranty is nothing but smoke.


[/code]

 

[bcmc58]

Honda blame

Lucky,

Please re-read my second paragraph in my above post. That is really what happend and Honda was not trying to hide anything. They just weren't prepared to say anything until they knew the whole story. The biggest mistake I think they made was not telling dealers soon enough so they could advise customers.

With regard to your comment about the company changing after Mr. Honda's death; I met Mr. Honda on two ocassions. He was a very dynamic personality and hard charger. What happened to the company had nothing to do with Mr. Honda's death. What happened is that Mr. Honda built such a great company that it evolved, like all small, successful companies, into a huge monster. Huge monsters need huge care and feeding and old policies and methods don't always do the trick. I can remember when I came to Honda in 1981, they were in the process of evolving and we all had to attend meetings to explain to the old timers at the company what was happening.

It was an inevitable change from a small company, where everyone knew each other and had been there from the beginning, to one that has to hire college kids with high falootin degrees that our modern "Human Resourses" (formerly called Personnel) are forced to hire in order to keep up with the "new" ways of doing business. Honda is big on Affirmative Action because they think it is good. I always thought that hiring the best was a better idea. So, us old folks watched as Honda hired a lot of bean counters and young men and (mostly) women and minorities, instead of doing what is best for the company. I was not a popular person in the Human Resources Dept. at Honda, as you might surmise. I have nothing against anyone who can qualify for a job. But he or she needs to ready to do it and not just because of his or her race or gender.

As far as the lawyers are conserned, they are reactive not pro-active. They don't start fights, they finish them. Please don't blame them for the law suits that have stirred up a bees nest. Others did that.

Actually, the company has gone through some real hard times. In the mid-eighties, Honda Motorcycle Division offered those who had been with the company for many years and were growing older, an early retirement package most couldn't refuse. The program was voluntary, but many took it and Honda lost over 200 of its most senior employees. They never did, to my knowledge, regain those empty spots. I know I had to do more with less in my job. But there are many that have been with the company for 25 or 30 years still there bustin their butts to try to keep us happy out here. Field reps. are ridden hard and hung up wet. I lost over half of my Rider Education staff in the retirement program.

No big company has the control that it had when one man or a few people were running it. So, the actual blame for what the company is now belongs to ........ YOU.... the folks that bought the best motorcycles in the world and made the company what it is today! Nothing stays the same, dammit!

 

[Sandman53]

Gary,

OK if you've had these personal contacts with Honda insiders all these years...WHAT ARE THE '05 GOLDWING UPGRADES GONNA BE?? :lol: :lol:

Gordon

 

[Tom Finch]

To Gary Smith

Gary, yours is the most insightful post I have seen on this board and I am glad to see it. My main lament is that it is burried down in this thread.

I have watched over the years (I have clicked of 67 of them) the various companies go through the life process, birth, adolexcence, maturity, and old age.

When Don Douglas and Bill Boeing did their aircraft, it was a real joy to watch. Look at what Kettering did for the auto industry and Kelly Johnson did for military aircraft.

Honda did that for motorcycles. I think the GL1500 was a pinnacle achievement. When a single strong person is in charge, there is only one way, the right way.

All along the way, there are the bean counters and ivy leagers who always wanted to have thier way, but could not. when Mr. Honda passed on, these pople that had waited in the loft, swooped in to do their thing.

Hopefully, reason will prevail. The GL1500 was a symphony and the 1800 is a brass band. They are both good, and some like a band better than a symphony.

I think we have another problem and that is that the Wing has no real competition. If there were four makers of luxury 6 cylinder bikes, the competition would do a lot in making up for Mr. Honda's absence.

Although BMW at one time made the best bike, and they have made an attempt to compete with the Wing, they are seriously short of the mark. They are advertising their poor quality by their warranty policy as much as Honda is making a strong statement with their 3 year unlimited warranty.

I have a 12 year old Wing with 250,000 miles of trailer pulling to its credit. If it had had a 12 year unlimited warranty, it would have cost Honda nothing. The valve covers have never been off. Yes, it has had a few sets of brakes and one clutch. And I have replaced the wheel bearings and alternator brushes each 100,000 miles Belts at 50,000 along with plugs and air filter. I never check the oil, just change it every 8,000 or 10,000 miles. If it fell in a heap tomorrow, it would still be a good bike, but it won't.. It still looks and runs like new.

Not Rolls Royce nor Cadillac, Mercedes have ever built as reliable a vehicle.

I hope Honda matures gracefully and just as fervently hope the other manufacturers compete more evenly on a similar bike.

I feel that the frame and overheating problems were the result of too much education and not enough practical experience. Hopefully, there will be some grayheads emerge that can bring a mature look back to Honda. That is not to say that there has not been some very innovative and good engineering, because there has. The electronic control of the engine functions has for me been flawless. I have put over 100,000 miles on 1800s and think it is basically a solid machine with ABS brakes, 220 watt headlights, direct drive rear wheel, and Electronic fuel control at the head of the list of improvements over the 1500.

I am very sorry to see this large lawsuit and object to any lawyer getting over $150, per hour for his work on this. I think Honda responded well to the problems and understand the time it took because of the aforementioned extra hands in the kitchen. I can understand the frustration of those who were affected by this. It is nothing compared to the giant piles of Cadillac engines that corroded through the water jacket, and I had to put a new engine in mine with no wear on the engine, just started bleeding to death. It cost me many thousands of dollars, and spoiled my image of Cadillac for ever. My wife's Audy A6 is worse, but that is getting away from the point.

I hope that Wing riders understand as a group that they should not kill the goose that lays the golden egg. I for one, would have a very hard time being satisfied with anything else. In fact, when I got my forst 1500 in late 1990, I was so overwhelmed at the quality and sophistication that I promised myself if anything caused them to stop building the 6 cylinder Wing, I would just buy another one and store it for future use. I still pretty much feel that way.

Thank you again Gary, for your very good post.