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08 sm450r problem

8K views 99 replies 23 participants last post by  bodgeitt 
#1 ·
I have 120 miles on my 08 sm450r now, It has not been over 8000 RPM or more than half throttle. The bike ran flawless everytime I rode it, I did the first oil change at 74 miles and checked the valves. Sunday I put 50 miles on it and had a great time, I absolutey love this bike. I was going to take it for a short ride on teusday and as soon as I left my driveway I noticed a hesitation when giving it very little throttle, then it would come alive after a second. A mile down the road it started making a knocking noise like somethig came loose in the engine. I drove it back home at like 2000 rpm and called the dealer. It will be brought to the dealer saturday and their husky tech will look at it on teusday.
I didn't realize how much I love this bike until it broke, I don't even want to look at it now because I get sad that I can't ride it.
The noise sounds like it is coming from inside the head or cylinder. It always made a bit of noise when I first started it for about a minute, usually after I gave the throttle a little blip it would go away. I figured it took a moment to pump the oil up to the valves.
All I can do now is hope that the dealer takes care of it pretty quick so I can get it back and ride again. Hopefully I wont have any more problems with it. I almost want to start taking it apart to check that everything looks tight and see if maybe its clogged where the oil is pumped to the valves or something.
If anyone knows where I can get a shop manual for this bike in english, Please let me know
 
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#2 ·
do you have a catch can? if its a KTM hard parts its mounted infront of your rear shock, pull the drain bolt (8mm)
Also, with 7.2 hours on my bike I had 2 8mm allens come loose off the gear on my main shaft, due to someone putting never seize on them :damn:
 
#4 ·
That's a real bummer. Hopefully they get it sorted quick. I have about 3400 miles on mine, and they give off all sorts of valve train noise for the first 30 - 60 secs when cold.

As for the bad noises....Don't take it apart. That is warrenty work. If you start fiddlin, they can give you a real hard time on the warrenty.

Good luck.
 
#5 ·
Yea, I haven't touched it. I'll bring it back tommorrow and hope they take good care of her. I'm starting to scare myself with how dissapointed I can get over a bike, I had so much fun on it the last couple weekends. Now I know why they call it supermoto junkie. My name is seth and I've been addicted to my husky for about two weeks now, I have a problem. At least I'm not alone, right.
 
#9 ·
I dropped it off today, Mike assured me as soon as I walked in that they would get it taken care of right away and told me I am completely covered under warranty. I am definately happy that I bought it at a place that finds it important to keep there customers happy. I explained what happened to the service manager, and talked to him for a while about how fun these bikes are, he said their husky tech will be back from school teusday, He has 2 rebuilds to do and he will get to mine by thursday or friday, it should be taken care of or at least parts ordered by the weekend. Now I wait and hope it doesn't take too long, I already miss her.
 
#12 ·
That same noise in mine was crank bearings, Now my brand new clutch is slipping, I drained all the synthetic and started running reg motorcycle oil to see if that would help, NOPE!!! And now my starter is only working half the time. Its time 4 the Honda650r conversion...
 
#13 ·
Well its been a few weeks now and they still have not diagnosed the bike. Everytime I call, the lady that answers the phone gives me some reason why they have not diagnosed the problem yet and despite my many requests, the service manager has not talked to me once about the bike. Last friday she told me that the problem was in the crankcase so they would have to take the engine apart to diagnose it, it might take a little while. I asked if she meant like a couple weeks and she said they were doing everything they could to make sure it doesn't take that long, when I called yesterday she said that it hadn't been taking apart yet because the service department was getting real busy and the tech didn't want to start it if he couldn't finish it? I am now very upset with motofit and how they are treating this situation. Its going to be in the 80's this weekend and they will only be busier. I am out $7000 and without a bike indefinetely while all I can do is count on a shop that wont evencall me to tell me whats going on with my bike. Next step is attorney, BBB and shop reviews on google etc, although I'd much rather just get my bike back.
 
#14 ·
Man....that stinks. You wanna take it to the top and get Husky North America involved? Mark S Brady is the president of Husqvarna Motorcycles North America LLC (since 2008). I'm sure you could send him a letter via snail mail to his home address explaining your situation and ask for some divine intervention. I looked him up www.whitepages.com, and there is only one in Sharpsburg, GA. :hmmm: It may not seem like the right thing to do, but all it would take is a quick phone call from him, and your problem would "POOF" disappear.
 
#16 ·
I was told that he was working on it all yesterday and he is working on it today, I should get a call tonight with an update? I wasn't aware that it could take 2 days to check inside the crankcase o a simple single cylinder bike? I wish they would just uncrate an 09 and throw the engine on my bike, it is absolute torture seeing all the bikers out today, I'm crying inside.
 
#18 ·
no, They never called me back last week. I called yesterday and was assured that they would call me today by noon, called today and the mechanic was not in so they will give me an update tomorrow. I wish I never purchased from motofit, they were very helpful and responsive until they got my money, now they are obviously not very concerned about keeping me happy.
 
#19 ·
When I called the shop on friday I talked to Colleen and asked for an update, she said that they have been working on checking inside the crankcase but they needed to order a special tool to split the case, she would order it right away and it would be in in a couple weeks so they can continue diagnoses. I pretty much flipped out at her and let her know that the shop is completely incompetent if it takes tem 5 weeks to figure out that they need tools split the case. The only thing that they have done in 5 weeks is check the valves? I told her that because I have had no luck getting the tech to return any phone calls I would show up on saturday to talk to him and let every customer in the store know what they were doing to me.
Later that day the tech, Dave called me to let me know that he had split the case and the crank bearings are bad, new ones should come in a week or two. I am so frusterated with dealing with motofit, They could have diagnosed the bike in a couple days nd gotten it back to me by now, I can't believe I recommended this shop to people. I still am not positive that they are not just feeding me some crap so I will stop calling.
 
