EricV
Riding, farkling, riding...
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Well, the correct answer is: It depends. The asking member was from Atlanta, so yes, Scott is correct about the service being something you can do yourself w/o concern for warranty. UK owners have a different situation.scott123007 said:As has been noted on this forum many times before, no, you do not have to go to your dealer to have service performed. You can do it all yourself and keep a log. I can assure you though, if anything goes wrong with your bike that in any way ties in with service you performed (ie. oil related engine failure, cam chain, cam, valve failure, spoke failure, etc) you will have an uphill battle trying to prove you were qualified to do that work enough so to get it covered under warranty.
Now, in regards to US owners and self service, here are a couple of tips to avoid any issue with warranty repairs. Keep all of your receipts. Use the log in the owner's manual and fill it out for every oil change, spark plug change, air filter change, etc. Write every single bit of service you do down, the mileage and date it was done and "owner service". Include the brand and weight of oil you use, the brand of filter, etc. If you keep the bike long enough, take a ruler and make more lines and keep filling it out. Even if you have to move to a new blank page in the owner's manual. (there are several). I do this, and have a tire log too, again in the owner's manual.
When my 98k mile FJR went in for major issues, (still covered by the YES at the time), the warranty claim person at Yamaha requested receipts for my owner service. I could have provided them. Instead, my dealer scanned both my log for service, which included owner service and dealer service for valve checks and warranty work, and my tire log. The repairs were immediately approved with no further mention of my receipts.
Every event is unique. But detailed service records in your owner's manual will never hurt you. FWIW, I did note the brand of car filters I was using, and the Rotella oil, STP, etc. and they never said a word about any of that. I think it was the tire log, with comments about each tire and how it performed, that pushed them over the edge. Apparently they believed that I really did my service because I kept detailed logs.