#20 ·
I bought my bike there that place is fucking crap i will never bring my bike there to get any work done!!!! No one there has a clue what they are doing or what is going on the customer service there is terrible! I havent even had to deal with them yet for any service and can see they suck right away every time i have been there there is always a pissed customer there! My friend got his starter replaced there and they told him it was under warranty and fixed it then after they fixed it they then found out it wasn't (or so they say)! Then they had the nerve after there fuck up to make him pay for it! He also had the same issue with them never calling back and when he would call no one had a clue what was going on. Your best bet is to get your bike out of there and bring to Rockwell cycles any huskey dealer will do warranty work on your bike if its still under warranty even if you dident buy it there! when did you buy the bike?
 
#22 ·
Thats fu*ked. I Basicly flipped out on them also yesterday. How the hell do you use an excuse that "we dont have the right tool". Your a goddamn husky dealer. You sell and service huskys...

Do me a favor and type somthing up about the service/ your thoughts about Motofit. I am currently having issues also with motofit and am all about sending them a letter about the shitty service that i am recieving. I am thinking about sending a bunch of letters from mulitple people to show them how shitty they are. And i am going to mention that i will tell eveyone that i know (or talk to on here) NOT TO BUY A BIKE OR DO ANYTHING THROUGH MOTOFIT.
 
#23 ·
I bought my bike in march and only had it for 2 weeks beforeit broke. What dealer do you recommend for husky's. I called the one in worcester to see about bringing it there, Jay gave me a husky reps number so I could clear it with them since it already had a warranty order from motofit, after I talked to him motofit called to tell me that the bearings were the problem and they have been ordered. I am still considering talking to an attorney because I would rather buy a bike from a more reliable dealer and get my money back for this one. Who knows when I will finally get it back or how long before it breaks again.
What problems have you guys had with your bikes and how many miles.
The funny thing is if I ended up getting my money back for this bike I would go out and buy another 450/510 the same day.
 
#24 ·
I would recommend rockwell cycles its near west point in Ft. Montgomery, NY they really seem to have good customer service there and all the mechanics really seem to know what there doing and are all very helpful if you have any questions. I got my 510 from motofit in march have almost 800miles on it now and no real issues but my lowbeam on my headlight keeps going out prob just a loose wire but i have a brighter headlight on order so im not worried about it. Also i have noticed a really small amt of oil under where the starter motor is idk if maby it was from me changing the oil or if its a minor leak. I have heard of other people having a bad gasket and having the same issue but im gona have it checked out soon cause if it is a leak the warranty should cover it. Other wise i love the bike so far but im deff not going back to motofit for anything that for sure they are all such ass holes there! Oh yea when i picked up the bike it had no skid plate when i told them they went searching arround for one found it and gave it to me and they made up some bs saying it never came with the hardware to mount it and they would call me right away when it came in well still haven't heard a dam thing!
 
#25 ·
I was able to talk to a husky rep today that is looking into why it took the dealer 6 weeks to diagnose my bike. He seemed like he wanted to help but there is not much he can do for me. The guys name is Jay, he said that he would contact the shop and get back to me. I asked him if my warranty could be extended seeing the bike will end up in the shop a few months out of the 6 month warranty, he told me they could not help me there. I guess I will just have to depend on the lemon law if this thing continues to break down. I am actually considering buying another bike now, while this one is in the shop. Is there a more reliable bike that is comparable to the 450/510.
 
#26 ·
hmm as far as reliable the drzs are good but comparable no... the aprillias are but haven't seen much good posts on reliability on those ... maby a ktm sm haven't heard much about them but they seem pretty good from the little i have heard. From what i have read it seems that the huskeys are pretty reliable for the performance yea they are high maintenance but its worth it. Honestly it just really seems to come down on the dealer you get the bike from and take it to,, as far as i know not many people have had your problem but if you had a good dealer it prob would have been resolved in a week or two, motofit is just bs! They take forever to do anything and have poor customer service.
 
#28 ·
Man....this sucks. My bike (3977 miles) decided it was done, and now I have a EFI warning light (neutral light is blink, blink, constant, blink, blink, constant). I really don't want my bike to go to motofit. Next closest dealer is...

Rockwell Cycles
1005 Rt. 9 West
10928 - Highland Hills (NY) - USA
tel: 845 446 3834 fax: 845 446 3425

or

Fox Powersports
5637 State Route 5
13350 - Herkimer (NY) - USA
tel: 315 866 1200 fax: 315 866 1588

or

Wagner Motor Sports
700 Plantation St.
1605 - Worcester (MA) - USA
tel: 508 854 1377 fax: 508 852 6940

I have heard great things about Town & Country Cycle Center, but they are a serious haul for me.

115 Route 23 N
7419 - Hamburg (NJ) - USA
tel: 973 875 2111 fax: 973 875 8968

Oh well....we will see what happens.:headshake
 
#29 ·
That sucks man. Does it still run? Definitely do not take it to motofit. Jay, the husky rep called me back yesterday after he ha talked to motofit, he said that the part they were waiting on is a flywheel puller. He is expediting it from Italy and it should be here in 3 to5 days, I guess that means motofit basically just lied to me about having the bearing ordered, they have not even diagnosed the problem yet. I appreciate the recommendations for other shops
 
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